How Does Alcohol Get Metabolized?

Alcohol is immediately absorbed because enzymes break it down before it even hits the stomach. It gets converted into acetaldehyde. The enzyme that is responsible for that is called alcohol dehydrogenase. Acetaldehyde can travel many places in the body, including the smallest capillaries. The liver has a series of micro capillaries, which acetaldehyde can enter and encompass the entire liver. When you drink alcohol, the liver prioritizes getting that out of the body, and slows down other processes.

How to Choose High Quality Alcohol

The government allows 74 different additives to wine, including fillers, chemicals, and sugar, sulfites, and PH balancers. It’s kind of like adding additives to meat instead of it being natural. Wine has a shocking level of arsenic do to the pesticides sprayed on the grapes, as well as a lack of filtration and not allowing the wine to mature like it should. Also, selecting a grape with the right PH and extending the fermentation will prevent you from needing to use additives. In order to get rid of the toxins and have more antioxidants in the wine, look for biodynamic, or organic wine. Sometimes wine companies don’t want to go through the organic certification process, but they still may be organic.

How to Naturally Cure a Hangover

What is a hangover?

The hangover typically consists of anything that’s significant enough to impair or disrupt your daily routine, cognitive function, and the ability to make intelligent decisions. These disruptors can include headaches, a poor sense of  well being, constipation or diarrhea, fatigue, sleepiness, nausea, and dizziness.

How do you get a hangover?

Most people think it’s do to dehydration. This plays a role, but your pituitary gland produces something called anti-diuretic hormone (ADH), which increases blood pressure by causing your body to retain water. When you drink alcohol, your pituitary gland makes less ADH, so you lose more water. However, as soon as your drink wears off, ADH production is once again increased which causes a rebound of fluid retention. Your kidneys also produce more of an enzyme called renin, and a hormone called aldosterone, which results in formation of a substance known as vasopressin. which increases your blood pressure. Also, cortisol works with the hormone aldosterone to balance electrolyte levels. When you have a hangover, you produce more cortisol, which contributes to more fluid retention and blood glucose disregulation. Also, as mentioned above, when alcohol gets broken down into acetaldehyde, this causes increased production of tiny blood vessel constrictors called thromboxanes. These cause blood platelets to stick together, and decrease your natural killer cells, which suppresses the immune system. Lastly, most alcohols contain something called congeners, which also significantly contribute to hangover symptoms. These are free radicals and positively charged molecules that can disrupt your PH balance and increase your inflammation levels.

How to naturally cure a hangover

These supplements can be useful before and after drinking. Look for whole food supplements for best results.

NAC-

This is an altered form of the amino acid cysteine, which is commonly found in food and synthesized by the body. NAC helps the body synthesize glutathione, an important antioxidant. NAC protects the liver from the effects of exposure to several toxic chemicals, including the toxins acquired from alcohol.
Dosage: 1,000–1,500 mg per day.

Vitamin C-

Research shows that vitamins C acts as an antioxidant force to counter acetaldehyde-produced free radicals, helping to protect against long-term damage.
Dosage: 500–1,000 mg per day of vitamin C; 400 IU of vitamin E.

Vitamin B6-

There are several nutrients that work synergistically with NAC and vitamin C. Vitamin B6 is a key sulfur-containing nutrient that may be depleted by alcohol and may help with acetaldehyde detoxification. Vitamin B6 has been proven to further enhance the ability of the combination of cysteine plus vitamin C to prevent hangovers.
Dosage: 300 mg per day of B6.