Interestingly, my taste-buds became heightened after I cut out booze. The reason, says gastroenterologist Dr Alan Desmond, is that alcohol reduces our ability to taste food, causing a craving for salty, sugary foods to quell the limitations in our palate. As for my gut health, he couldn’t have put it more plainly.
Ethanol, says Dr Desmond, worsens heartburn and compromises the intestinal barrier (the cells that line the gut), causing what’s known as “leaky gut”, which in the long term drives inflammation, a known driver of disease. “Just two or three alcoholic drinks a day boosts bowel cancer by 25 per cent, according to a peer-reviewed study from 2020,” he warns. The good news is that within a few days, a healthy appetite and enjoyment of healthy nutritious food resumes. While inflammation and the gut microbes can recover within weeks, depending on what you feed them, Dr Desmond recommends a plant-rich diet void of ultra-processed foods.
What happens to your brain
Alas, the brain is slower to respond. “Our brain-imaging work at Amen Clinics shows that heavy drinkers tend to have decreased blood flow to the brain. Low blood flow is associated with lack of focus, brain fog, depression and increased risk of memory loss and Alzheimer’s disease.
Research shows that drinking just one or two glasses of wine per day has been linked to atrophy in the hippocampus, an area of the brain involved in memory and learning. Drinking too much also decreases the generation of new brain cells, according to studies,” Dr Amen explains.
With a nugget of encouragement, he adds: “When we compare SPECT scans of the brain before and after heavy drinking, we can see remarkable improvements after just two months of not drinking, provided it’s in conjunction with healthy lifestyle changes,” concluding: “Giving up alcohol will likely lead to enhancements in brain function after one month. This will continue to improve at three months, six months and ongoing.”
An alcohol-free future?
Looking back at the pivotal decision I made last May, when I promised myself I’d go alcohol-free until my 50th birthday in December, I had no idea whether I’d stick with it after the fact.
I didn’t. I had three glasses of champagne at my 50th dinner party, not because I missed alcohol but because I was curious. Curious as to whether I could dip in and out; a glass here and there on special occasions. I decided I could and went on to have a glass of wine with dinner over the Christmas break, only to resume my alcohol-free ways once Dry January got under way.
I haven’t sworn off alcohol altogether and may decide to toast the next big occasion with a glass of the good stuff, but for the foreseeable future I’ll be living life sober. Alcohol has been a good friend to me, but a toxic one that I no longer need to boost my mood or lower anxiety. I have real friends for that, and we laugh until our sides hurt, whether I’m drinking or not.