Alcohol's Effects on Waistline

[Rommie]

An interesting article here- link

Basically it seems that if you do moderate drinking (ie one drink a day for women, two for men) you actually gain less weight then those who don't drink at all when you look at the increase in calories as people tend to eat more fatty foods etc (ie who eats salad with a beer). It likely has something to do with how alcohol makes your metabolism kick into high gear a little bit.

Anyway kinda an interesting read. What I found interesting was how they said women consume about 350 calories a day extra on days they drink, and I find that's about right for me based on a calorie-counting app I have.

[Hap]

Yeah, being diabetic, I knew that alcohol can actually lower blood sugar, and it is recommended not to drink if you don't have some food with it.

[geonuc]

(ie who eats salad with a beer)

Me?

[SciFi Chick]

Well, when I mentioned that part of the reason I was taking a break was because of my waist line, it was a combination of things.

One - I was definitely having more than one drink a day, so lots of calories strictly from alcohol.
Two - I wouldn't work out as hard, because you're not supposed to drink after an intense workout.
Three - I wasn't drinking nearly enough water, and that's really important when trying to lose weight. Now that I'm not busy drinking alcohol, I'm drinking water like there's no tomorrow, in between the non-alcoholic beers. Also, non-alcoholic beer is way lower in calories than normal beer, and it doesn't dehydrate me. It's almost like drinking water.

Now, I'm really finding all sorts of fascinating changes since I quit drinking. As an example, I used to blame stuff on alcohol that really wasn't alcohol. I'd have a glass of wine and think it was hitting me really hard. Today, I felt that way and I didn't have anything to drink and I was like, "Huh. So I was just tired all that time."