How Drugs and Alcohol Fool You

Alcohol is a trickster. It fools your brain and your body in all kinds of ways. And people who have developed problem drinking and drug use often fool themselves that they’re just fine, until it’s gone too far. 

Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) literature calls alcohol “cunning, baffling, powerful.” You see alcohol everywhere. You can’t go to a restaurant or even walk down the street without passing a liquor store. Around $6-8 billion dollars is spent per year on alcohol advertising, with $2 billion of it in the US. It looks glamorous, sophisticated, fun.  

We don’t always trust ads, but even the news publishes all kinds of stories about “studies” that say things like drinking red wine is good for your heart, or beer is good for your stomach. But don’t be fooled by these either, comprehensive research has disproved them all. 

The scientific truth is that no amount of alcohol is good for someone or safe for overall health.

Alcohol is a toxin and any supposed health benefit is far outweighed by the damage it does to the brain and body. The alcohol in beer, wine and liquor is ethanol, which is used in gasoline. 

The negative effects of alcohol pour gas on a wide range of health issues. Alcohol actually contributes to heart disease, and it disrupts your stomach (there’s a reason why people throw up when they’ve had too much to drink). Drinking ethanol leads to malnutrition, interferes with metabolism and the immune system, and is even linked to several forms of cancer. The toxins of alcohol are processed in the liver, damage is common. 

Where alcohol really does the damage is in your brain. Even the smallest amount does it. 

Drinking alcohol seems to reduce stress and increases feelings of happiness and well-being, but it also makes you feel bad. Alcohol actually lowers the volume of the brain’s gray matter, regions of the brain where information is processed and decisions are made. Alcohol contributes to early onset dementia. You literally drink to forget. When people don’t remember what happened last night when they binged on alcohol, it’s because alcohol has shut down the part of the brain that makes memories.

“Hangxiety” is a real thing – it’s not just the day after. Those intoxicating moments lead to longer and lasting anxiety, depression and a host of other mental health issues as alcohol affects your brain’s vital processes. Alcohol dehydrates you. Your brain is 73% water. That hangover headache is your brain telling you it’s been hurt. 

What’s making you feel relaxed and feel good while drinking is how alcohol inhibits an important neurotransmitter called gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA), which calms the central nervous system and reduces stress. Alcohol has that same effect, but when it’s gone, the come down is harder. Your body isn’t naturally making GABA the way it needs to. 

Drugs and alcohol trick your brain in all kinds of ways and your brain stops producing the neurochemicals it needs. They hijack the brain’s rewards center where neurochemicals like dopamine are produced. When the alcohol is gone, you feel bad and you start craving more. When you don’t feel normal without drinking or drugs, you’ve passed from use and misuse into abuse and addiction. When you can’t stop drinking despite negative consequences in your life, you’re in that danger zone and need help.

People with substance use disorders commonly fool themselves and deny that they have a problem. They do it to the people closest to them when they express concern. Concealing drinking is a huge red flag of addiction. Heavy drinkers and drug users surround themselves with people who drink and use at high levels too, they’re known as enablers. It can seem like you’re just like everyone else, but your drinking buddies aren’t drinking like the rest of people. The majority of alcohol is consumed by just 10% of the population and nearly 40% of Americans just don’t drink at all.

The good news is that the effects of alcohol on the brain begin to fade after stopping drinking and people begin to start thinking clearly. There can be withdrawal symptoms, discomfort, and bad feelings at first. Professional support from an addiction treatment program helps with therapy and also medications where necessary. 

But, without alcohol damaging the areas of your body and brain that keep you from sleeping and regulating your mood, in just 30 days people start sleeping better, find more energy, have better emotional regulation, and begin doing things that make them feel good naturally.

Affect’s digital recovery program speeds that process along and helps people get control of their drinking and drug use as they build new habits. Our system of rewards is based in neuroscience and it activates the brain’s reward center to take the place of those highs, and you don’t get the lows that follow.

Since alcohol is everywhere, it can’t be avoided. The way to get back control and keep it is to get into recovery where you break your addiction by managing the things that make you want to drink. Exploring the issues under those triggers with understanding counselors disarms them. You stop fooling yourself and start growing as an authentic person. Honesty and accountability is one of the greatest gifts of real recovery, it leads to a happier and healthier life where we have real control.

With all the lies and tricks, there is nothing more powerful than being able to quit drinking. One of the biggest ways people fool themselves is by thinking they can’t quit. But, millions of people in recovery show the truth – recovery is possible and it’s beautiful.

“Beauty is truth, truth beauty,—that is all. Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.” – John Keats