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Please donate today to help us save, support, and change lives. Saying something like, “Well, that’s my one drink for the night,” might help your loved one remember their own limit. If you’re having a hard time shifting your focus from internal to external, consider the quality of your inner self-talk. Dissect and challenge those worries with more realistic thoughts.

Be sure to use a standard drink calculator to accurately record the number of drinks you’re consuming. This journal can also track times when you’re more likely to drink, as well as times when you do a better job of moderating your drinking. Per government guidelines, https://ecosoberhouse.com/ a standard drink contains about 14 grams of pure alcohol, and this amount can be found in 12 ounces of regular beer, 5 ounces of wine and 1.5 ounces of distilled spirits. Use the standard drink calculator here to determine how many drinks you’re really having.

Recognizing the Signs of Binge Drinking

While you can’t control how other adults handle alcohol, if you’re the parent of a teen who binges, you’ll want to take action. Alcohol use can have life-long effects on developing brains and bodies. Teens who drink are also more likely to struggle with school, use other risky substances, or experience alcohol poisoning.

• You may begin to binge drink more often, the days you abstain between sessions becoming fewer.
• Binge drinking isn’t necessarily an indicator that you or a loved one has alcohol use disorder (also known as alcoholism), which is a dependency on alcohol consumption.
• One recent study by researchers at the University of California at San Francisco found that 21 binge drinking sessions over seven weeks was enough to cause symptoms of early stage liver disease in mice.
• With personal commitment and professional support, you can make important lifestyle changes and develop a healthy relationship with food.
• It’s often easier to turn down a drink when you don’t have to do it alone.
• Digestive problems and liver disease are also potential long-term health risks that binge drinkers face.

Drinking heavily can have an impact on your physical and mental health in both the short and long-term. More frequent binge drinking, though, is more likely to lead to long-term damage. In addition to increasing the risk of injury, binge drinking impairs the body’s ability to heal from those injuries. A single night of binge drinking has a number of other effects, especially at higher amounts. Or by depressing the gag reflex, which puts a person who has passed out at risk of choking on their own vomit.

Binge Drinking: What It Is And What You Can Do

Additionally, anyone who feels they are not able to gain control of their drinking might consider the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration National Helpline. Your Care Team will recommend a combination of prescribed medication, alcohol therapy, and community support to get you from where you are to where you want to be. By Sarah Bence, OTR/L

Sarah Bence, OTR/L, is an occupational therapist and freelance writer. She specializes in a variety of health topics including mental health, dementia, celiac disease, and endometriosis.

Although people commonly binge drink at ages 18-34, it can happen at any age. “Because the blood level of the alcohol becomes much higher with binge drinking, you’re much more exposed to the acute toxicity of alcohol,” Dr. Streem explains. But both alcoholism and binge drinking can have similar health consequences.

Helping Someone with a Drug Addiction

Consider if you should avoid situations where heavy drinking is involved or limit your time with friends or places where binge drinking behavior is likely to take place. It’s easy to fall into the trap of peer pressure, regardless of your age group. If you’re around people who are excessively drinking, you’re more likely to be pressured to continue drinking, too. As binge drinking involves consuming significantly higher amounts of alcohol, the health impact can be more severe. Another common and more immediate effect of binge drinking is alcohol poisoning.

That way, you will have healthy food in the house and be less tempted to reach for binge foods. Intuitive eating is also linked to better psychological health. People who eat intuitively are less likely to have depression, low self-esteem, or body dissatisfaction.

What Causes Binge Drinking?

Recognizing the negative consequences of binge drinking, it is essential to address and overcome this harmful behaviour. Once you’ve cut back on your drinking (so you’re at or below the recommended guidelines), examine your drinking habits regularly to see if you’re maintaining this level of drinking. Some people attain their goal only to find that old habits crop up again later. Binge eating disorder (BED) is a serious condition that often requires counseling and treatment by a licensed mental health professional. Mindfulness meditation, in particular, is a helpful tool for combating binge eating.

Alcohol temporarily messes with your brain’s levels of feel-good hormones like serotonin, causing some people to feel on-edge or jittery as the booze leaves their system, per the Cleveland Clinic. At the same time, feeling anxious can cause physical symptoms like heart palpitations or chest tightness, headache, or queasiness—all things that can be made worse by drinking. Other types of therapy used to treat binge eating include dialectical behavioral therapy, interpersonal psychotherapy, and behavioral weight loss therapy (37). Starting each day off with a healthy breakfast might reduce the risk of binge eating later in the day. Another study in 84 women found that pairing cognitive behavioral therapy with regular exercise was significantly more effective at reducing the frequency of binge eating than therapy alone (20). Binge drinking can be described as drinking too much alcohol in a short time.

Social Anxiety

Fortunately, binge drinking can be treated with holistic methods including community support, specialized alcohol therapy, and prescription medication to stop drinking. At Monument, we’ve brought all of these tools online so you can make progress on your own terms, and own time. There are many cultural factors at play in binge drinking, and it can be difficult to change a behavioral pattern that society expects, even if those behaviors are objectively not good for your health. Start by talking to your loved ones or a healthcare provider openly about the effects of your drinking, and try to dig deeper into why you are binge drinking in the first place.

It’s always wise to check with your doctor — she should be able to help you decide whether it is best for you to cut back or to abstain. People who are dependent on alcohol, or have other medical or mental health problems, should stop drinking completely. Try to get at least eight hours of sleep a night to reduce the risk of late-night binge eating. Doing nighttime yoga can also help relax the mind and promote good sleep. Meal planning can help to regulate your eating and prevent binging. Take time each week to plan what you will eat each day and shop accordingly.

Binge Drinking Prevention

The truth is other people are usually far less focused on you than you believe. It might seem convenient when you have company over, but it also makes it easier to reach for multiple drinks while you’re alone. If you do end up storing alcohol at home, keep in the back of the fridge or in the basement—somewhere out of immediate sight. It’s easy for teens and young adults who aren’t sure how much alcohol they can handle to go past their limits. Even older adults can overestimate their tolerance and wind up drinking far more than they can handle.

• Dissect and challenge those worries with more realistic thoughts.
• The CDC defines a binge-drinking episode as at least four drinks for women or five drinks for men within a two-hour period.
• Instead of cooking daily meals, consider preparing several dishes at once.
• If drinking in moderation is a suitable option for you, a counselor or therapist can work with you to help you set drinking goals.