#Positively Stressed - Week 4
I told my family that I was going to start writing about stress and wanted to hear their thoughts. My mother told me, “Just make sure not to send us back to Prohibition.” I promised her that would not be my intent, but that I would need to talk about alcohol consumption and its complicated relationship with stress.
On the one hand, you have Hollywood to Madison Ave and even William Shakespeare and Ancient Greco-Romans telling us having a drink will reduce your stress. On the other hand, doctors are constantly telling us “any amount of alcohol is too much”.
So what is the real deal?
Studies published with the NIH – even into the 2010’s – showed that doctors were attempting to figure out the relationship between stress and alcohol. From what I have found, there may be some benefits in the short term for some people some of the time. But even that isn’t definitive. (See article in comments below).
~HOWEVER~
There are three significant factors that should be considered against drinking alcohol: dependency-induced stress, consequence-related stress, and cancer risks.
Anyone who has known an alcoholic – especially one who has tried to quit – has likely seen the physical and emotional stress caused by alcohol. As hopefully we were all taught in health class back in high school, the physical consumption of alcohol changes the body’s chemical balances to create a new equilibrium with the alcohol added into the mix. By withdrawing what the body recognizes as a “normal” substance (the alcohol), the body attempts to recreate the same equilibrium – which it fails to accomplish. This is what creates the physical “withdrawal” symptoms. Added to that if there were any emotional stressors that were being depressed by the alcohol (PTSD, anxiety, etc.), those emotional stressors will no longer be depressed but will likely rise back to the surface.
The consequence-related stresses are any stressors that come as a result of actions while intoxicated – with family and friends or even with law enforcement and the court system. I won’t go further into that one today.
The last is increased #cancer risks – particularly Mouth, Throat, Laryngeal, Esophageal, Breast, Liver, and Colo-Rectal cancers. As someone who went through cancer treatment, I can tell you first-hand that cancer treatment causes additional physical, emotional, familial, and psychological stresses. How does alcohol increase cancer risks? Alcohol metabolizes into destructive metabolites, increases inflammation through oxidation, changes hormone levels, and it absorbs other carcinogens which are then more easily absorbed by the body. (See HHS article in the comments below).
Even knowing all of this, I will still probably go to a Super Bowl party with my family and have a beer – and bring a 4-pack of my favorite Root Beer!
By: Stephen Delcuze, Esq. - Found on LinkedIn here.
