Alcohol & Health
Treatment
Helping Alcoholics
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Medically Reviewed by Dr P. E. Pancoast, MD
Reducing or quitting alcohol can improve your well-being in many ways.
The benefits of cutting out alcohol for 30 days include:
Anyone can benefit from an alcohol-free month.
There are no negatives of going alcohol-free for a month for most people, besides making some minor adjustments to your social life and exchanging your alcoholic beverage for water at happy hour.
If someone has an addiction, they should not suddenly go without alcohol. They need professional detox to guide them through withdrawal and face the consequences caused by withdrawal. If you start to get shaky and tremorous from not drinking alcohol every 4 to 5 hours, you definitely need professional detox.
Here’s what can happen if you don’t drink alcohol for a month:
Abstaining from alcohol will help you get a better night’s sleep and wake up feeling refreshed.
Although 15 to 28 percent of people use alcohol to help them sleep, it reduces the quality and quantity of rest. Alcohol can disrupt the two most essential parts of our sleep:
Most light to moderate drinkers who reduce their alcohol intake or stop drinking altogether will see the quality of their sleep improve relatively quickly.
People who give up alcohol are likely to experience the appearance of a slimmer face and torso as a result of less bloating caused by alcohol.
Alcohol is an inflammatory substance that causes swelling in the body.
This inflammation is worsened by the things often mixed with alcohol, such as sugary and carbonated liquids, resulting in gas, discomfort, and more bloating.
People who give up alcohol, even temporarily, may lose weight. Alcohol contributes to weight gain by reducing the speed of the body’s metabolism.
When the metabolism is slower, the body breaks down alcohol first, so fats and sugars burn off slower.
Plus, alcohol also carries almost the same number of calories as pure fat, at seven per gram.
Drinking also lowers inhibitions and can make some people more prone to snacking. While sober, it’s easier to maintain a strict diet.
Going alcohol-free can help you improve your mental health.
Although many people use alcohol to cope with stress and anxiety, evidence shows that alcohol is more likely to worsen anxiety. Going off alcohol can contribute to lower anxiety levels.
When our blood alcohol content increases, we become more emotionally unstable as we experience impairments to memory and comprehension.
This emotional instability makes managing stress while intoxicated even more challenging than it already is when we are clear-headed.
Alcohol alters the chemistry of the brain and can make anxiety worse. Chronic alcohol use is also a contributing factor to developing panic disorder.
Going booze-free can elevate your energy levels.
Drinking depletes your supply of B vitamins (which are crucial for sustained energy).
Like most nutrients, the B vitamins don't only have one purpose, so you may notice an impact on both your energy and focus with alcohol consumption.
Alcohol is dehydrating, so going without alcohol will allow your body to absorb water better and help you stay better hydrated.
Alcohol is a diuretic that causes your body to remove fluids from your blood at a much quicker rate than other liquids.
Your body has a hormone called vasopressin that helps your body reabsorb water passed through the kidneys.
When you drink alcohol, your body produces less vasopressin, which means less water is reabsorbed and it is expelled as urine.
Since you’re not reabsorbing water as much as you usually would, you end up getting dehydrated.
Abstaining from drinking means that you will no longer suffer from hangovers. Instead of nausea, headaches, or tiredness, you will feel more energized and productive.
Going without alcohol helps your skin recover from the dehydrating effects of the substance, which gives it an unhealthy color and texture.
Some drinkers have also reported that curbing their drinking has cleared their eczema.
Giving up drinking offers many positive health benefits and reduces the risk of adverse consequences associated with long-term alcohol consumption.
Giving up drinking lowers your risk of developing the following:
During the first week of going alcohol-free, you may not notice much of a difference.
It can take days before you feel back to normal after heavy drinking. During this time, the body is repairing itself from harm caused by the alcohol.
Bouncing back from drinking includes ridding the body of alcohol, catching up on sleep, and cutting out other bad habits which may have coincided.
You might start to notice some positive side effects after stopping drinking for just a few days, including less bloating and some slight weight loss due to the hefty calorific content of many alcoholic drinks.
But it usually takes at least two weeks of consistently not drinking to notice results, assuming all other factors stay the same.
Going without drinking will also help users understand their drinking habits better and build a healthier relationship with alcohol.
“Dry January” is when many people voluntarily stop drinking alcohol for all of January.
The goal of Dry January is to start the new year on a sober, clearer, more refreshed, and healthy note.
It can also help you answer the question, "am I an alcoholic?"
Dry January started in 2012 as an initiative by a British charity, to help people “ditch the hangover, reduce the waistline and save some serious money by giving up alcohol for 31 days.”
Millions of people now participate in the challenge.
The growing awareness comes as recent studies have found no evidence that light drinking might help keep people healthy. Drinking more than five drinks weekly on average can take years off a person’s life.
Approximately 82 percent of participants of Dry January felt a sense of achievement after successfully going a month alcohol-free.
For some people, it may be safe to drink alcohol moderately with occasional breaks.
On the other hand, some people should consider quitting drinking permanently rather than temporarily.
Quitting alcohol is strongly advised for people who:
Anyone who feels that they have an alcohol addiction should also consider quitting drinking.
Common signs of alcohol addiction include the presence of any of these symptoms within the last year:
Another sign of alcohol addiction is experiencing withdrawal symptoms, which include:
If you experience even one of these withdrawal symptoms, you should contact a medical professional to help you safely detox from alcohol.
Speak with a doctor first before you reduce or quit alcohol.
A doctor can give you medical advice based on your health, create a withdrawal plan, and help you prepare for withdrawal symptoms.
The best way to safely detox from alcohol is to receive inpatient care at a licensed rehabilitation facility, where you can receive on-call medical care to support you as you go through alcohol withdrawal.
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