How Alcohol Affects Your Gut Health & Ways To Help

As anyone who has ever consumed one—or two—too many adult bevy’s knows, overindulging can result in many physical and mental health effects. Nausea and vomiting with a hangover are signs the alcohol isn’t sitting well in your tummy. If you experience digestive symptoms when you drink, learn more about how alcohol can throw your GI microbiome off balance.

Alcohol Effects on your Gut

To understand how to restore your gut health after drinking alcohol, it helps to know how drinking impacts the delicate balance of bacteria in your gut microbiome. These billions of organisms have dedicated bodily functions but can make us ill if we develop too many "bad" bacteria that can make us sick. These are some telltale signs alcohol has affected your gastrointestinal tract.

Bloating

As an inflammatory substance, alcohol causes cells in your body to swell, including GI cells. Drinking also dehydrates, making bloating worse as they desperately try to hold onto all possible moisture.

Nausea

Alcohol has a few effects causing nausea and vomiting. These unpleasant symptoms can result from gastritis, which occurs when the inflammation described above affects the stomach lining. Your body may react to the presence of toxins by vomiting.

Trouble in the Bathroom

You might feel constipated after heavy drinking. Alcohol makes your bowels move more slowly, which means your stomach and intestine contents take longer to pass through. Many women also experience urinary tract infections, yeast infections, and related symptoms associated with overindulging in alcohol.

Inflammation

Over time, the inflammatory effects of alcohol on your GI system can cause the linings of your stomach and intestines to break down, becoming  more permeable. This condition, called "leaky gut syndrome," allows food particles to pass into your bloodstream, creating even more inflammation and symptoms like cramps, bloating and gas.

How to Help Relieve Your Symptoms

Keeping your gut healthy and consuming alcohol in moderation can help reduce the effects of drinking on your GI system. Here are a few tricks to try.

Dry February 

The idea of dry February was originally an initiative of the Canadian Cancer Society. When you abstain from alcohol for a month, you give your body and your gut a chance to recover. A study published by the British Medical Journal found a month without drinking resulted in weight loss and lower blood sugar and blood pressure for participants.

If you want to go further to improve your gut health, try avoiding sugar and alcohol during dry February. Too much sugar in your diet can contribute to GI upset.¹

Eat Your Probiotics

Probiotics help replenish the good bacteria in your gut, bringing your body back into balance. This reduces symptoms like chronic bloating and weight gain that can occur with frequent social drinking. Harvard Health reports taking probiotics also helps with diarrhea and constipation. In addition to taking probiotics in capsule form, you can get these good bacteria from fermented foods such as tempeh, yogurt and kimchi.

Do a Full Body Cleanse to Flush the Toxins

Detoxify products cleanse toxins like alcohol from your system safely, using your body’s own natural processes. If you notice telltale signs of alcohol's effects on your gut health, such as nausea, vomiting, bloating, and constipation, we recommend the 10-Day Reset to bring your GI tract back to balance.

The journey to wellness starts with a five-day supply of Polisorb. Its natural ingredient, silicon dioxide, binds to bacteria, alcohol, and toxins to carry these harmful particles out of the body. For the second half of the cleanse, Ever Clean will bring back your energy, boost your metabolism and reduce your unpleasant GI symptoms by replenishing lost nutrients and hydration.

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Anti-Inflammatory Supplements 

You can take further steps to reduce disease-causing inflammation with natural supplements. Some of the best anti-inflammatory ingredients to incorporate into your diet include curcumin, fish oil, garlic, ginger, green tea, spirulina, vitamin D, and vitamin C.²

In addition to supplementing with nutrients that reduce inflammation, eating a variety of different types of foods supports a healthy diet. Strive to try fruits, veggies, whole grains, low-fat dairy, and other items to get a full spectrum of vitamins and minerals.³ These items also contain prebiotics, which encourages the growth of probiotics. Emphasize antioxidant-rich, high-fiber foods such as raspberries and other berries, beans and legumes, apples, bananas, broccoli, green peas and artichokes for optimal gut health.

You don't have to struggle with alcohol-related GI symptoms. These tips can help you maintain good gut health and avoid complications. If you don't notice a difference even after taking steps to improve your health, talk to your doctor about whether an underlying issue such as food intolerance or an autoimmune condition could be causing your GI problems.

REFERENCES

1https://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/8/5/e020673

2https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/6-anti-inflammatory-supplements

3https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/325293#probiotics-and-fermented-foods