WEBVTT - How Alcohol Affects Our Mind and Body 0:00:03.600 --> 0:00:05.920 Hi, guys. I hope you all had a really great 0:00:05.920 --> 0:00:09.440 weekend and are starting your week off strong. Today, I 0:00:09.440 --> 0:00:11.399 want to talk about a topic I've been thinking about 0:00:11.440 --> 0:00:14.080 for a long time, and that's reducing the amount of 0:00:14.120 --> 0:00:17.640 alcohol I consume. Because we all know alcohol isn't the 0:00:17.640 --> 0:00:20.120 greatest for us. I'm bringing on an expert to talk 0:00:20.120 --> 0:00:24.079 about the effects of alcohol and about addiction. In no 0:00:24.239 --> 0:00:27.720 way am I addicted to alcohol, but I think it's 0:00:27.720 --> 0:00:30.040 an important topic for us to discuss because so many 0:00:30.040 --> 0:00:33.440 of us are affected by it. Even if you're not addicted, 0:00:33.479 --> 0:00:36.320 the chances of you knowing someone who abuses alcohol is 0:00:36.360 --> 0:00:40.040 pretty high. According to the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse 0:00:40.159 --> 0:00:44.360 and Alcoholism, almost thirty million Americans had an alcohol abuse 0:00:44.400 --> 0:00:48.840 disorder in twenty twenty three. Anyway, let's bring on my guest. 0:00:48.920 --> 0:00:51.760 His name is Joe Jurillo. He's a marriage and family 0:00:51.840 --> 0:00:55.040 therapist and he also has over twenty years of experience 0:00:55.120 --> 0:01:01.360 treating people with chemical use disorders. Hello, Joe, Welcome, Welcome 0:01:01.400 --> 0:01:02.320 to the podcast. 0:01:03.120 --> 0:01:05.119 Hi, nice to see you, Nice to meet you. 0:01:05.560 --> 0:01:07.600 Likewise, how are you today. 0:01:07.520 --> 0:01:09.560 I'm great, Thanks, good, good. 0:01:09.600 --> 0:01:14.200 I'm so happy to have you because I have been 0:01:14.360 --> 0:01:17.600 wanting to drink less. I have been drinking less, but 0:01:17.640 --> 0:01:19.640 I want to stop completely. And we'll get into that later. 0:01:20.040 --> 0:01:22.480 But why don't we start off with you telling us 0:01:22.480 --> 0:01:25.000 a little bit about yourself and your experience with helping 0:01:25.040 --> 0:01:25.840 people with addiction. 0:01:26.800 --> 0:01:30.840 Sure, I'll try and make this brief, even though it's 0:01:30.840 --> 0:01:33.080 a very long story. I grew up in a house 0:01:33.080 --> 0:01:36.160 where there was no alcohol at all, and as a kid, 0:01:36.200 --> 0:01:38.720 we never had alcohol at the table for dinner anything like. 0:01:38.800 --> 0:01:42.120 I grew up in a Catholic Italian family, and when 0:01:42.120 --> 0:01:44.559 I was fourteen, I had an older brother who passed 0:01:44.600 --> 0:01:47.960 away from cancer. It was a very traumatic experience for 0:01:48.000 --> 0:01:52.400 our whole family. I started falling in with friends that 0:01:52.440 --> 0:01:55.840 were drinking and smoking weed, and so my life took 0:01:55.920 --> 0:01:59.640 off on a trajectory where I normalized getting high to 0:01:59.680 --> 0:02:02.640 manage my emotions and stuff like that, getting drunk just 0:02:02.720 --> 0:02:07.240 about every day, drinking probably most days of my life 0:02:07.320 --> 0:02:09.280 until the age of forty two, when I stopped. From 0:02:09.320 --> 0:02:12.239 the time I was fourteen, oh wow, other little things 0:02:12.240 --> 0:02:15.240 that between there, but alcohol was always the constant. I 0:02:15.440 --> 0:02:18.400 found out when I was about twenty five that my 0:02:18.520 --> 0:02:23.440 grandfather had been a horrible alcoholic up until we grandchildren 0:02:23.520 --> 0:02:26.880 were born, but I had no consciousness of that beforehand. 0:02:27.280 --> 0:02:30.680 Suffice to say, I got jobs in career I was 0:02:30.720 --> 0:02:33.960 not interested in after college and sales and marketing and 0:02:33.960 --> 0:02:36.799 stuff like that. And around the age of thirty six, 0:02:36.880 --> 0:02:38.920 I decided to go back to school to become a 0:02:39.000 --> 0:02:42.880 therapist because when I had come home from college, included 0:02:42.919 --> 0:02:45.680 with my heavy drinking and stuff, I had pretty much 0:02:45.720 --> 0:02:48.680 what you would call a nervous breakdown and became very suicidal. 0:02:49.200 --> 0:02:53.680 Got into therapy with MFT, who helped me tremendously to 0:02:53.680 --> 0:02:55.919 be able to kind of back away from the ledge 0:02:55.960 --> 0:02:59.680 and find a way to value myself and my experience 0:02:59.680 --> 0:03:02.440 in life. I kept drinking, though, and then I went 0:03:02.919 --> 0:03:06.160 back to do my master's Marriage and Family therapy. Took 0:03:06.760 --> 0:03:10.119 like a one unit course in alcoholism that they were 0:03:10.120 --> 0:03:13.000 teaching as part of the curriculum, which I think is horrible, 0:03:13.280 --> 0:03:15.639 but that's pretty much the standard these days. You don't 0:03:15.639 --> 0:03:18.000 get a lot of training in it unless you work 0:03:18.000 --> 0:03:21.360 in the field with it, so that happened. I got 0:03:21.400 --> 0:03:23.640 married for the first time at the age of forty two, 0:03:23.800 --> 0:03:25.560 to a girl I had a mad crush on in 0:03:25.639 --> 0:03:29.640 high school, and we were very happy and we drank 0:03:29.680 --> 0:03:32.640 together a lot. I have to say that before that 0:03:32.680 --> 0:03:36.120 part even I got a career for God, like about 0:03:36.160 --> 0:03:41.000 seven years where my life was about selling wine and 0:03:41.120 --> 0:03:46.480 spirits to retail, which allowed me to become a professionalized 0:03:46.560 --> 0:03:49.200 drunk because I was able to drink every day and 0:03:49.240 --> 0:03:51.840 it worked really good for me, and I enjoyed it. 0:03:52.160 --> 0:03:55.440 I enjoyed the vast majority of it. Got married at 0:03:55.440 --> 0:03:59.000 forty two. Two years later. My wife and I, who 0:03:59.080 --> 0:04:02.440 drank together for fun all the time, my wife was 0:04:02.480 --> 0:04:04.680 getting sick and we couldn't figure out what it was, 0:04:04.720 --> 0:04:07.120 and it turned out that she was. What was happening 0:04:07.240 --> 0:04:10.600 was she was literally dying of alcohol poisoning because she 0:04:10.720 --> 0:04:14.200 was drinking so much, and she had developed a syndrome 0:04:14.240 --> 0:04:17.440 where she couldn't hold any food down, so she would vomit. 0:04:17.760 --> 0:04:19.640 You know, when she woke up in the morning, she 0:04:19.680 --> 0:04:22.960 would drink wine or commerr stomach down. Anything she ate 0:04:23.040 --> 0:04:25.680 during the day she'd throw back up. And after about 0:04:25.720 --> 0:04:28.040 a month of not being able to hold anything down 0:04:28.040 --> 0:04:31.599 except alcohol, she was really really messed up. Now, it's 0:04:31.640 --> 0:04:35.280 not unfamiliar for alcoholics to vomit in the morning when 0:04:35.279 --> 0:04:37.839 they've gone long enough without alcohol that they start to 0:04:37.839 --> 0:04:41.200 go into withdrawal symptoms. We got her into treatment over 0:04:41.200 --> 0:04:44.760 at Los Andinas in Pasadena. I As far as I'm concerned, 0:04:44.800 --> 0:04:47.840 they pretty much saved her life and our marriage. But 0:04:47.920 --> 0:04:50.719 she did the hard work by staying sober. But I 0:04:50.839 --> 0:04:54.039 quit with her at the same time and realized just 0:04:54.080 --> 0:04:56.760 a couple of days later how far down the path 0:04:56.800 --> 0:05:00.280 I had gone without even realizing it, because we just 0:05:00.360 --> 0:05:03.440 kept normalizing it over and over again, getting drunk, being 0:05:03.560 --> 0:05:06.520 hung over all that stuff. It's only wine, all the 0:05:06.600 --> 0:05:10.320 stuff that goes on in your head, because the nature 0:05:10.360 --> 0:05:13.680 of alcoholism is to kind of minimize and justify and 0:05:14.320 --> 0:05:18.480 rationalize all the consequences and behavior that you're going through. 0:05:19.080 --> 0:05:26.080 In my household, there wasn't necessarily alcohol at the table 0:05:26.160 --> 0:05:29.080 when we were having dinner, but it was very normal. 0:05:29.320 --> 0:05:33.760 Tequila has been a part of our life and our work, 0:05:34.000 --> 0:05:38.640 and I didn't really drink much like a few years ago, 0:05:39.200 --> 0:05:42.160 and as I started going on stage it became part. 0:05:42.240 --> 0:05:44.440 It's very much part of the culture, the type of 0:05:44.520 --> 0:05:47.680 music that I sing, and your job is to get 0:05:47.680 --> 0:05:51.839 everyone drunk, and I'm pretty good at that, so of 0:05:51.880 --> 0:05:54.960 course I'm drinking. But I never liked how I felt. 0:05:55.400 --> 0:05:58.240 I've never liked it. I'm like, I'm poisoning my body. 0:05:58.360 --> 0:06:01.560 My brain feels different, I'm sluggish, I have a lot 0:06:01.560 --> 0:06:03.960 of brain fog. But I would ignore it just for 0:06:04.000 --> 0:06:08.160 the sake of I'm drinking because it's a way to socialize, 0:06:08.240 --> 0:06:10.400 and you know, I'm not going to be any fun 0:06:10.480 --> 0:06:12.400 or can I have fun without alcohol? And right now 0:06:12.400 --> 0:06:15.839 that you said wine, I just recently stopped drinking hard alcohol. 0:06:16.520 --> 0:06:19.839 And now I'm like, oh, but wine, it comes from grapes, 0:06:20.920 --> 0:06:25.080 and it's it's natural, it's natural, it's better. So I've 0:06:25.120 --> 0:06:27.560 been I was in New York a few days ago 0:06:27.720 --> 0:06:29.680 and I hadn't drink in a while, and I'm like, 0:06:29.720 --> 0:06:31.080 I'm just gonna have a glass of wine. And I 0:06:31.080 --> 0:06:33.440 told myself just one. But I felt it right away, 0:06:34.000 --> 0:06:36.680 and I didn't feel as bad as I do with 0:06:36.800 --> 0:06:39.839 Thiki Lab. But still i can see it in my 0:06:39.960 --> 0:06:42.919 eyes and in my energy level, and I'm like, okay, 0:06:42.960 --> 0:06:45.200 I need to just cut this, just nip it in 0:06:45.200 --> 0:06:47.360 the bud. Which is why it's so perfect that you're 0:06:47.360 --> 0:06:50.920 on the podcast. But you've been sober now for how 0:06:50.960 --> 0:06:52.239 long I've. 0:06:52.040 --> 0:06:54.960 Been sober now for twenty two years? 0:06:55.400 --> 0:06:57.479 And have you still had a lot of fun after 0:06:57.520 --> 0:06:58.080 the alcohol. 0:06:58.480 --> 0:07:00.480 I have had so much fun. In fact, I've had 0:07:00.520 --> 0:07:02.479 more fun because I don't have to worry about the 0:07:02.520 --> 0:07:05.520 things I used to worry about. It's interesting because when 0:07:05.520 --> 0:07:08.120 I worked at Los Antinas, I worked with doctor Drew Pinsky. 0:07:08.279 --> 0:07:11.440 I don't know if you're familiar with sober celebrity rehab 0:07:11.480 --> 0:07:13.520 and all that stuff that was going on in MTV 0:07:14.120 --> 0:07:18.440 fifteen years ago, reality television having to do with rehab 0:07:18.760 --> 0:07:21.840 and so forth. So we're living and all that, and 0:07:22.480 --> 0:07:27.240 Drew was a brilliant doctor understands addiction like nobody I've 0:07:27.240 --> 0:07:29.400 ever worked with before. But there was a team of 0:07:29.480 --> 0:07:32.559 us that worked there for that time. I was there 0:07:32.720 --> 0:07:34.840 in there for like seven years, and I learned so 0:07:34.920 --> 0:07:38.640 much about addiction on the daily basis because I worked 0:07:38.640 --> 0:07:40.960 in the rehab section, which was called the Briar Unit, 0:07:41.000 --> 0:07:43.400 where we had people come in. We would help them 0:07:43.440 --> 0:07:48.520 detox medically, you know, because Okay, there's only two types 0:07:48.560 --> 0:07:50.960 of chemicals that you really need to detox in a 0:07:51.040 --> 0:07:55.440 hospital for one is alcohol and the other is benzodiazepines 0:07:55.480 --> 0:07:59.360 like adavan, xanax, klonip and stuff like that. Because both 0:07:59.400 --> 0:08:01.440 of those you try and do it on your own 0:08:01.480 --> 0:08:07.800 you run a high risk of seizures, blood pressure spikes, strokes, death. 0:08:08.280 --> 0:08:13.679 I've seen people die detoxing at home. Okay, it's yeah, 0:08:13.760 --> 0:08:15.720 And most people don't know this. Mostly people think it's 0:08:15.760 --> 0:08:18.760 like heroin and meth or the bugaboos and stuff like that. 0:08:19.160 --> 0:08:22.600 Those don't kill people by themselves, but you mix any 0:08:22.640 --> 0:08:25.600 of that with alcohol, it will. And if you don't 0:08:25.640 --> 0:08:28.400 detox in the hospital when you're an alcoholic, if you've 0:08:28.440 --> 0:08:31.200 been drinking daily, you really need to be under nurse's 0:08:31.240 --> 0:08:33.840 care and on a medical protocol to survive it, because 0:08:33.880 --> 0:08:34.800 it's serious stuff. 0:08:35.240 --> 0:08:39.400 Yeah, And how do you know, Joe when you're addicted? Like, 0:08:39.440 --> 0:08:41.760 what are some signs? I mean, because I have a 0:08:41.800 --> 0:08:45.000 friend that I think, okay, she's definitely an alcoholic in 0:08:45.080 --> 0:08:48.280 my mind, but she's like, no, it's the only thing 0:08:48.800 --> 0:08:52.600 that takes my stress away. And she's like, even if 0:08:52.640 --> 0:08:54.160 I have two or three I'm like, well, you're drinking 0:08:54.200 --> 0:08:57.920 every day. But anyway, you tell me, what are the signs? 0:08:58.320 --> 0:09:00.320 Really good question. There's two ways to look at this. 0:09:01.120 --> 0:09:04.480 One is the signs of the things happening, and then 0:09:04.520 --> 0:09:06.720 the other is the signs of the things not happening. 0:09:06.800 --> 0:09:09.880 When you stop in terms of the signs of what's 0:09:09.920 --> 0:09:13.079 happening well, our definition over at loss and seen as 0:09:13.120 --> 0:09:17.560 for addiction period is the intense desire to use even 0:09:17.600 --> 0:09:20.600 in the face of negative consequences. You know you're going 0:09:20.679 --> 0:09:22.560 to lose your job if you show up to work drunk. 0:09:22.840 --> 0:09:24.599 You know that your husband's going to leave you, or 0:09:24.640 --> 0:09:26.520 your wife's going to leave you because they've had it 0:09:26.559 --> 0:09:30.160 with you already, and you've made ultimate promises. You know 0:09:30.679 --> 0:09:33.040 for weeks, months, and years that you're not going to 0:09:33.080 --> 0:09:36.080 drink anymore. You're starting to get sick, you're starting to 0:09:36.120 --> 0:09:39.240 feel ill, you're starting to not feel yourself, and yet 0:09:39.280 --> 0:09:42.800 you still continue to drink. Any number of different things 0:09:42.800 --> 0:09:45.920 that are consequences. You get your driver's license taken away, 0:09:45.960 --> 0:09:49.280 or you get two DUIs, three DUIs, and you still 0:09:49.880 --> 0:09:53.440 drink and drive, of course, because the idea of not 0:09:53.520 --> 0:09:57.280 driving yourself to your drink is ridiculous. But those are 0:09:57.320 --> 0:09:59.719 literally the types of things when you start to recognize 0:09:59.720 --> 0:10:02.839 that you choose to drink no matter what the danger is, 0:10:02.960 --> 0:10:04.959 or what the threat is, or what the thing is 0:10:05.000 --> 0:10:07.760 that could you could lose your career. Everybody could turn 0:10:07.800 --> 0:10:10.760 against you. We've seen it in the media a million times. Yeah, 0:10:10.800 --> 0:10:13.679 as long as somebody is partying and they're holding it together, 0:10:13.720 --> 0:10:15.959 everybody thinks they're so cool, And as soon as something 0:10:16.000 --> 0:10:18.360 bad happens to them, everybody thinks they're a total loser. 0:10:19.000 --> 0:10:20.000 That's so true. 0:10:20.320 --> 0:10:23.920 Yeah, that kind of impact itself is a negative consequence. Now, 0:10:23.960 --> 0:10:25.520 the other way to look at it, how do you 0:10:25.600 --> 0:10:29.319 know what you know? What is addiction? What is alcoholism? 0:10:29.360 --> 0:10:31.120 How do you know whether it's a problem or not? 0:10:31.720 --> 0:10:33.800 It's a problem when it's a problem. In other words, 0:10:33.840 --> 0:10:37.679 if you can't not drink, you're probably an alcoholic. I mean, 0:10:38.120 --> 0:10:41.439 if you can't not drink that you are an alcoholic. 0:10:41.559 --> 0:10:45.760 That means that you've got a condition. It's a physical condition, 0:10:45.880 --> 0:10:48.480 and it's a mental condition, and it's even a spiritual 0:10:48.480 --> 0:10:51.000 condition as well. A lot of people get nervous about 0:10:51.000 --> 0:10:54.599 talking about that, but I'm quite used to talking about it. 0:10:54.480 --> 0:10:58.319 And it's a physical problem because your body, your brain, 0:10:58.480 --> 0:11:02.200 all your organs become a customed to a chemical that's 0:11:02.240 --> 0:11:06.000 actually killing it over time, and then it can't function 0:11:06.080 --> 0:11:09.760 without it. That's why in later stage alcoholism, you can't 0:11:09.800 --> 0:11:12.040 get started for the day unless you've had a drink 0:11:12.120 --> 0:11:15.640 or two. You can't function calmly without a couple of 0:11:15.679 --> 0:11:18.240 belts in you, And it just goes on and on 0:11:18.400 --> 0:11:21.920 like that, and you're convinced this is the way you survive. 0:11:22.679 --> 0:11:25.400 The other way to look at it is what are 0:11:25.440 --> 0:11:29.480 the things that stop happening when you stop drinking? As 0:11:29.640 --> 0:11:33.760 proof that alcoholism is what's going on. I used to 0:11:33.840 --> 0:11:36.640 change jobs every two to three years all through my 0:11:36.760 --> 0:11:40.280 thirties and early forties, even my twenties as well, and 0:11:40.320 --> 0:11:42.920 it was amazing because I would always either have to 0:11:43.000 --> 0:11:46.320 quit a job because my boss was an ass, or 0:11:46.720 --> 0:11:50.600 I would get fired because, well, my boss was an ass. 0:11:51.120 --> 0:11:54.080 And I had probably the world's record of getting hired 0:11:54.160 --> 0:11:59.920 by asses beyond anybody else's comprehension. When I got so 0:12:00.400 --> 0:12:04.959 for some reason, I wasn't getting fired anymore from any jobs. 0:12:05.400 --> 0:12:08.800 And I found that I was staying places five years, 0:12:08.840 --> 0:12:11.560 ten years, twenty years, and leaving for a better opportunity, 0:12:11.640 --> 0:12:15.840 not running before everything came crashing down, and not because 0:12:16.600 --> 0:12:19.560 you know, I was waiting to get busted, you know, 0:12:20.240 --> 0:12:24.400 thoroughly expecting it, because that was my story. So when 0:12:24.480 --> 0:12:26.680 you kind of put those things together, you get a 0:12:26.720 --> 0:12:30.200 sense that obviously something's not working here, and I maybe 0:12:30.240 --> 0:12:32.760 I don't even understand entirely what it is, but I 0:12:32.760 --> 0:12:36.080 should probably pay attention to the writing on the wall. Yeah. 0:12:36.120 --> 0:12:39.160 Absolutely, And right now, as I was hearing you speak, 0:12:39.480 --> 0:12:41.920 it reminded me of someone that was in my life 0:12:42.760 --> 0:12:46.840 and how he said, no, I am not an addict. 0:12:46.880 --> 0:12:49.640 And everything that you just said was confirmation for me 0:12:49.760 --> 0:12:51.840 because he started making me feel bad like I was 0:12:51.880 --> 0:12:55.120 accusing him or keeping him from having fun. But it's 0:12:55.120 --> 0:12:57.600 like all these broken promises and it was ruining and 0:12:57.640 --> 0:13:01.280 it ruined our relationships. Kind of gave me a little 0:13:01.280 --> 0:13:09.160 bit of peace, So thank you for that. I did 0:13:09.200 --> 0:13:13.400 want to ask you, do you think that it's okay now? 0:13:13.440 --> 0:13:17.400 Knowing what alcohol more than ever, what it does to 0:13:17.440 --> 0:13:18.800 the body, what it does to the brain, and I 0:13:18.840 --> 0:13:20.800 want to get a little into the brain because that's 0:13:20.800 --> 0:13:24.400 like my main concern. But do you think that even 0:13:24.520 --> 0:13:27.440 having a glass of wine once a week is okay? 0:13:27.559 --> 0:13:29.520 Or do you feel like if you were telling your 0:13:29.600 --> 0:13:32.240 daughter or your sister, whoever, that someone that you truly love, 0:13:33.240 --> 0:13:37.800 would you tell them no alcohol at all or once 0:13:37.840 --> 0:13:38.400 in a while? 0:13:39.040 --> 0:13:44.120 Just wondering, good question. So there's nothing evil or wrong 0:13:44.400 --> 0:13:48.600 or dangerous about wine? If it's done in moderation. In 0:13:48.600 --> 0:13:52.000 other words, if you're not drinking every day, it shouldn't 0:13:52.000 --> 0:13:55.240 be a tremendous problem. If you binge when you drink, 0:13:55.520 --> 0:13:58.880 it's a problem if you find that you're working five 0:13:58.960 --> 0:14:02.439 days a week and weekends you let yourself have beer 0:14:02.559 --> 0:14:04.600 or wine or whatever it is that you're drinking, even 0:14:04.679 --> 0:14:07.440 hard liquor. As long as you're not getting really drunk 0:14:07.480 --> 0:14:10.199 each time you do and losing track of how much 0:14:10.200 --> 0:14:13.560 you're drinking, and as long as you're conscious of any 0:14:13.640 --> 0:14:17.040 kind of consequences that are occurring in terms of your 0:14:17.120 --> 0:14:20.520 decision to drink, then, like I said, it's not really 0:14:20.600 --> 0:14:22.760 a problem unless it's a problem. 0:14:23.000 --> 0:14:25.040 And now that you brought that up, I think it's 0:14:25.080 --> 0:14:29.880 a perfect way to talk about the effects that alcohol 0:14:29.920 --> 0:14:32.320 has on the brain or on the organs. Can we 0:14:32.360 --> 0:14:34.760 talk a little bit about that? Right? 0:14:35.840 --> 0:14:38.800 So, let me give you a little show and tell. 0:14:39.000 --> 0:14:40.680 I'm not going to do it here, but when you 0:14:40.720 --> 0:14:43.240 get home tonight, take a glass of water and take 0:14:43.280 --> 0:14:46.040 a bottle of rubbing alcohol, and pour a little bit 0:14:46.080 --> 0:14:48.320 of the rubbing alcohol into the water. And what you're 0:14:48.320 --> 0:14:51.080 going to find is the rubbing alcohol actually pushes the 0:14:51.120 --> 0:14:56.240 water aside. Right when you do anything to disrupt the 0:14:56.280 --> 0:14:59.640 balance of water inside the brain, and this goes for 0:14:59.680 --> 0:15:02.920 the other organs as well, because humans are mostly water. 0:15:03.360 --> 0:15:06.520 When you mess with the ability to your body's availability 0:15:06.880 --> 0:15:10.240 to handle the electrostatic charges in your brain, it's going 0:15:10.240 --> 0:15:13.440 to cause brain damage. It's going to cause cell destruction, 0:15:13.520 --> 0:15:17.280 et cetera, et cetera. Even small amounts of alcohol cause 0:15:17.640 --> 0:15:20.760 small amounts of brain damage. If you drink less than 0:15:20.800 --> 0:15:23.880 your body is reproducing in terms of brain cells, then 0:15:23.920 --> 0:15:26.360 it's not a problem. But if you're drinking every day, 0:15:26.360 --> 0:15:29.400 and you're drinking heavily, you're binge drinking, it can take 0:15:29.520 --> 0:15:31.400 a big chunk out of it. If you look at 0:15:31.680 --> 0:15:34.600 cat scans of an alcoholic sprain at the time of 0:15:34.640 --> 0:15:38.040 their autopsy versus someone about the same age there wasn't 0:15:38.080 --> 0:15:41.880 an alcoholic, you see tremendous differences in like the cavities 0:15:41.920 --> 0:15:44.320 that are supposed to be open and filled with fluids 0:15:44.360 --> 0:15:47.680 that the brain produces to regulate itself, and the mass 0:15:47.840 --> 0:15:51.280 material of the brain actually has shrunk over time. Quite 0:15:51.280 --> 0:15:53.320 often you have what they call water on the brain 0:15:53.400 --> 0:15:56.360 because the chambers are actually breaking down inside the brain 0:15:56.720 --> 0:15:59.800 over time. Because you've got a very sick brain that 0:15:59.800 --> 0:16:03.200 does and work. They call there's a condition called wet 0:16:03.240 --> 0:16:06.440 brain that when people who are in late or end 0:16:06.520 --> 0:16:13.160 stage alcoholism develop a kind of dementia. Alcoholic dementia. Wet 0:16:13.200 --> 0:16:17.040 brain is when you can't think straight, when you are hallucinating, 0:16:17.080 --> 0:16:18.920 when you are I mean, you might as well have 0:16:19.000 --> 0:16:22.520 Alzheimer's and stage Alzheimer's because it looks very much like that, 0:16:23.080 --> 0:16:25.640 which is a direct cause of the alcohol's effect on 0:16:25.680 --> 0:16:29.160 the brain. Men usually hit the wall around the age 0:16:29.200 --> 0:16:32.800 of fifty or just before that where they really need 0:16:32.840 --> 0:16:35.600 to have help if they're going to stop using. Women 0:16:35.720 --> 0:16:38.320 hit it closer to the age of forty. Now, that's 0:16:38.400 --> 0:16:42.600 completely anecdotal, okay, from my experience working in rehab and 0:16:42.600 --> 0:16:45.480 stuff like that. So if you quote me to somebody 0:16:45.520 --> 0:16:48.200 who's a statician, they're going to say, I don't know 0:16:48.200 --> 0:16:51.320 if that's necessarily accurate, but it was a constant that 0:16:51.360 --> 0:16:54.920 I saw the majority, the majority of women were hovering 0:16:54.920 --> 0:16:57.120 around forty and the majority of them were right hovering 0:16:57.200 --> 0:17:00.000 around fifty when they finally said, I can't get this anymore. 0:17:06.560 --> 0:17:09.080 Now that we're talking about the damage that it causes, 0:17:09.160 --> 0:17:11.639 and I'm glad you brought up because a lot of 0:17:11.640 --> 0:17:14.160 people are like, I'm done twenty, I'm young, and it's 0:17:14.160 --> 0:17:18.200 not going to affect me. But is it like long term, 0:17:18.280 --> 0:17:21.240 if you continue this behavior, it will, right? Is this 0:17:21.359 --> 0:17:22.600 damage irreversible? 0:17:23.160 --> 0:17:26.760 It's not just the brain either. I mean the damage 0:17:26.800 --> 0:17:28.639 that you do to any of your organs, most of 0:17:28.680 --> 0:17:32.639 it is pretty much reversible over time. But most people 0:17:32.720 --> 0:17:36.680 I know who quit drinking even in their forties recognize 0:17:36.680 --> 0:17:41.960 into their fifties and sixties that they started having problems cognitively, 0:17:42.359 --> 0:17:45.080 you know, back in their forties and really just kind 0:17:45.080 --> 0:17:47.359 of dismissed it as being the role of alcohol. But 0:17:47.400 --> 0:17:49.440 when you take alcohol out of there and you're still 0:17:49.440 --> 0:17:53.159 having problems with memory and stuff like that, then you 0:17:53.240 --> 0:17:55.880 recognize that this is like something that's left over from 0:17:55.920 --> 0:17:58.680 a long time ago that's not going to necessarily clean 0:17:58.720 --> 0:18:03.440 itself up completely. Now. On the other hand, the fact 0:18:03.480 --> 0:18:05.399 of the matter is that the other organs of the 0:18:05.400 --> 0:18:07.760 body outside of the brain are also getting damaged in 0:18:07.800 --> 0:18:12.000 the same time. Cardiovascular system, all the veins and arteries 0:18:12.040 --> 0:18:14.400 and stuff like that take a real beating when you're 0:18:14.440 --> 0:18:18.000 flooded with alcohol. All right, again, don't forget when you're 0:18:18.040 --> 0:18:21.800 drinking alcohol is replacing water and being chemical that your 0:18:21.800 --> 0:18:25.199 body is trying to produce. Your kidneys will start to 0:18:25.200 --> 0:18:30.560 fail after a time. Your liver is basically the oil 0:18:30.600 --> 0:18:32.840 filter of the body, right if you can imagine, the 0:18:32.880 --> 0:18:35.400 liver is the filter. Which is why I can never 0:18:35.480 --> 0:18:37.560 understand why people go to a restaurant and order liver 0:18:37.680 --> 0:18:39.920 for dinner because it's a filter. Why would you eat 0:18:39.960 --> 0:18:40.320 the filter? 0:18:40.400 --> 0:18:43.119 That's that's not yeah, no, thank you. 0:18:44.440 --> 0:18:47.240 I agree. But the liver has different stage. You've got 0:18:47.280 --> 0:18:49.760 three lobes that make up your liver, three lobes of 0:18:49.760 --> 0:18:52.560 the liver combined, and the fact of the matter is 0:18:52.600 --> 0:18:56.520 they're all affected in different ways. During the course of 0:18:56.560 --> 0:19:00.000 a person's drinking. The first thing that they know they find, 0:19:00.080 --> 0:19:03.440 and quite often they can diagnose alcoholism if they really 0:19:03.480 --> 0:19:07.360 need something physical like a lab to diagnose it, they'll 0:19:07.440 --> 0:19:11.360 recognize it by decline of the liver. The first thing 0:19:11.400 --> 0:19:15.199 they see is what they call elevated liver enzymes. That 0:19:15.280 --> 0:19:18.040 means that enzymes that are usually in a certain kind 0:19:18.080 --> 0:19:21.000 of balance in the liver that the liver produces are 0:19:21.040 --> 0:19:23.080 suddenly now way out of whack. All of a sudden, 0:19:23.080 --> 0:19:25.280 You've got more of these types of enzymes in those 0:19:25.600 --> 0:19:29.840 and it's not in balance anymore. The second phase is 0:19:29.880 --> 0:19:33.840 called fatty liver. Fatty liver means your body is no 0:19:33.880 --> 0:19:36.760 longer breaking fats down because the liver is not capable 0:19:36.760 --> 0:19:39.159 of helping with that, and the other organs of the 0:19:39.160 --> 0:19:42.840 body that help break down fats that are coming in 0:19:42.880 --> 0:19:45.800 and fats that are stored can't do their job anymore, 0:19:45.840 --> 0:19:48.320 and it starts to show up. The fat that's not 0:19:48.359 --> 0:19:52.159 getting processed jams the liver up, and then it can't 0:19:52.200 --> 0:19:55.000 clear them, so your liver does a worse job than ever. 0:19:55.480 --> 0:19:59.960 The third is called cirrhosis, and cirrhosis the liver is 0:20:00.119 --> 0:20:04.240 is to the liver what emphysema is to the lungs basically, 0:20:04.320 --> 0:20:07.679 which is where the baffles that are physical baffles that 0:20:07.800 --> 0:20:10.800 catch and collect garbage and get rid of it so 0:20:10.840 --> 0:20:14.280 that it doesn't destroy the filter itself start to break down. 0:20:14.359 --> 0:20:16.960 That's what happens when people die of enthysema. They have 0:20:17.040 --> 0:20:20.040 nothing left to breathe into anymore. They're just like these. 0:20:20.480 --> 0:20:22.600 They used to have tons and tons of these little 0:20:22.600 --> 0:20:26.160 teeny sacs that would transfer oxygen out of the blood 0:20:26.160 --> 0:20:28.640 and stuff, and now the sacks broke and they don't 0:20:28.680 --> 0:20:31.200 do their job anymore. The liver does the same thing 0:20:31.240 --> 0:20:37.480 in cirrhosis. Everything is reversible up to the point of cirrhosis, 0:20:38.040 --> 0:20:43.359 that is, if you stop early enough. Okay, So it's 0:20:43.520 --> 0:20:46.320 very serious stuff. And this is the thing when you're younger, 0:20:46.680 --> 0:20:49.160 all this stuff sounds so remote, like. 0:20:49.160 --> 0:20:50.359 Oh, that's not gonna happen. 0:20:50.480 --> 0:20:52.439 That's not gonna happen. I mean, I'll stop before then 0:20:52.480 --> 0:20:54.880 there or I just went to the doctor. I got 0:20:54.880 --> 0:20:57.239 a clean bill of health. I'm doing good, you know. 0:20:58.119 --> 0:21:01.160 And people don't want to see what the long term 0:21:01.160 --> 0:21:04.480 effects are because they're really not available to them until later. 0:21:04.920 --> 0:21:08.280 Yeah, I mean, I now that I'm getting older, I'm thinking, 0:21:08.640 --> 0:21:10.320 I just I want to feel better. I want to 0:21:10.320 --> 0:21:13.159 take care of my body. I want, you know. And 0:21:13.240 --> 0:21:15.239 sometimes I even I hug myself. I'm like, I am 0:21:15.280 --> 0:21:17.280 so sorry that I did not take care of you better. 0:21:17.320 --> 0:21:20.000 But I'm going to do my best now. And we 0:21:20.400 --> 0:21:22.919 just talked about it on the podcast, about detoxing and 0:21:22.960 --> 0:21:25.600 detoxing the liver and how important it is to detox 0:21:25.960 --> 0:21:29.359 your organs and the body. I've done a lot of cleanses, 0:21:29.480 --> 0:21:31.840 you know. I'm like, Okay, no alcohol for ninety days, 0:21:32.480 --> 0:21:34.840