Whenever we talk about social
evils, I am pretty sure alcohol would definitely be in everybody’s top 10 at
least. There is nobody here that does not know that alcohol is bad for health.
It can lead to serious diseases such as liver failure, sometimes kidney failure
also. Young people who start drinking are always warned that they are going to
spoil their health, fall sick, and get into accidents and what not! It is
supposed to scare them off of the drinking habit. I have a new bit of
information that might actually succeed in scaring such people if at all, they
care about having a fulfilling life.
This is to all you people
having regular drink sessions with your buddies, knocking back more than a few
as a regular party custom or having more than four drinks a day to “relieve”
yourself from your daily stressful lives . I have news for you, soon, hangovers
and liver failure is going to sound very pleasant when the alcohol you consume
actually starts affecting the most important organ of your body – the brain!!
ALCOHOL AND THE BRAIN
Anybody who has seen a drunken
person cannot argue with the opinion that the consumption of alcohol seriously
impairs the brain functions. Slurred speech, wobbling stance, unable to
articulate thoughts properly are the normal indicators of a heavily drunk
person. Some people even have blackouts when they consume more than 5 drinks in
2 hours (men) and 4 drinks in 2 hours (women).
Hangovers, blackouts or severe
headache that occurs the day after the drinking episode are just small time
effects of alcohol on one’s brain activity.
Our brain functions as the
central information and command center of our body by constantly obtaining
information on everything we come into contact, storing them and using them
later to help us make decisions, recall incidents , etc. These are called as
the cognitive functions of the brain. A bigger explanation on them has been
given in the “Stereotype” article. Now, these functions are enabled by the help
of a set of chemicals called neurotransmitters. They carry the information
around and deliver them wherever and whenever needed. Alcohol affects the brain
functions by altering the levels of neurotransmitters, so that important
messages involving thought processes, emotions and behavior do not get delivered
to the sense organs. In layman terms, your brain functions but does not co
ordinate with your sensory organs making it impossible for you to express
yourself, form a coherent thought and take decisions even about small things
like which door to use for exiting!! Imagine how difficult your life would
become then, not only for you but for your family too!
LONG TERM EFFECTS
The above stated effects are
about the short-term effect of alcohol on brain. So what happens when you
continue drinking daily at a rate of 5 drinks per day? Each and every part of
your brain gets affected, resulting in a great impact on your memory-related faculties,
co ordination abilities and also other organ related diseases. We all know that
liver, the organ that is responsible for breaking down alcohol into smaller
substances, is the worst affected by it. But, brain cells are now being
considered as being affected as much as liver does in the long run. While you
can undergo liver transplant to restore your body to normal conditions, growing
brain cells or restoring functions is a very lengthy and often an unsuccessful
process.
Cognitive thinking
The
white matter in our brain, responsible for cognitive functions and transmission
of messages to cognitive areas, are also highly damaged due to prolonged
consumption of alcohol. Loss of memory, slowed thinking, impaired problem
solving and decision making are especially vulnerable to damage caused by
alcohol consumption, because it disrupts white matter connections to the
cerebral cortex and deep brain structures necessary for these mental functions.
Brain Shrinkage
Long-term
drinking can leave permanent damage, causing the brain to shrink and leading to
deficiencies in the fibers (nerve like structures) that carry information
between brain cells. Many alcoholics develop a condition called Wernicke-Korsakoff syndrome,
which is caused by a deficiency of thiamine (a B vitamin type). This deficiency
occurs because alcohol interferes with the way the body absorbs B vitamins.
People with Wernicke-Korsakoff syndrome experience mental confusion and lack of
coordination, and they may also have memory and learning problems. Alcohol
makes it very difficult for the body to absorb Vitamin B, hence people who
consume it on a daily basis have high risks of being affected by mental
illnesses such as memory problems, anxiety, depression, schizophrenic
disorders, etc.
EFFECTS ON MEMORY
Our
brain stores information about a multitude of things, hence our memory is
divided into three main categories based on the type of information stored, for
easy understanding and analysis. They are explicit memory, implicit memory and
work-process memory.
Explicit memory is responsible for recalling incidents
and information that require conscious effort such as the time and venue of a
party(episodic memory), or a person’s name(semantic memory). Alcohol severely
impairs episodic encoding making it difficult to retrieve recently learnt
information also, while due to alcohol’s effect on the Central Nervous System,
semantic memory is also hampered because the storage and consolidation of the
information retrieved is restricted by the effect of alcohol. Again in layman
terms, your brain might store information in episodic memory but make it
difficult to retrieve it while semantic memory elements such as name of a
person, age , relation might not get stored at all with the continuous drinking
habit.
Implicit and work-process
memory are both types of
procedural memory , i.e., they store information required to perform tasks that
are done on a daily basis, like driving a car, tying your shoe laces. While
this memory is not affected much by alcohol, poor recall ability caused by the
effects of alcohol on other brain areas, a person might forget or be unable to
obey certain stimuli responses while doing these tasks, like balancing oneself
while tying the lace, or being careful on speed blocks while driving, etc.
Bottom line
I
know it is a very long article infested with what people like to call, science
mumbo-jumbo or crazy psych talk, but I would just like to call the attention of
the people who indulge in drinking habits on a daily basis to a few simple
facts :
1.
You might not have any big physical illness due to your alcohol consumption,
but you cannot save your brain being affected by it. Your brain starts
shrinking, nerve ends start being less sensitive after 2-4 weeks of regular
alcohol consumption.
2.
Liver failure looks and sounds very serious but there is an immediate cure for
it, using today’s advance techniques in the field of medicine while it would
take at least 7-8 months for your brain to be restored to its normal function
after you give up alcohol completely.
3.Falling
sick physically can be handled, coped by a lot of people but mental illness
does not affect the patient alone, it has a long standing effect on the
patient’s family, friends, society.
So,
if you are young and having fun with drinking, kindly know your limits and
consider giving up alcohol, if you plan on living a happy and fulfilling life.
For people, who are well past the fun stage and are into the addiction phase of
the habit, please contact your local doctor to start your treatment and avoid
any lasting damage to the brain and other vital organs.
-Wanna-be-Savant
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