I Can’t Drink Now Like I Used to a Few Years Ago (26M), is that Normal?
During college and a few years after (maybe til 23/24) I drank almost weekly and don’t get drunk that easily. In terms of beers, maybe I get tipsy at about 6 and give up at 10.
But now, I drink 2 and I get tipsy, and maybe tap out at 4/5.
Is that normal?
It’s fairly normal to suddenly find hangovers are a big problem as we get older… it feels like one day you’re able to go out, knock back a hideous amount of booze, then bounce back the next day ready to do it all over again… and all of a sudden those two pints of beer create the hangover from hell.
Not sure about tolerance though. What country are you in… is it easy / cost effective to get a liver test done? It might be down to lots of perfectly natural factors… if you lost weight; if you have a different diet (some foods ‘soak up’ alcohol better than others and cause it to be absorbed more gradually, if you’re drinking on a salad instead of say, pasta you’ll see a difference); you could be drinnking different beers.
Also, if you’ve had significant weight gain, this causes your liver to get fatty, which puts a strain on it; I’m not a medical professional but would think that could have an effect too.
Just an aside:
Fatty liver disease is so associated with alcoholism that it’s the default!
the other term is non-alcoholic fatty liver disease :)
Both come from an overabundance of carbohydrates in the diet. Alcohol is converted very efficiently into blood glucose which is interesting. Before diabetes became super common, most people only got their excess carbohydrates from drinking.
/End aside
Interesting, thanks. My mum has it (FLD), but she rarely drinks, just quite overweight unfortunately (cue the mum jokes lol). My dad has a condition I call ‘microliver’, he went through years and years of blood tests then liver biopses before a surgeon opened him up for something more than a core sample… and in his words “laughed at how small the liver was”. He gets drunk exceptionally quickly!
So genetically I’m double-fucked. Starting to get the same ‘weird’ gamma GT levels in my blood tests and being told I’m an alcoholic (as my dad did for 2 decades in the air force before they discovered what’s up), I do drink but prob about once a fortnight. I’m much taller than him though so maybe I just have a miniliver instead of a microliver :)
If you’re worried about developing fatty liver disease, you might want to look at a ketogenic diet. But I don’t want to get preachy, I’m happy to give you more information if you want it.
Reducing the carbohydrate load, reduces the amount of visceral fat stored in organs, which makes the liver more performant and healthier.
I am in a constant struggle atm to lose weight. Am 6’ tall, but 94kg so definitely technically overweight (and it’s fat, not muscle, do they make bras for men? Cause I’ve got hairy tits right now).
You’re right, last time I cut down on carbs combined with drinking green tea the weight melted off (though I was also doing a lot of pushups daily which also helped). cries in love of pasta
I’m a big advocate for the ketogenic diet (when followed correctly), but even just cutting down carbs is a great way to reduce weight and lower your A1C. Cutting down sugars from a typical diet can lead to withdrawals that are almost as bad as cutting smoking. We eat too much sugar as a species.
Am in the final stages of buying a house (hopefully), landlord evicted me over repairs so I’m temporarily living with my dad… he’s a bit of a feeder, I did make the point to him last night that if he puts food on a plate in front of me I’m going to eat it (brought up to eat everything I was given, ‘starving kids in Africa’ etc) and he agreed he’d stop offering me food all the time. I’ll defo make an effort to eat more protein & less carbs, thanks for the headsup!
Going keto can be hard. But you can try eating clean keto for two meals, and then having a normal carb meal socially. That limits your carbohydrate intake to a small window per day. Your body processes it out of your system and three or four hours. So most of the day your body’s working in keto.
It’s hard to do, because you’re constantly going to be craving, but it’s more socially acceptable especially when you’re living with a feeder.
I really like metrics, so I got a keto mojo, and I can measure my blood ketone levels everyday. Helps me stay on track. If you like data that might be an option for you
Some great tips there, very much appreciated. I’m fairly ignorant re keto so will do some reading up on it, if you have any resources to hand I’d be interested to read them
“Yo momma so fat she has fatty liver disease” just doesn’t hit the same.
hahahaha. Yeah it’s a bit too on the nose.
I did gain about 15 to 20kg.
I should just tone down on drinking.
I’d say that’s significant. Your liver is probably kinda creaking under the combined strain.
Have a serious think about your drinking, as if you are actually alcoholic / addicted then it could be harmful to go cold turkey instead of reducing gradually. I know from experience it’s really hard to say no especially if your social life revolves around pubs / bars & clubs. But it’s certainly not impossible, you’ve got this.