There’s a lot of mixed messaging about alcohol some say a little is good for you, while others warn it’s always harmful. The reality is that small amounts can help some people unwind, shifting the body from stress mode to relaxation. But beyond that first drink, alcohol takes priority in the body, slowing down detox, depleting important nutrients, and making it harder to fight off disease. Over time, this can contribute to health issues like inflammation, poor metabolism, and even an increased risk of serious conditions.

That said, alcohol is also a big part of social life and personal enjoyment for many people. While drinking in moderation might not be a huge issue, it’s worth considering how it affects energy levels, sleep, and overall well-being. Making small adjustments like staying hydrated, eating well, and supplementing key nutrients can help offset some of the downsides. In the end, it’s all about balance and deciding what works best for your body and lifestyle.

Highlights of the Podcast

00:04 – The Conflicting Research on Alcohol

01:49 – The Psychological Effect of Alcohol

03:43 – How Alcohol Impacts the Body

05:21 – The Detox Process and Alcohol’s Effect on Metabolism

06:54 – Nutrient Deficiency and Alcohol Consumption

08:47 – Dr. Chalmers’ Personal Experience with Alcohol

10:23 – Alcohol’s Impact on Oxygen Levels and Sleep

11:37 – Finding a Balance

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:00:04] So we do know on radio interviews, there was apparently some research that came out that said out of all is good for you in small amounts. Then like the next day, research came out. It was like alcohol is a horrible, terrible thing and always toxic and causes cancer. So we’ve been asking lots of questions about, okay, where are we on this? I think this is a phenomenal kind of position for where our government is right now. You can you can find research if you if you really want to read into it. This is pretty much where you are. So that the actual position that I hold on this is that. There’s a there’s a there’s a spot for alcohol with some people in very small amounts. And what I mean by that is when you first take if you were free, first thing, a drink of wine or whiskey or whatever, at the end of the day, you drink it. The they feel that they kind of wash off you if you yourself just kind of unwind and you just feel like, man, okay, what’s happening when you do that? Is it your mind, your psychological system, your nervous system, everyone’s that is shifting from sympathetic fight flight freeze back to parasympathetic, which is resting, digesting that change is hypercritical of your health. You can get it from exercising it from, you know, meditating and you’re from your things. But a lot for a lot of people. A lot of times that first set back, that’s where it is. In that case, it’s very, very healthy. It’s very, very important. And you can usually get it with a half a glass of wine or, you know, the first couple sips of the beer or whatever, you know.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:01:49] And for a lot of people, the reason we get it is because it’s tied to a very real, very psychological. But like lie. I think the the work part of the day was that way. The rest of the day is this way. And so when we drink that, drink it bang, that line shows up and we’re like, we’re done with the workday. So yeah, that’s where a lot of us have a drink to relax that comes from. Now we have that, first of all, sips and it does that fantastic. It’s not going to happen anymore. The more you drink, the worse you should get healthwise. The what the research is actually showing us is that consumption of alcohol pretty much point is viewed by the body as a toxin. And let me explain why. We say viewed as from the body, your body kind of stops doing a lot of the other things it’s doing and focuses on denaturing breaking the alcohol down and getting it out of the body. That’s its primary concern. And depending on what you’re reading and what you’re seeing, it takes about an hour per drink. So if you’ve heard that, you know, if you if you’re drunk, it takes, you know, eight hours or an hour perjuring for you to be sober, roughly the same concept with roughly the same idea. And it’s not an hour for everybody. It’s 25 minutes for one guy and an hour and 30 minutes for another. So it’s it’s an average like an 8.6. Like it’s a rough average. But here’s thing. What happens when you’re doing that is that, like I said, it’s shutting down everything else. So the reason the why they say it causes cancer, it does cause cancer things. It’s very difficult to say things cause cancer because what usually will happen is it will greatly accelerate the development of cancer that’s already there or it will slow down your body’s ability to cure the cancer that’s already there because your body creates the cancer.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:03:43] So what it what we really should say is that it radically reduces your body’s ability to fight cancer, which I think makes it easier to understand. And you know what? We’re actually doing so well since you write, it creates a lot of cancer. But you hear you’re like, my gosh, look over here. Don’t look there. Look over here. You raise focus over here. You mention the alcohol doesn’t deal with the cancers that are here. So think of this like, what are we? Radio interviewers ask me. Actually, he asked the best questions he asked me. He was like, All right. He’s like, so like we have we have one drink or five drinks. It’s it’s it’s like 3 or 4 hours one night. How is that going to cause cancer? In. It’s not really. If you had four drinks one night, unless you don’t have any significant other things, it’s not really going to cost a big deal. But we’ll get to that later. But what ends up happening is that remember, you’ve got cancer in your heart and your body is working massively overtime. Like all the chemical trash we have in our food or water, our air, all the stress we put in our body and the medications we’re on, the lack of sleep we’re getting the massive nutrient deficiencies we’ve got. You know, we have all of these things pushing against us all the time. And so, you know, to think that we’re caught up or ahead of the detox process is not a thing. So we have to kind of recognize is that your body is five days behind on cleaning the trash out and then you’re like, hey, why don’t you take, you know, a day off or seven hours off or five hours off or how much you drink, right? Drink spirits. 24 hours.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:05:21] So, you know, which I think a lot of us adopt instead of, you know, that’s kind of the idea. And so if it’s processing all the stuff from the alcohol and not dealing with all the metabolic waste, the reactive oxidative stress and all those cancer causing heart attack, stroke causing chemicals, it’s focus on the alcohol. That’s how we start to get behind. So the other thing that we see is that because the way your body breaks down alcohol, it uses B vitamins, it uses all sorts of minerals. It’s like that because it’s got to make enzymes to go turtle apart. Let’s get a buffer and it’s going to help bind it and excreting out the body and all those things, right? And so, you know, as it’s doing that, we’re running again lower on our nutrient function. And so if we’re nutrient deprived to begin with and now we’re losing all sorts of hyper critical B vitamins. So who has greater risk if you guys are watching Gary Brecker and he talks about methylation issues, that’s just in circles. It’s not exactly the time. But the thing with this insert lack of B vitamins whenever he says methylation problems because the vast majority of the time it’s because we don’t have the methylated four version or the enchaine version of that, but it is like methylated B six helps you create, you know, liver bile salts. If you also like fat and breakdown that we don’t have any bile issues, gallstones or a lack of B6, especially where you’re at. You know, that’s where folic acid, the intestinal end in metals which are high folate, is really, really important for brain function, brain development, colon function, mucous membrane function.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:06:54] You know, I can go through all of that. You get the point. So when we start depleting our body of these minerals, all sorts of other stuff won’t work, right? The thyroid methylation won’t work, bile function won’t work, you know, brain function, regeneration, healing, colon. So now that stuff works, right? If your body is, you know, nutrient depleted to begin with and you strip out more nutrients, try to do naturally alcohol. So that’s kind of where we’re at. So it’s another reason of like, if you want to live a fine lifestyle, you’re going to have to supplement to fill up the void of the nutrient deficiencies we’re all going to have. So again, right, So that’s what we’re going to ask with with alcohol. And so, you know, we’ve got to kind of strip that stuff out. Now, here’s the thing, and this is really where it makes it difficult. This is where, you know, we have this conversation. A lot of people really enjoy it. And so and this kind of brings up a point that’s very important. It’s morbid, but it’s kind of very important. Remember, you’re going to die. It could be tomorrow, dude. Today could be 20, 30, 50 years from now, you’re gone. What’s important is that we sit back and we’re like, Did I enjoy it all of the days of my life to the fullest without hurting other people? Right? Ecologically, let’s just say I enjoy my life ecologically. You know, so that’s that’s one of the things we’re all going to decide. I can tell you, I quit drinking. I used to drink like just as an F when I my kids are in love with this. I used to start the parties that were our house by drinking a liter of vodka before people got there. And then I would drink with everybody else. And so I had a I’ve consumed gigantic amounts. I just don’t do something that completely blocks hangovers because I like to drink. And I have so I went from that to I haven’t had anything for almost two years. And the reason I quit was because I realized that I couldn’t burn the fat.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:08:47] I wanted to burn and build the muscle. I wanted to burn and drink at the same time. So I was like, I’ll put this on hold for a little bit while I do all this, this body transformation stuff. And then I’ll pick it up whenever I want it. This is two years old. Say, I don’t remember to drink. It’s just not worth it. Like I don’t have. I got the same parties since. The same people. I go out, do the same things. I just don’t drink. And it’s no different. So yeah, personal experience. If you guys want to drink, drink. If it’s one of those things where you like you’re not a part of your life or it’s, you know, you’re making all the crazy hardcore decisions, knock it out. But I, I would not be the person I am today if I didn’t go through the 20 years of drinking I did. So I’m not going to say you shouldn’t do it. I should say that you should think about why you’re doing it before you do so. But that’s kind of it. Is It is. It is. Like I said, it’s not a great thing to do for the body from a health standpoint because your body is going to have to deal with it before it deals with everything else is going to further that mineral question. Vitamin mineral nutrient depletion is going to wash out. The other thing we do is that, you know, the reason that alcohol can kill you is because it it messes with the pores. And so inside the pons is the autonomic nervous system that creates breathing. And so you literally will just stop breathing, kind of like with opioids and then you die. Well, the other thing that we see is that it also increases sleep apnea tremendously. And so when we start talking about hypoxia or lack of oxygen to the tissue, that’s radically increasing oxidative stress, radically increasing damage to the heart and the brain and everything else.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:10:23] So, yeah, from a long term standpoint, it’s that create those issues as well. The more and more, you know. So yeah, not only is it creating issues of nutrient depletion, stealing nutrients from you, it’s also radically reducing the intake of the most critical nutrient, which is oxygen. So kind of keep all those things in mind as you’re trying to decide if you want to drink or not. You know, it’s kind of natural. The other things, alcohol reacts very similar to the sugar in the body. So as far as like severe functional control, as far as what it does to your metabolic function, it’s just not not a good idea. No, I’ll tell you that. You know, no athletes should be consuming large amounts of alcohol. As an athlete who consume giant alcohol. I can tell you that you you train much better. You live actually, the results get much better without it. So, you know, things I wish I would have known earlier. But anyway, it’s one of those deals. So if you guys are drinking and you like it, you know, keeping up, there’s ways to buffer against that. So, yes, I like to drink. Is there a way to make it safer? Well, not really. But what you can do is make sure that the processed foods are in your diet. You know, drink more water, you know, take a much more supplementation.

Dr. Matt Chalmers [00:11:37] And if you want to drink, you can still drink that. So just I would simply like the reason that’s like the big thing, right, is enhance quality of life. Yeah. If you want to be a little better, we can walk in the room. You want to build some muscle looking like you want to be healthier so you can live longer, feel better. Correct. If you want to figure out a way where you can still drink or smoke or whatever, fantastic. You know, what are we willing to give up? What are we not willing to give up to have a lifestyle we want to have? That’s the real question. You know, alcohol is not the worst thing in the world for you, but it is definitely something you should know what’s actually going on before you make the decision whether or not you want drink. So that’s how we’re going with lots of stuff. So. All right. Thanks for your time. Get some more questions drop in the comments or [email protected] to our scoresheet. So we’ll see you guys later. Thanks for your time.

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Dr. Matt Chalmers

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