Most know the classic problems that come from alcohol abuse like mental confusion and liver problems, but drinking damages every part of the human body. There are all types of alcoholic drinking, if you think you or a loved one has an alcohol problem, it’s best to seek treatment before alcohol’s consequences take an irreversible toll.
Let’s learn 5 of the biggest ways drinking in excess can damage your body including the worst types of symptoms and what can be done to bring an alcoholic back to good health. Alcohol can touch every part of your body but there is a way out.
How Does Alcohol Work?
You drink alcohol, you feel its effects, but why? Alcohol causes a sudden abnormal release of neurotransmitters like GABA, dopamine, and serotonin. The flood of these brain signals make you giddy, lets you drop your guard, and causes all the effects felt by someone who drinks alcohol. Alcohol travels through your brain and in your bloodstream, which is why abuse causes such widespread damage.
How Alcohol Abuse Can Damage Your Brain
When most think of alcohols affect on the body, they think of abuse to the liver, but alcohol abuse starts in the brain. Abusing alcohol causes an excessive release of neurotransmitters which makes the alcoholic feel good for a spell but causes damage to the natural pathways that your brain signals travel through.
After continued abuse, the brain becomes used to the flood of transmitters and will become dependent on alcohol to operate. A chemically dependent brain is a brain gone haywire. It has trouble regulating emotion, memory, and can change how your body handles daily processes.
The strain drinkingt to treat either when you’re abusing alcohol.
How Alcohol Abuse Can Damage Your Heart
Drinking is terrible for your ticker. It causes high blood pressure, rapid or irregular heartbeat, stroke, cardiomyopathy, heart attack, anemia, and much more. According to the World Health Organization, 593,000 people died of alcoholism-related cardiovascular issues in 2016.
How Alcohol Abuse Can Damage Your Liver
Your liver filters toxins but alcohol abuse can overwhelm your liver’s natural processes and cause severe issues. Drinking causes inflammation, fatty liver, liver cancer, alcoholic hepatitis, and scarring known as cirrhosis. Failure to abstain from alcohol can cause death from liver disease.
How Alcohol Abuse Can Damage Your GI
Alcohol is corrosive and will slowly wear down the lining in your throat and the rest of your gastrointestinal tract. The abuse in your GI system can cause ulcers, excess stomach acid, and can reduce your body’s ability to properly absorb vitamins and minerals. The damage resulting from alcohol abuse can make you much more susceptible to the colon, esophageal, stomach, and other forms of cancer.
How Alcohol Abuse Can Damage Your Nervous System
Wernicke-Korsakoff Syndrome, more commonly known as ‘wet brain,’ is the result of alcohol’s effects on your central nervous system (CNS.) Caused by low levels of vitamin B1 associated with alcohol abuse, wet brain can cause confusion, learning problems, and memory loss.
Like Alzheimer’s, wet brain causes holes in your brain which is why wet brain mirrors the symptoms of Alzheimer’s and dementia. Your CNS is further affected by liver problems which can lead to anxiety, depression, trouble sleeping, and changes in mood. There is not much you can do once wet brain symptoms start except mitigate its progression by stopping.
Other Ways Alcohol Abuse Can Damage Your Body
We got into detail on five major ways alcohol abuse punishes the body, but that’s not where the abuse ends. Consuming too much alcohol can also lead to incurable pancreatitis, calcium imbalances that lead to bone loss, issues from dehydration, eye problems for alcoholic diabetics and much more. A large quantity of alcohol certainly impacts your brain and liver but can spread to every cell in your body.
Alcohol Withdrawal
Alcohol abuse is dangerous even when you quit drinking. Alcoholics should be very careful when quitting alcohol since alcohol withdrawal can lead to irregular heartbeat and seizures. Anyone that’s chemically dependent on alcohol should check into a certified detox facility for a safe and comfortable detox process. Can you Reverse Alcohol Abuse?
The good news is most consequences from drinking can be reversed by abstaining from alcohol. Though it depends on the history of abuse abstaining from alcohol will allow the brain to repair its pathways, your liver to return to normal function, and your heart to become stronger. The longer your drinking continues the more likely certain damage is irreversible.
Alcohol Addiction Treatment
If you are abusing alcohol and in danger of suffering its brutal effects, it’s best to seek treatment. A professional alcohol addiction treatment center can guide an alcoholic through the steps of alcohol treatment from a professional monitored detox to aftercare and follow ups.
Doctors and addiction professionals use a combination of medical and drug treatment, counseling, education, health and diet lessons. They also use much more to properly get someone off alcohol.
Don’t wait another day while you or a loved one wastes away from chronic alcohol abuse. Call a certified counselor today and get the help you or a loved one deserves.
