Ever wonder why you’re not losing weight even after you’ve cleaned your diet and exercised more? Alcohol can be a huge factor in your weight gain or prevent weight loss. Sugar and carbohydrates can get into your system and become stored fat, but alcohol can do far worse for the body.
Alcohol contains what we call “empty” calories or calories that contain no nutritional value and is likely to turn into fat. Going grocery shopping, you can read nutritional labels on the back of the food packets. Most alcoholic beverages don’t have this nutritional label. You are not able to see the contents of alcohol, you don’t know how many sugars, fat, and other ingredients in your alcoholic drink.
You might think, how can you possibly remove alcohol from your diet? Well, you don’t. Not completely that is. People need to eat healthy, exercise and lessen vices to be at optimum health. Note that I said lessen. Vices such as cigarettes and harmful drugs should be completely removed from your lifestyle, but alcohol can be limited. There are people that would drink a glass of wine every night to help them relax and there are some people that go out with friends and binge on alcohol. You might say that the first person drink every day while the other drinks once a week. The difference with these two people is their consumption. The first person may drink everyday, but they drink one glass while the other drinks once a week of about a carton of beer. The amount you intake matters, a small amount of wine a day is good for your body. It can help improve your heart and help with free radicals. While a carton of beer can have multiple negative effects on the body, such as liver damage, dehydration and of course weight gain. Let’s discuss further the cause of weight gain from alcohol. Below are the reasons why alcohol can make you fat.
The Caloric Content of Alcohol
Let’s just say that you’re drinking a glass of wine that contains about 110 calories. Not bad right? A 110 calories isn’t much to add to your daily calorie intake, but what if you take in about 4 glasses of wine? Wine is one of the healthiest alcoholic beverage out there, but the caloric intake of one glass can pack a punch. A bottle of beer can go up to 300 calories and a shot of tequila can go up to a hundred calories. Light beers may contain lower calories than its original counterpart, but drinking a few of these can still add on the calories. You can cut down your calorie intake by adding more ice to your drink or adding in diet soda. This will increase the amount you intake without adding on calories.
The Components of Your Drink
Aside from the calorie contents of your drink. Consider the other components such as carbohydrates, proteins, sugar and more in your alcoholic drink. Now, consider the fruit juices, grenadine syrups, cream and lime liqueur that goes into your cocktails. All these add-ins add more calories to your drink.
How the Body Stores Alcohol
Alcohol contains a lot carbohydrates. The body converts protein to improve muscle and carbohydrates are converted into sugar that is most likely to turn into stored fat. Fat in adipose cells takes up more space than muscle fiber. This is why, you and your lean friend are in the same weight range, but are in two completely waist line charts.
Appetite Stimulant
Centuries ago, doctors will prescribe alcohol to the elderly to increase their appetite. Alcohol increases the body’s need to crave food and increase hunger pangs. If you succumb to your cravings, your body, then converts most of the food you intake during intoxication as surplus. This surplus is then turned into stored fat. Alcohol also slows down digestion and metabolism. The food that you intake with alcohol are harder to digest and most likely to accompany your weight gain.
To end this, alcohol isn’t just carbs or sugar. Alcohol can do far worse in your body. It can slow down your system, decrease metabolism, cause hydration and more. Keep tabs of how much alcohol you consume, especially when you’re trying to lose weight. Alcohol is also one of the leading causes of an expanded waistline. If you really want to fit into your new jeans, try cutting down on the booze.
