Drugs and Alcohol “ Friend or Foe

March 07,2013

...In fact, alcohol and drugs, when used in moderation and as intended, can offer the user tremendous benefits. Let's take a look at the benefits...

To most people who aren't addicted to drugs or alcohol, or have not been involved with drug rehab, drinking alcohol or taking a pill is something we do without a second thought, not considering the possibility of becoming dependent on the drug. In fact, alcohol and drugs, when used in moderation and as intended, can offer the user tremendous benefits. Let's take a look at the benefits:

Drugs can generally remove pain from your day. Yet drugs as benign as aspirin can be both beneficial and dangerous. Headache? Take an aspirin. Allergic to aspirin? Take an ibuprofen. Both offer great help in relieving the headache, right? But what if you take an overdose? Yes, you can overdose on aspirin or ibuprofen. The consequences? Ibuprofen can damage, sometimes irreversibly, your liver, and from there, other internal organs, like your kidney. Aspirin? In large quantities, it can cause ringing in the ears, dizziness, seizures, and a coma. Other drugs, of course, can be far more deadly, even if they have some redeeming qualities.

Alcohol can calm you down, and some alcohol offers you the benefit of increased antioxidants, relieved stress and tension, and lowered inhibitions. But there is a large downside, of course. When you drink to excess, you not only lose perspective, good sense, and reason, you can damage your liver, and kidneys, your heart, your brain, and worst of all, you can become addicted to it. This can lead to the future decision of joining an alcohol rehab program.

The most innocent of mind-altering drugs, one of which alcohol is, can be dangerous when used excessively. We'll focus on alcohol for a bit here, leaving drugs for another article.

What is alcohol? Alcohol is created when yeast, which is a living organism, consumes and excretes carbohydrates. So far, it sounds disgusting. We know this process as fermentation. When fruits are fermented, we generally see the result as cider, wine, or vinegar. When cereals, such as wheat, rye, or barley are fermented, the result is generally beer, gin, or rye. Potatoes, as you know, can make for some great vodka.

Some of the benefits of alcohol are present only when small amounts of alcohol are ingested. These include flavonoids and phenolic substances in wine, which help the body repair cell damage which, in turn, helps protect us from aging, cancer, and heart disease. Alcohol can also help reduce or stop blood clots, since it acts as a blood thinner. Alcohol reduces the œbad cholesterol, and increases the œgood cholesterol. Alcohol reduces blood pressure, which helps to prevent heart attacks, stroke, and heart disease.

Now, the tougher part. What are the things alcohol can do to harm you? We can start with the rapidity of the uptake, or assimilation of the alcohol into your system and to your brain. The effects of alcohol can be felt almost instantly. The alcohol then goes to the liver for metabolizing. When the liver receives the alcohol, it must put its normal handling of metabolizing fats on hold, and focus on the alcohol. Since the rate of management is about 1/2 ounce an hour, the effect is like a 5-car pileup on the turnpike “ everything gets backed up. While this is happening, the liver lets fat deposits accumulate, which in turn slows down the normal production rate of the liver. When suffering from the absence of fat processing, the liver actually becomes malnourished. After a prolonged period of time of excessive intake of alcohol, which includes weekend binging, cirrhosis of the liver develops. What this means is that the infected cells are now being replaced with scar tissue, which causes the liver to harden. Alcohol can increase your risk of certain types of cancer. Alcohol can damage your heart. Alcohol can impair your ability to judge time and distance, which leads to one of the leading causes of death in this country, drinking and driving. Mix alcohol with drugs, and you might ingest a lethal cocktail.

Let's move on to what you can see with your own two eyes. You'll get fatter because your body will store the alcohol as fat. This is only part of your weight gain, because alcohol will also bring about an increased appetite.

What's the answer? It's actually pretty simple. If you drink, do so in moderation. That means one drink is fine, two is the limit. Saving up and drinking all of it at once (binge drinking) is not going to help. Of course, by the time you realize you've damaged your body in a terrible way, it's too late to turn it around. The best thing to do is to stop drinking totally, and if you can't, then limit drinking to a glass a day.

Be smart. Be focused on good health. YOLO “ make it count!

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For over ten years, Florida Center for Recovery has offered a wide array of comprehensive treatment programs and services to those in need. Offering a unique blend of traditional and holistic methods, we provide our patients with the opportunity to develop life-management skills, relapse prevention techniques, and a better understanding of drug abuse and its harmful effects. Our treatment programs at Florida Center for Recovery are based on several components that are essential for every successful recovery:

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MARK KILLAR

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