This is an Alcohol Drinker's Organs After 1 Drink

Well , you might be surprised , because with each sip , a cascade of changes begin in your organs almost instantly the heart , the liver , the brain , none are spared . In today's video , we're going to be breaking down the science of exactly what happens to an alcohol drinker's organs after just one drink .

Believe me , once you see the full picture here , you're going to rethink that casual glass of wine or beer . So , drink in moderation . This is the slogan that society bombards us with from a young age . Nowadays we have a new one drink responsibly . I don't know who came up with that one .

So presumably this is something nice , something pleasurable , but only if you consume it in moderate quantities , say , a couple of drinks . But is all this really so ? Let's take the best-case scenario Somebody who has just one drink and then can put down the glass and , without fail , say no more . Is this person really doing something responsible ?

Well , by the time you're finished watching this video , the answer will be plain as day . Not just that , to even ask the question in the first place will seem completely ridiculous . Now , before we get into this , I want to clarify that each person's body will react very differently to a unit of alcohol .

For the purposes of this video , we'll be dealing , by definition , with a very light drinker , somebody who drinks no more than one glass at a time . This person's body will react in certain aspects completely the opposite to somebody who's a heavy drinker , for example in terms of blood pressure and heart rate .

But even among the light drinkers there will be massive variations Due , for example , to sex , body mass , the presence of certain enzymes , the bull down to genetics , and so on . So with that big disclaimer out of the way , let's get right into it .

So already in the 1950s , scientists understood that there is no threshold value for alcohol impairing cognitive and psychomotor performance , and the primary area that they first looked into , and the one that receives the most attention to this day , is alcohol's effect on driving ability , which you can then break down into subcomponents like reaction time , coordination , etc .

So very early on , they found that there is no amount that you can drink , no matter how small , and fire on all cylinders . It is just not possible . As a society we've basically looked the other way . For example , we have set legal blood alcohol concentration limits for driving .

We say that if you have blood alcohol levels above 0.08% we will consider you drunk driving . That's the equivalent to three or four drinks . If we catch you above that , then we're simply going to punish you . But this is just a convention . If you actually test people in very strict conditions , there is no lower limit .

After the very first drink their performance starts to decline . Now one of the most extensive reviews of the scientific literature commissioned in 1998 by the US Department of Transportation concluded that quote . On the basis of present results , it can be asserted that BACs of 0.03% or less are sufficient to affect skills relevant to driving . That's basically one drink .

The review recommended dramatically lowering the legal BAC for driving , something which never happened . The driving impairment can be traced to specific cognitive deficits that form after just one or two drinks . These include visually detecting an object , tracking it and divided attention , or multitasking as we call it nowadays .

After the second drink , everything goes downhill fast Reaction times , hand-eye coordination , hand-steadiness , body balance , you name it . The relationship between alcohol consumption , heart rate and blood pressure is complex . At high doses , alcohol increases heart rate , and this increase is seen consistently up to 24 hours after consumption .

High doses also decrease blood pressure for the first 12 hours , but then increase it after that . One lone drink of alcohol doesn't appear to be enough to have any effect on blood pressure . It is enough , however , to bring about an increase in heart rate , and this can last for up to 6 hours .

So people with pre-existing heart conditions or blood pressure problems may be more susceptible to this increase . After the throat and esophagus , the alcoholic drink that we consume will then make its way to the stomach . Just one drink is enough to increase the incidence and duration of acid reflux episodes .

This is when the contents of the stomach flow back up towards the esophagus . One drink of a fermented alcoholic beverage like wine , beer or champagne will also be enough to increase the secretion of gastric acids . Now , if these effects are severe enough , they can lead to heartburn . This can last from a few minutes to several hours .

A complicating factor is that alcohol can also stimulate appetite and lead to overeating , particularly on low nutritional value foods . Often it will make you crave total junk food . This will only aggravate your gastrointestinal system further . One drink will also lead to an increase in so-called gastric motility , meaning that you will tend to go to the bathroom more .

Multiple drinks , however , often have the opposite effect . The liver is responsible for metabolizing , or breaking down , the large majority of the alcohol that we consume .

One fascinating thing about alcohol metabolism is that it's linear , in other words , the liver breaks down alcohol in the same way and at the same rate , regardless of how many drinks that we've had . So it doesn't matter if you've had one beer or ten . The liver will work in the same way and at a predetermined pace .

And sadly , the way the liver works is by using an enzyme called ADH . This removes hydrogen atoms from the alcohol molecule , converting it to a highly toxic molecule known as acetaldehyde . As bad as ethanol is , it pales in comparison to acetaldehyde .

I think most people don't realize that that being drunk is actually a poison-induced disruption in the way that your neural circuits work .

This means that it likes to interact and destroy more or less every cell that it comes into contact with . There is absolutely no safe lower limit of aceteldohide . Every single molecule is damaging your health . Most of the aceteldohide that is produced in the liver will stay in the liver .

Every little escapes into general circulation , meaning that out of your entire body , the liver will bear the brunt of that one drink far more than any other organ . Over time , this one innocent drink can have a catastrophic effect on the liver , which brings us to the next point .

So we looked into some of the ways that just a single , one-off drink will impact your body . But of course nobody will ever have just one drink and then never touch the stuff again .

People drink in patterns and many problem drinkers kid themselves that by clinging onto the idea that one day they'll be able to drink responsibly or become so-called light drinkers they think wouldn't that be great ?

Wouldn't it just be fantastic to be a normal drinker , become a light drinker , then indulge in that one glass of wine alongside my pasta and then put the bottle away for the rest of the day . Well , here's the thing . There are two problems with this .

The first and obvious one is that if you are a heavy drinker , then drinking in moderation is a strategy that is pretty much proven to fail 100% at the time . Listen , the only solution is to stop drinking completely , and if you're a regular viewer of the channel , you'll probably understand that well .

But the second problem is that even low consumption of alcohol can have negative , even disastrous , effects on your body over the long term . A few years in 2018 , we got this comprehensive review published in the Lancet . It was the result of a massive collaboration involving more than 500 researchers from all over the world .

The review used literally hundreds of data sources and studies to calculate the long term health effects of various levels of drinking . According to one of the senior study authors , the main conclusion was that the quote safest level of drinking is non .

She noted that these results conflict with most health guidelines , which espouse health benefits associated with consuming up to two drinks per day . Another author explained that quote . Previous studies have found a protective effect of alcohol on some conditions , but we found that the combined health risks associated with alcohol increase with any amount of alcohol .

The review added that older studies which found some health protective effects of low alcohol consumption , notably on the cardiovascular system , typically suffered from various limitations , including small sample sizes . This is down mostly to the fact that the risk of certain types of cancers goes up if you have just one glass a day .

Another comprehensive 2015 study that looked at cancer specifically found that light drinking increases the risk of developing the following types of cancer the Malfun Farynx by 13% . The Oesophagus by 26% . The Galbladder by 23% . The Small Intestine by 5% . Melanoma by 11% . Breast Cancer by far the most common cancer in women 4% . And let's not joke around here .

This is pretty depressing stuff . Now I have saved the best thing for last . So what is the big secret of alcohol ? What is it that explains everything that we've talked about so far today ? The one overarching , timeless and ultra-multrable truth about booze is that manufacturers never want to talk about it . It is nothing other than a poison .

All alcohol is is a toxic substance that , when you put it into your body , it metabolizes into even more harmful toxins and , unlike other poisons which have very specific modes

of action . Alcohol is a very special kind of poison because it literally destroys cells and tissues in a million different ways . You see , ethanol is a small water soluble molecule that can easily cross cell membranes and travel through the bloodstream . From there it spreads rapidly throughout the body and attacks more or less every single organ .

So next time somebody tells you that just having one drink is good , I want you to be able to look them in the eye and say this if one drink of alcohol is good for you , then surely 100 must be amazing . Thanks for checking out the Stop Drinking podcast by SoberClear .

If you want to learn more about how we work with people to help them stop drinking effortlessly , then make sure to visit wwwsoberclearcom .