THE SCIENCE OF ALCOHOL

Turning to Alcohol After a Hard Day? Try These 3 Ways to Unwind Instead

Changing how you transition at the end of the day can turn you from stressed to relaxed.

I sure did look forward to uncorking that chilled bottle of wine the minute I walked through the door after a killer day.

It was almost an automatic response.

I was a single mom raising two boys with all the responsibilities that go along with it.

Those who have custody have been through it, so you understand.

The wine appeared to be the perfect answer to wind down after a hectic day.

Sound familiar? I’m sure you’ve had those days, too.

However, using alcohol doesn’t relieve the stress. It may seem that way at first— but you’re only temporarily numbing yourself.

Keep this up day after day, and you may develop an alcohol dependency. Perhaps, like me — you already had.

Unfortunately, I never learned how to manage my stress during those years. I did keep it under control, however, as I was a responsible parent and career woman and needed to be at my best to function optimally.

Since then, I’ve learned so much about alcohol abuse and the problems that develop due to it.

I was unaware that alcohol diminishes our capacity to adapt to stress by reducing our sleep quality and increasing inflammation. I knew my sleep quality was poor, but I didn’t see the connection between sleep and handling stress.

According to Erik Koren, Ph.D., founder of AIM7:

A 2018 study found that alcohol was dose-dependently associated with disturbances in the autonomic nervous system, measured via heart rate variability (HRV). HRV is a standard metric used by popular wearable devices to quantify recovery. Fewer than two servings of alcohol per day for men and one serving per day for women reduced HRV-derived recovery by 9.3 percent. Oh, and by the way, one serving is just five ounces of wine, not the full glass most people drink. When male subjects drank two full servings and females drank slightly more than one, their HRV decreased by 24 percent.

As mentioned, regular consumption of alcohol not only decreases your sleep quality but causes inflammation, which can damage our organs — including the brain.

Even light to moderate alcohol consumption was associated with loss of brain volume. The more you drink, the greater the loss is.

Alcohol is not the answer to reducing your stress.

Don’t be deterred by the methods below — they are truly uncomplicated.

Here are three simple things you can do to lower stress and improve your health, according to Erik Koren:

Get Into Optic Flow

Optic flow is a pattern of motion in which objects move past you in the visual field. Going for a walk, jogging, or cycling outside puts you in a state of optic flow, which has a powerful effect on your nervous system.

Optic flow dampens neural activity in the amygdala, a structure in your brain that suppresses feelings of fear and anxiety. Therefore, simply moving your body through forward ambulation can dramatically impact your stress level. The key is you must be outside. A treadmill or stationary bike won’t work.

Practice Cadenced Breathing With an Emphasis on Exhalation

Our bodies are equipped with a unique neurological system that enables us to move up and down a continuum of stress and relaxation. This system is called the autonomic nervous system (ANS), and it can be manipulated through breathing.

By performing cadenced breathing wherein the exhalation is twice as long as the inhalation, you can immediately begin to shift your body from a stressed state to a relaxed state. As long as you stick to the 1:2 ratio, you can get creative with the duration of the breathing sequence. For example, you could perform two or three minutes of cadenced breathing wherein you inhale for three seconds and exhale for six seconds.

This simple mechanistic behavior can provide you with immediate stress relief and control when life feels out of control.

Practice Gratitude

Finally, simply taking a few moments at the end of the day to take note of the good things in your life can profoundly impact your well-being. Research suggests that a gratitude practice can improve optimism and resilience, reduce biomarkers for stress and inflammation, and enhance sleep quality.

If you want to implement a gratitude practice, I suggest the three good things exercise.

First, write down three good things that happened during the day. Then give each event a title and write down what happened in detail. Next, include how this event made you feel at the time and how this makes you feel later. Finally, sit with the positive experience and let positive feelings bubble up and soak in.

My favorite is the gratitude practice. I do a quick, easy version: upon waking, I thank God I’m alive and for all the blessings I have. At night, I do the same and recall all the good that came into my life that day.

The Optic Flow was new to me. I hike or walk daily and know that the movement creates a high, never realizing objects in my visual field had anything to do with my pleasure and exhilaration.

I recently discovered cadenced breathing through the app Insight Timer with Davidji. I’ve been meditating often this way, and I agree it does release stress.

Whether you’re trying to moderate your drinking or quit entirely, this is a simple and workable way to change your end-of-the-day stress into a peaceful way to unwind.