Is alcohol good if you can have some then how much can you have are they

healthy is it a no no? I'll explain coming right up

Hey I'm doctor Ekberg with Wellness For Life and if you'd like to truly master

health by understanding how the body really works make sure you subscribe and

hit that notification bell so that you don't miss anything. A lot of patients

ask me if they can drink when they're on a nutrition program, so I wanted to share

with you some of my opinions about alcohol. First of all I'd really like to

emphasize that this is not okay I'm not saying that alcohol is alright but I

want to say that if you're going to drink I think that there are certain

things that you want to think about so that you minimize the detrimental

effects of alcohol so first of all alcohol is a result of fermentation so

alcohol is not a poison per se it's not like aspartame or sucralose or arsenic

or plutonium those are poisons there is no purpose there is no place for them in

the body alcohol however is a natural product that's a result of fermentation

and as a result we have something in the liver called alcohol dehydrogenase we

have an enzyme that can break down alcohol and turn it into useable

substances however in nature that happens very very small amounts and when

we drink an alcoholic beverage we're drinking something that has been

amplified it has been increased tremendously and therefore if we drink a

lot then it becomes a burden on the liver so the alcohol dehydrogenase that

we have it's made to take care of small amounts of alcohol like we have in

fermentation of sauerkraut or yogurt or kombucha but when we make alcohol and we

distill it now there's a lot more and the liver has to work really really

hard and it takes the place of other work that the liver has to do plus it

also depletes certain B vitamins if we drink we should drink in moderation

so the things that we get from alcohol from alcoholic drinks is first of all of

course alcohol but then there can be other things along side so we might get

grain we might get gluten we might get starches we might get sugar high

fructose corn syrup artificial colors artificial flavors artificial sweeteners

even so we want to learn which drinks have what so that if we want to have a

little bit of alcohol then we avoid as much as possible of the other things

that are in there so if we have a beer for example that is I happen to like the

flavor of beer but I don't drink beer because it has so many bad things for us

as alcohol it has grain it has gluten and it has partially digested starches

so this is like a triple quadruple whammy on the body and there's nothing

good about it if we have a mixed drink it is guaranteed to have large amounts

of sugar or high fructose corn syrup if you have a margarita in a restaurant God

knows what's in that mix that they give you there's some artificial colors and

flavors and high-fructose corn syrup and on and on and on so if you drink you

want to avoid all the things that are grain that is beer you don't avoid

anything sugary because a lot of these drinks like Cointreau or Grand Marnier or

the sweet the course or the flavored vodkas they're gonna have tremendous

amounts of sugar added man-made sugar in them so if you're gonna drink

I would suggest drink something natual something that has been fermented

and aged and has interacted with wood that there's a certain culture around it

maybe dry wine white or red dry wine the sweet wines are gonna have sugar the

dry wines are going to have very little sugar 2 3 4 grams maybe per glass or

maybe even better vodka whiskey gin cognac has zero sugar in them because

they're distilled so they have some flavors they have flavors from oak they

have flavors from whatever they interacted with or however they're

developed and cultured but they have no added sugar and if you can make a mixed

drink you can make it with Zevia so you can have some of your the the mixed

drinks that you enjoy but use Zevia which is a soft drink sweetened only

with stevia it has no coloring it has no flavoring nothing artificial in there it

is clear so it looks kind of funny if you get a Coke or an orange soda or

something because there's no color in it but that's a good thing so if you get a

drink I would also suggest that you have no more than one to two drinks per day

and that you also make sure that you have at least two days a week that are

clean days where you don't drink at all this would lessen the burden on your

body and make it more easy for your for your liver and your body to to cope with

this so don't drink because you heard that there's some health benefit to it

the possible health benefit from drinking is that you relax when you

drink and your body heals better when you drink then when you're stressed but

you can also accomplish those things with relaxation exercises and meditation

and so forth if you're going to drink make sure that you really enjoy it and

that you like the flavor and that you do it for the

right reasons if it's a good wine with some food or if it's a nice social

gathering or some interaction then I think it's okay again this is my opinion

and this these recommendations would be for someone who is reasonably healthy if

you're trying to recover from something that's a different story if you're

trying to recover from a digestive disorder or from some kind of liver

issue or from some hormonal issue or a thyroid problem then I would say that

the less that you have the better so in some future videos I'll probably try to

come up with some recipes and show you how to make maybe a margarita or some

mixed drinks with Zevia that would give you basically zero sugar that are

still very very good drinks please share this content this these videos are for

people to learn more about the body these things that we all need to know if

you're going to drink don't drink beer it is probably the worst thing out there

it's up there with donuts and if you enjoy this sort of content make sure

that you subscribe and you hit that notification bell so that we can keep

this content coming your way thanks for watching