One study that has fascinated me is where a rodent group was fed pure ethanol diet, they did not even get fatty liver. When a bit of linoleic acid acid was added to that diet the mice rapidly developed fatty liver, cirrhosis and death.
I think you must be misremembering something here. There were studies that looked at the effects of alcohol and linoleic acid on mice (e.g. DR Warner et al., 2017) and they did indeed show that linoleic acid exacerbates the damage from alcohol, but AFAIK nobody ever tried "feeding" mice a pure ethanol diet (without any other nutrients), and if they did, it would be about as much a disaster as such a "diet" usually turns out in humans.
As a drinker, i can attest to the falling asleep quickly, only to have trouble the second half of the night. Therefore being sleepy the next day. I appreciate these videos. Help reinforce the changes im making. Thank u.
We used to call waking up at 2 am after drinking “alcohol insomnia “ . It’s hard to get back to sleep. I always thought it was because of a drop in blood sugar. Sometimes it took eating something sweet to get back to sleep. I realize now how hard that is on your body!
A lecture on time line and stages from Alcohol cessation to recovery of IR, ROS, A1C, and healing of the endothelial layer would be watched by many. 👍 TY!
Well you have convinced me that even though I have reduced my alcohol consumption considerably since going Keto, even the occasional wine Spritzer is probably not a good idea when it comes to recovering from my insulin resistance. And my own experience when I disregard this advice has proven it to me. It is good to know why however - Thank you!
I believe everything you say so i must be a weirdo.i am female and have had hardcore insomnia for 40 years.i have run marathons with no sleep.hiked big peaks with no sleep and no food.i don't get tired during the day,never take a nap.easy to fall asleep,never stay asleep.the most i sleep i get at one time is 3.5 hours.yes, have had sleep studies.no one can help with the insomnia.i have been offered sleeping pills.i don't take them.i don't have sleep apnea.whether i have some wine or not the nights are the same.i have followed advice from everyone who offers it.i have always exercised..in the seventies i was deemed a health nut.even though you can't help me i believe in you and watch every lecture you make. i have learned so much from you.
That’s me before they found my adrenal tumor. Now that it’s been excised my superpowers went away. I miss the metanephrines but not the cortisol so much. It turned out the cortisol gave me a blood sugar dyscrasia. A high blood glucose and a normal A1C. Probably not you. Just saying. It took 35 years for me and if it wasn’t for the bladder cancer I’d never have known I wasn’t superhuman. Can you say ROS. Lol
Might I ask, how many grams of protein do you eat daily? I too, have bad insomnia but recently I upped my protein intake to the range of 130-170 grams per day. I'm male, 6'0, 160 lbs and am fit
@@MikeShonVideos probably meant this for the Gal above. If insomnia (I really did think I just didn’t need sleep.) is only sleeping a few hours it disappeared with the tumor eventually. I found walking and resistance exercises gives me 8 to 9 hours these days. I’m 68 so I do a gram per pound of mainly animal protein in a 6 hour window if you really want to know. lol
I’m in perimenopause and any time I have a drink I have the WORST sleep. I wake up between 2:30 and 3:30 and cannot get back to sleep. I used to love a social drink, but sleep is more important!
In case anyone still wants to have alcohol every now and then. I found a couple of videos here on youtube by a russian doctor Alexandr Barsukov where he explains that consuming alcohol together with lemon (juice, or whole lemon) neutralizes the destructive effect of alcohol on the liver. He also gives an interesting method of reducing the amount of alcohol while achieving a desired "relaxation" effect: take a small sip and hold it in your mouth for a few second before swallowing. This way alcohol is absorbed into your blood stream through its contact with your gums.
Not mentioned today is the well documented data that alcohol users even heavy regular use, have lower blood sugar and HbA1c. I expect this is because alcohol inhibits glujconeogeneis at the level of the liver. I have done many experiments with CGMs to prove to myself without any question that blood sugar drops quite precipitously after alcohol ingestion. This is well known in the Medical field where bad alcoholics can have life threatening hypoglycaemia. In my case where I am fat adapted my blood sugar can drop to what would be considered normally as life threatening levels (below detection on the CGM) yet I am completely asymptomatic. I assume because my brain is used to ketone metabolism. This is not to encourage ethanol ingestion, just some interesting side notes. I choose to drink very rarely in moderation.
Dr Bikman addressed this in a previous Q&A session, saying that alcohol inhibits glucagon, resulting in the decreased blood glucose. In my case, a modest drink at the end of a meal will often return my glucose to a normal level quite reliably. That can’t all be bad, though I understand there are other negative effects to consider. I do wonder about the connection between this phenomenon and the suggestion you sometimes hear to consume fermented foods and drinks (like vinegar) as a way of regulating blood glucose spikes from a meal. I’m sure this is a delicate area of discussion for any professional in this area of concern.
I really like your experiment. Maybe this means that alcohol could be used in the metabolic therapy of cancer, in professor Seyfried's press-pulse protocol. Something like this: - fast for 72 hours - use DON and alcohol to block both glutamine and glucose - fast a few more days I am not an expert in this at all, it may even be counter-productive, but it looks very interesting.
I've tested a few acholic drinks (a glass of wine, an old fashioned, and a beer). None of them really spiked my blood sugar. But I did gain a pound or 2 the next day after each drink. I learned that the liver turns off fat burning and stores excess in the liver. I am a very infrequent drinker and this new found knowledge has affirmed that habit.
@@miklosszThese are great comments, I was having a conversation with a colleague (a Cardiac Surgeon), he recanted a story regarding a friend who used alcohol to moderate (control) his blood glucose as a T2DM. I think at the time we were discussing a couple of fit and active 95-year olds who consumed 2-units twice a day.
yes, for me rarely means no more than one week out of a month. If it takes 3-4 days for alcohol to clear the systems, if you just drink on the weekends (Fri, Sat, Sun) it never completely clears. Give you liver a break, at least!
Dr Bikman, it would be very helpful to have a glossary of the terms you use in each. Is that currently available or can it be made available? Thank you for this wonderful information ; its so helpful even for those of us who are laymen. Regards, Angela McDaniel
Thank you for very clear and really useful lecture. Now, back to reality. I retired a couple of years ago. Till then my job was very stressful, long hours, frequently working on weekends. My typical bed time was, I would be lying in bed, unable to fall asleep, sometimes almost till morning. Having a few shots of whiskey, was my way to turn off my brain and fall asleep. My choice was, either little or no sleep or at least a reasonable number of hours, even though not the best quality of my sleep. What would you chose? By the way, other remedies like melatonin, etc. were of no effect. Regarding the overall impact of alcohol. While those studies are very important, I don't think this is always 100% conclusive. Take for example geographic areas where people culturally have alcohol (wine) as a normal staple consumed from early ages: France, Armenia, Georgia, in those two, people are known for longevity (100 years is not unusual) and wine is on dinner table every day.
While excessive alcohol consumption can lead to insulin resistance, moderate alcohol intake may actually improve insulin sensitivity. It's a matter of self-control. That's why I drink milk kefir and sometimes red wine. Traditional kefir, made with kefir grains, can have an alcohol content of around 2.5% to 3%.
This is the hormetic rebound argument saying a little won’t hurt but the discussion here suggests combining lactate and ethanol can introduce higher than regular insulin levels, inhibiting glucose transport into cells and inflammation of the gut lining and subsequent elevated cortisol affecting sleep cycles. Question is should be any? Sure the body can handle it but at what cost?
It does not spike blood sugar, but I have found that it does cause me to gain weight the next day. With alcohol, the liver turns to storing it as fat and turns off fat burning. I only had one glass/drink each time and I was surprised that I gained a pound or two each time, even if I was careful with the rest of the diet
Very interesting. I’m a big fan of your work. I would though be interested to hear your additional thoughts on the OGT test. If alcohol ‘forces’ the liver to stop ‘business as usual’ to metabolize it (your priority boarding), then given the liver is a major actor on storage of glucose from the blood, is it not to be expected that blood sugar would remain raised and the pancreas would respond by producing more insulin? In this case, can we really term it as ‘resistance’?
Since High Fructose Corn Syrup entered the beverages used as mixers, doesn't the metabolic bus add the fructose priority right after alcohol? Thanks. There is usually 2-3 times the amount of mixer to alcohol ratio used.
Usually Dr. Bikman specifies that he is talking to keto people and not those with a mixed or 'SAD' diet. So, IDK what holds for keto folks in this talk. On keto, your blood sugar is already low, and if you drink low-carb beer, like me, you probably get quite drowsy or feel tired soon after drinking. I've always assumed that's because my gluconeogensis is inhibited when my liver turns to processing booze. With low glucose production, and just a few grams of carbohydrate from beer, I expect my insulin would only rise if the alcohol was also blocking glucose from entering cells (as Ben mentions early on), and triggering insulin to come to the rescue under low energy signalling (mainly for the sake of red blood cells, but perhaps for some nerve cells, that depend on glucose. This is just mechanistic speculation, of course. Also, I drink my 2-3 beers per day (have for a decade) in the late morning before lunch. I sleep very well and most often wake up precisely in the position I fell asleep... so, some of the data here doesn't match my experience. Is it because I get about 12 hours before bedtime after drinking? IDK
@@GB-nu6ow I suppose it would confirm to a degree that the reason I feel tired is low blood sugar... an apple watch might say more about whether I'm getting deep sleep. That's how John MacKey, co-founder of Whole Foods, found that alcohol ruined his deep sleep. Great interview with him on ReasonTV recently.
@@GB-nu6ow Even though it's legal to sell without a prescription now, FreeStyle Libre can't be purchased on Amazon without one. Waiting for that to change. ;)
I like the framed plaque on the wall over your left shoulder. It makes the background look “complete”, as opposed to that previous lone hook that could bother a person with OCD tendencies when watching you in these videos.
@@lindapestridge3073 I increased the quality and put it to theatre mode on the computer to look at it after reading your previous comment to see if it was hanging crooked and noticed the other.
Again, another good and useful presentation, thank you. I am however totally confused now! I am currently reading a book "The very good news about wine" by Tony Edwards. Everything he writes is extremely well referenced. And the conclusion is that wine (and other alcohols) is in fact good for you (in moderation, of course). I do recommend the reading of that book!
I don't really understand what you are talking about. I have reversed my T2D and have been on no medication for 2 years now. My last A1C was 5.27 and my fasting insulin was 3.6. And I have a beer with my meal and a couple of shots of hard liquor during the day. Minimal carbs, obviously. So, what is this?
Short version: glad you are doing fine, good for you. Surely you could do better by stopping alcohol but as usual it is a personal decision, if you are good enough you can certainly keep doing what you are doing. Also age is a VERY important variable: what you do in your 20s or 30s may be fine but not good on your 50s or 60s. Hope this helps!
Are you on a ketogenic diet? If so..Alcohol may pause ketosis but only until the ketones produced from alcohol are consumed. Then the body will ramp right up again if it needs energy. The dose makes the poison, plus what you are eating with it. Theres an old diet called the " Military diet" that was basically eat only meat when you are drinking....and the military guys drank alot. They could still lose weight as long as they didnt consume carbs or extra fat. Again, I think the dose makes it problematic and if you are stimulating excess insulin.
I have auto brewery syndrome meaning my body creates ethanol from carbs. I have been drunk 24/7 for 2 months and my BAC as hogh as 0.3%. When it started i cut all simple carbs including everything with added sugar. I had a glucose level well over 300 when it started. Today my fasting glucose is
Q to Dr Bikman: How is insulin resistance to be fully understood: It may occur in certain cells, i.e. Partially, e.g. PCOS = insulin resistance in the ovaries. Following your brilliant presentation, it strikes me that there might be a temporary insulin resistance as a concequence of e.g «a long and happy weekend with good friends». If this way of thinking gives meaning, what would be an indicated time lap for «being resistant»?
Insulin resistance may occur in many ways like from decrease sensitivity of receptors to breakdown of it. If the receptors sensitivity decrease like waking for whole night then it insulin sensitivity may restore repidly but when the receptors are destroy by the cell inside lysosomes which will take longer than expected to restore sensitivity.
@Insulin IQ If a t1 diabetic of 8years has been an alcoholic most of their life (who after going carnivore back in March can no longer stand the smell or taste of alcohol of any kind 😁 ) could the insulin resistance extend for an extended period beyond giving up drinking? Could you suggest ways to accelerate reversal of the IR? Thank you. 🙂
It probably means that you shouldn’t eat skin cream with ceramides. Just kidding, but your skin is already full of ceramides, they help keep moisture in and bad things out. That is why they are in skin cream products. Also, ceramides is plural, there is more than one kind and they serve different purposes throughout the body.
But is this true for equivalent for 1 oz. Vodka beverage? I drink minimally n when I do I use juice of fresh Lemon only and I am curious if this too related to insulin spike. It didn’t sound like that to me … ?
Just checking that I have understood your lesson correctly… If sleep disruption can lead to insulin resistance via elevated cortisol, are new parents at risk of developing high cortisol and therefore insulin resistance, given the inevitable sleep disruptions each new baby entails…? 🤔
New parents are certainly prone to consider drinking more to manage stress and eating more easily prepared junk food to manage the increased time it takes to care for a baby. Not scientific, but certainly a common experience anecdotally.
I would like to know what quanties of alchol were used in these studies. If i have 2 drinks in 4 hours, is that a health issue. If i do that 3 times a week, is it a problem.
Can Benzodiazipines work the same as alcohol? I take a .5 mg with melatonin and GABA every night to get to sleep. I have high blood sugars in the morning, I am type 2 and I have hypothyroidism. I can't seem to lose weight on keto.
Even in small amounts. The idea that two glasses of red wine a day is good for your heart has been debunked. Canada's guideline is down to two a week being safe.
My hdl goes to 100 and my insulin drops and my triglycerides are 90 when I drink and I have no idea why. If I don’t drink it all switches… I wish someone could explain it because my doctor cant.
Alcohol spikes insulin? Thay might explain the fact that when I go to the bar and drink one or two hard licqour drinks, my cgm shows my blood glucose going down. I had not ingested any carbs previously or while ddrinkiing.
I’m 64, working class, still working, hard life, I’m tired , it’s been one BS thing after another. A couple beers on the weekend with friends and a ball game is the only time I feel like living. Sorry, but that’s the truth.
I appreciate your position. I'm 77 and am fixing what I screwed up on for year. So in your life situation, you may start to know diabetics (type 2), maybe people on dialysis, losing their vision from glaucoma, or MacD, or fatty liver contemplating a transplant. I had a wake up call last year...and I want to avoid these and other associated problems with hyperinsulinemia. Get a Fasting Insulin and A1C test and see where you stand...right, wrong or indifferent...mine is next week. I may have a Michelob Ultra Pure Gold, or low sugar/alcohol wine with supper tonight. Best wishes
You should definitely enjoy yourself with your friends and quaff a few beers. Life is for living and if you stick to low carb or carnivore during the week you’ll be doing A LOT better than the great majority! 💪
I'd say yes. Science isn't fair. Many people aren't going to know if it matters until they get their bloodwork done. Many health conditions have a large genetic component, including obesity, diabetes, high cholesterol, and high blood pressure. Some people live healthy lifestyles, don't drink, and still have insulin resistance or prediabetes.
During covid, I was always spraying my hands with pure ethanol; would this have affected my insulin resistance or does it have to be consumed internally to have some damage done.
What can I take or do to lower cortisol? Mine is very high and it's affecting my insulin level making it high. I am under a lot of stress. Husband going through Cancer treatment I am worried about everything. My doctor wants me on meds. I believe eating a clean food diet. Vitamins and minerals also natural meds. I have never drank alcohol. So what should I take for lowering my cortisol? Thankyou very much in advance!
Why aren't you on meds? Eating a clean food diet won't help with this condition. Vitamins and minerals aren't natural meds. You could do this for years and not see any improvement.
So i drink no sugar liquid wi t h vidka. Ben said alcohol by itself does not illicit an insulin response. So 2 drinks a night, 4 nights per week, should not be a problem. My blood sugar us liwer when i drknk. Soooooooooo??????
Wow! Very good. Now we need some clinical context to put this knowledge into action. What level of chronic consumption is pathogenic? And, if we, for example, stop all alcohol consumption , how long will it take to reverse the negative impact? Is there permanent damage?
What are you talking about? Have you tried drinking alcohol and measuring your blood sugar? Does it fall too much? Why? And how do we secrete insulin if we don't have a sugar spike?
Alcohol stop the liver from releasing glucose into the bloodstream (a process called gluconeogenesis), but doesn't stop the pancreas from secreting insulin to cover said glucose. Insulin without glucose results in lower blood glucose level.
@@Dr.vip08055 Ummmm ... Dr. Bosworth has done research showing insulin levels rise when both protein and fat are consumed ... so your statement "Insulin without a sugar spike does not exist" is not supported by research
@@Dr.vip08055if you take a drink which has an artificial sweetener in it your pancreas will output insulin to cope with the glucose Spike it is expecting from the sweet taste in your mouth. But your drink has no glucose.
Dear Dr Bikman,❤ I hope you can cover the dairy consumption and why many carnivore MDs here on RUclips advise not to consume dairy. I don't think it's realistic for many people. To give up dairy (having given up sugar, grain etc). It can be too much limitations. But what is your opinion?
"don't think it's realistic for many people" to give up their last addiction... I love dairy, took me 5 years to stop consuming it, not fun because I'm a sugar/carb addict.
What's realistic, I think, is subjective and dependant on one's goals and motivation. There is always a cost/benefit to giving up, nor not, anything. Does it get you closer to your goal, or further away ... and by how much ... are you willing to accept the consequences.
@@EvgeniiaDolinenko I'm not happy about not eating what I want. I ate anything I wanted until I was 40, along with lots of exercise, I was able to keep the fat off. Now I'm 64 and I can't eat any carbs/sugar without gaining weight. It really sucks but it's normal for most of us. Giving up my last favorite thing (dairy) really sucks but I want to keep the fat off and keep my A1C in the good range. I agree with you, for most people it's not realistic to stop addiction w/o some kind of assistance. Take care.
@@MrLuba6a it's a simple quip analogy Mr. Snappy. A good one too. I'm referring to it's addictive, personality changing qualities pertaining only to your first question... it IS like playing with fire. The second question no-one knows about, there is only weak associative hypothesis... but personally I'm doing exceptionally well without exogenous polyphenol input.
@@Tezzzaaa One night I measured my glucose and it showed 115 ml. I drank a glass of red wine (125ml) and after half an hour my glucose showed 95ml...how come? If RED WINE IS BAD?
@@MrLuba6a Ben is saying that insulin is stimulated but the ethanol interferes with the livers glyco-neogenesis (ability to make sugar) and can cause blood sugar to drop to far. Combined with raised insulin trying to store not release sugar it's not good. He's looking at it from a low carb perspective also. It's more nuanced than good or bad. Even artificial sweetener in the mouth stimulates insulin and causes blood sugar to drop. When you exercise hard ur blood sugar can double or more even as a zero carber. It's temporarily raised for a reason so blood sugar per se isn't the main problem. It's frequent exogenous interference in the glucose chain mechanism that Ben is pointing out. A single glass one off will do little harm in the same way that grazing your knee does little 'harm' but you wouldn't do it on purpose. There's a lot to take in here, I've watched it 3 times and still haven't got it all.🙂
I doubt very much that any religious beliefs bias the integrity of Bens scientific research. Plus his considerable intelligence to analyse data. You may be biased yourself to cope.🤔
Also Jesus Christ transformed water in wine. Your ignorance is appalling. Abstain not only talking about nutrition and metabolism but mainly about religion.
I'm the one who gave up alcohol because it's too harmful for the whole body. Even before i got to learn about insuline. I just realized that resveratrol thing or what benefits they claim, i dont need them.
So you spend the first 5 minutes talking about these effects of alcohol and then you suddenly say that it's not the alcohol. It's the carbs in the sugar that are consumed with alcohol. Man, be clear on what you're talking about in the title of the video
One study that has fascinated me is where a rodent group was fed pure ethanol diet, they did not even get fatty liver. When a bit of linoleic acid acid was added to that diet the mice rapidly developed fatty liver, cirrhosis and death.
I think you must be misremembering something here. There were studies that looked at the effects of alcohol and linoleic acid on mice (e.g. DR Warner et al., 2017) and they did indeed show that linoleic acid exacerbates the damage from alcohol, but AFAIK nobody ever tried "feeding" mice a pure ethanol diet (without any other nutrients), and if they did, it would be about as much a disaster as such a "diet" usually turns out in humans.
As a drinker, i can attest to the falling asleep quickly, only to have trouble the second half of the night. Therefore being sleepy the next day. I appreciate these videos. Help reinforce the changes im making. Thank u.
Same wake at 3am every time
We used to call waking up at 2 am after drinking “alcohol insomnia “ . It’s hard to get back to sleep. I always thought it was because of a drop in blood sugar. Sometimes it took eating something sweet to get back to sleep.
I realize now how hard that is on your body!
⁰
😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊😊
A lecture on time line and stages from Alcohol cessation to recovery of IR, ROS, A1C, and healing of the endothelial layer would be watched by many.
👍 TY!
Well you have convinced me that even though I have reduced my alcohol consumption considerably since going Keto, even the occasional wine Spritzer is probably not a good idea when it comes to recovering from my insulin resistance. And my own experience when I disregard this advice has proven it to me. It is good to know why however - Thank you!
I believe everything you say so i must be a weirdo.i am female and have had hardcore insomnia for 40 years.i have run marathons with no sleep.hiked big peaks with no sleep and no food.i don't get tired during the day,never take a nap.easy to fall asleep,never stay asleep.the most i sleep i get at one time is 3.5 hours.yes, have had sleep studies.no one can help with the insomnia.i have been offered sleeping pills.i don't take them.i don't have sleep apnea.whether i have some wine or not the nights are the same.i have followed advice from everyone who offers it.i have always exercised..in the seventies i was deemed a health nut.even though you can't help me i believe in you and watch every lecture you make. i have learned so much from you.
That’s me before they found my adrenal tumor. Now that it’s been excised my superpowers went away. I miss the metanephrines but not the cortisol so much. It turned out the cortisol gave me a blood sugar dyscrasia. A high blood glucose and a normal A1C.
Probably not you. Just saying. It took 35 years for me and if it wasn’t for the bladder cancer I’d never have known I wasn’t superhuman. Can you say ROS. Lol
Sleep - Dr Stasha Gominak website
Might I ask, how many grams of protein do you eat daily? I too, have bad insomnia but recently I upped my protein intake to the range of 130-170 grams per day.
I'm male, 6'0, 160 lbs and am fit
@@MikeShonVideos probably meant this for the Gal above. If insomnia (I really did think I just didn’t need sleep.) is only sleeping a few hours it disappeared with the tumor eventually. I found walking and resistance exercises gives me 8 to 9 hours these days. I’m 68 so I do a gram per pound of mainly animal protein in a 6 hour window if you really want to know. lol
So did increasing your protein intake help with the insomnia? I probably eat 80 grams daily, not entirely sure. Most of it is animal.
5 year as 100% free from alcohol will not ever more drink alcohol in my life..
Congratulations, brother.
13 months for me and I totally agree with you.Congrats to you!🎉
Very helpful. Looks like I need to eliminate alcohol from my diet. Thank you
Hello Ben Bikman from the ‘Peg in 🇨🇦
Finally reading your book
Page 5..my jaw dropped!
I had no idea about the role of insulin!
I am shocked!
Whoa.
Thank you so much, Dr. Bikman for the deep dive.
I will be sharing this video with family members
Once again, you are spot on with content, presentation, and that adorable face. Thank you Dr. Bikman.
Your generosity and time with your regular lessons needs thanks. I will definitely buy your book to ‘give back’.
Thanks!
Thank you. That is very kind of you and certainly not expected.
I’m in perimenopause and any time I have a drink I have the WORST sleep. I wake up between 2:30 and 3:30 and cannot get back to sleep. I used to love a social drink, but sleep is more important!
My dr said that is the liver detoxing, like clockwork, right?
Omg me tooo
Thanks
Charles, that is very kind of you. Thank you. Not expected, but appreciated.
Thank you for the update and information it’s excellent!!
In case anyone still wants to have alcohol every now and then. I found a couple of videos here on youtube by a russian doctor Alexandr Barsukov where he explains that consuming alcohol together with lemon (juice, or whole lemon) neutralizes the destructive effect of alcohol on the liver. He also gives an interesting method of reducing the amount of alcohol while achieving a desired "relaxation" effect: take a small sip and hold it in your mouth for a few second before swallowing. This way alcohol is absorbed into your blood stream through its contact with your gums.
it helps taking l-ornithine and molybdenum
Do you have a link to this dr? I can’t find him. Thanks
Not mentioned today is the well documented data that alcohol users even heavy regular use, have lower blood sugar and HbA1c. I expect this is because alcohol inhibits glujconeogeneis at the level of the liver. I have done many experiments with CGMs to prove to myself without any question that blood sugar drops quite precipitously after alcohol ingestion. This is well known in the Medical field where bad alcoholics can have life threatening hypoglycaemia. In my case where I am fat adapted my blood sugar can drop to what would be considered normally as life threatening levels (below detection on the CGM) yet I am completely asymptomatic. I assume because my brain is used to ketone metabolism. This is not to encourage ethanol ingestion, just some interesting side notes. I choose to drink very rarely in moderation.
Dr Bikman addressed this in a previous Q&A session, saying that alcohol inhibits glucagon, resulting in the decreased blood glucose. In my case, a modest drink at the end of a meal will often return my glucose to a normal level quite reliably. That can’t all be bad, though I understand there are other negative effects to consider. I do wonder about the connection between this phenomenon and the suggestion you sometimes hear to consume fermented foods and drinks (like vinegar) as a way of regulating blood glucose spikes from a meal. I’m sure this is a delicate area of discussion for any professional in this area of concern.
I really like your experiment. Maybe this means that alcohol could be used in the metabolic therapy of cancer, in professor Seyfried's press-pulse protocol. Something like this:
- fast for 72 hours
- use DON and alcohol to block both glutamine and glucose
- fast a few more days
I am not an expert in this at all, it may even be counter-productive, but it looks very interesting.
I've tested a few acholic drinks (a glass of wine, an old fashioned, and a beer). None of them really spiked my blood sugar. But I did gain a pound or 2 the next day after each drink. I learned that the liver turns off fat burning and stores excess in the liver. I am a very infrequent drinker and this new found knowledge has affirmed that habit.
@@miklosszThese are great comments, I was having a conversation with a colleague (a Cardiac Surgeon), he recanted a story regarding a friend who used alcohol to moderate (control) his blood glucose as a T2DM. I think at the time we were discussing a couple of fit and active 95-year olds who consumed 2-units twice a day.
yes, for me rarely means no more than one week out of a month. If it takes 3-4 days for alcohol to clear the systems, if you just drink on the weekends (Fri, Sat, Sun) it never completely clears.
Give you liver a break, at least!
Thank you Sir .,Great lecture
Great discussion, Ben and very helpful.
Listening in my car, thx Ben 👍🏻
Thank you, great topic
Thanks, Ben, for another important teaching. Always helpful, always clear. God bless!😊
Thanks
Extremely useful data.
Clear and very easy to understand.
Now i have a better insight of this topic.
The best synonym for inflammation beginning with S is septicity
Dr Bikman, it would be very helpful to have a glossary of the terms you use in each. Is that currently available or can it be made available? Thank you for this wonderful information ; its so helpful even for those of us who are laymen. Regards, Angela McDaniel
Thank you for very clear and really useful lecture.
Now, back to reality. I retired a couple of years ago. Till then my job was very stressful, long hours, frequently working on weekends. My typical bed time was, I would be lying in bed, unable to fall asleep, sometimes almost till morning. Having a few shots of whiskey, was my way to turn off my brain and fall asleep. My choice was, either little or no sleep or at least a reasonable number of hours, even though not the best quality of my sleep.
What would you chose?
By the way, other remedies like melatonin, etc. were of no effect.
Regarding the overall impact of alcohol. While those studies are very important, I don't think this is always 100% conclusive. Take for example geographic areas where people culturally have alcohol (wine) as a normal staple consumed from early ages: France, Armenia, Georgia, in those two, people are known for longevity (100 years is not unusual) and wine is on dinner table every day.
While excessive alcohol consumption can lead to insulin resistance, moderate alcohol intake may actually improve insulin sensitivity. It's a matter of self-control. That's why I drink milk kefir and sometimes red wine. Traditional kefir, made with kefir grains, can have an alcohol content of around 2.5% to 3%.
This is the hormetic rebound argument saying a little won’t hurt but the discussion here suggests combining lactate and ethanol can introduce higher than regular insulin levels, inhibiting glucose transport into cells and inflammation of the gut lining and subsequent elevated cortisol affecting sleep cycles. Question is should be any? Sure the body can handle it but at what cost?
It does not spike blood sugar, but I have found that it does cause me to gain weight the next day. With alcohol, the liver turns to storing it as fat and turns off fat burning. I only had one glass/drink each time and I was surprised that I gained a pound or two each time, even if I was careful with the rest of the diet
There's that word 'moderate' again! So, despite being classified as a toxin, you think that in 'moderation' it's OK?
That was brilliant... 2nd time listening.
Great lecture!
Very interesting. I’m a big fan of your work. I would though be interested to hear your additional thoughts on the OGT test. If alcohol ‘forces’ the liver to stop ‘business as usual’ to metabolize it (your priority boarding), then given the liver is a major actor on storage of glucose from the blood, is it not to be expected that blood sugar would remain raised and the pancreas would respond by producing more insulin? In this case, can we really term it as ‘resistance’?
Since High Fructose Corn Syrup entered the beverages used as mixers, doesn't the metabolic bus add the fructose priority right after alcohol? Thanks. There is usually 2-3 times the amount of mixer to alcohol ratio used.
Yes! Talk about lactate please
Is it important to test for ceramides when trying to reverse insulin resistance and metobolic syndrome,?
Usually Dr. Bikman specifies that he is talking to keto people and not those with a mixed or 'SAD' diet. So, IDK what holds for keto folks in this talk. On keto, your blood sugar is already low, and if you drink low-carb beer, like me, you probably get quite drowsy or feel tired soon after drinking. I've always assumed that's because my gluconeogensis is inhibited when my liver turns to processing booze. With low glucose production, and just a few grams of carbohydrate from beer, I expect my insulin would only rise if the alcohol was also blocking glucose from entering cells (as Ben mentions early on), and triggering insulin to come to the rescue under low energy signalling (mainly for the sake of red blood cells, but perhaps for some nerve cells, that depend on glucose. This is just mechanistic speculation, of course.
Also, I drink my 2-3 beers per day (have for a decade) in the late morning before lunch. I sleep very well and most often wake up precisely in the position I fell asleep... so, some of the data here doesn't match my experience. Is it because I get about 12 hours before bedtime after drinking? IDK
would it be useful to use a continual blood glucose monitor 🤔?
@@GB-nu6ow I suppose it would confirm to a degree that the reason I feel tired is low blood sugar... an apple watch might say more about whether I'm getting deep sleep. That's how John MacKey, co-founder of Whole Foods, found that alcohol ruined his deep sleep. Great interview with him on ReasonTV recently.
@@GB-nu6ow Even though it's legal to sell without a prescription now, FreeStyle Libre can't be purchased on Amazon without one. Waiting for that to change. ;)
I too find that I sleep better if I finish drinking by mid afternoon.
Thanks, Ben! Great message
I like the framed plaque on the wall over your left shoulder. It makes the background look “complete”, as opposed to that previous lone hook that could bother a person with OCD tendencies when watching you in these videos.
I think it's a little bit crooked
What makes you think I have
OCD LOL.
@@lindapestridge3073 The paper inside the frame looks to be slightly crooked.
@@jobrown8146Ha Ha
I didn't notice that.
@@lindapestridge3073 I increased the quality and put it to theatre mode on the computer to look at it after reading your previous comment to see if it was hanging crooked and noticed the other.
Reading the comments makes me feel like I'm in a mental institution.
Again, another good and useful presentation, thank you. I am however totally confused now! I am currently reading a book "The very good news about wine" by Tony Edwards. Everything he writes is extremely well referenced. And the conclusion is that wine (and other alcohols) is in fact good for you (in moderation, of course). I do recommend the reading of that book!
A French doctor who plugs red wine whitters on about polyphenals. Does Tony Edward’s do that? 🤔
@@1timbarrett
Why don't you read his book to find out?
Thanks Ben 👍👍🙏
I'll raise a glass to this one!
(I mean, it's just electrolytes and water, but still ....🍺🤓)
Yet another video pointing out the fact that I need to break my wine cheese and cracker habit.
I don't really understand what you are talking about. I have reversed my T2D and have been on no medication for 2 years now. My last A1C was 5.27 and my fasting insulin was 3.6. And I have a beer with my meal and a couple of shots of hard liquor during the day. Minimal carbs, obviously. So, what is this?
Short version: glad you are doing fine, good for you. Surely you could do better by stopping alcohol but as usual it is a personal decision, if you are good enough you can certainly keep doing what you are doing. Also age is a VERY important variable: what you do in your 20s or 30s may be fine but not good on your 50s or 60s. Hope this helps!
Are you on a ketogenic diet? If so..Alcohol may pause ketosis but only until the ketones produced from alcohol are consumed. Then the body will ramp right up again if it needs energy. The dose makes the poison, plus what you are eating with it. Theres an old diet called the " Military diet" that was basically eat only meat when you are drinking....and the military guys drank alot. They could still lose weight as long as they didnt consume carbs or extra fat. Again, I think the dose makes it problematic and if you are stimulating excess insulin.
Hea not speaking specifically to you.
Thank you Prof. Bikman! I’m sharing this with a dear alcohol friend.
I have auto brewery syndrome meaning my body creates ethanol from carbs. I have been drunk 24/7 for 2 months and my BAC as hogh as 0.3%. When it started i cut all simple carbs including everything with added sugar. I had a glucose level well over 300 when it started. Today my fasting glucose is
Q to Dr Bikman: How is insulin resistance to be fully understood: It may occur in certain cells, i.e. Partially, e.g. PCOS = insulin resistance in the ovaries. Following your brilliant presentation, it strikes me that there might be a temporary insulin resistance as a concequence of e.g «a long and happy weekend with good friends». If this way of thinking gives meaning, what would be an indicated time lap for «being resistant»?
Insulin resistance may occur in many ways like from decrease sensitivity of receptors to breakdown of it. If the receptors sensitivity decrease like waking for whole night then it insulin sensitivity may restore repidly but when the receptors are destroy by the cell inside lysosomes which will take longer than expected to restore sensitivity.
In PCOS ovaries doesn't become insulin resistant but highl insulin inhibit eromatas enzyme which convert androgen into estrogen
What if like me u drink red wine & eat zero glucose (but there is a little glucose in my meat & in my cream & in my salami).
@Insulin IQ If a t1 diabetic of 8years has been an alcoholic most of their life (who after going carnivore back in March can no longer stand the smell or taste of alcohol of any kind 😁 ) could the insulin resistance extend for an extended period beyond giving up drinking? Could you suggest ways to accelerate reversal of the IR? Thank you. 🙂
Does this mean I should not use skin cream with ceramides?
It probably means that you shouldn’t eat skin cream with ceramides. Just kidding, but your skin is already full of ceramides, they help keep moisture in and bad things out. That is why they are in skin cream products. Also, ceramides is plural, there is more than one kind and they serve different purposes throughout the body.
Thank u prof!
But is this true for equivalent for 1 oz. Vodka beverage? I drink minimally n when I do I use juice of fresh Lemon only and I am curious if this too related to insulin spike. It didn’t sound like that to me … ?
Is erythritol a factor in what you have explained does it do the same things in the body???
Just checking that I have understood your lesson correctly… If sleep disruption can lead to insulin resistance via elevated cortisol, are new parents at risk of developing high cortisol and therefore insulin resistance, given the inevitable sleep disruptions each new baby entails…? 🤔
New parents are certainly prone to consider drinking more to manage stress and eating more easily prepared junk food to manage the increased time it takes to care for a baby. Not scientific, but certainly a common experience anecdotally.
Most drinking alcohol works entirely because of ethanol. But Jamaican rum gets about 20% of its strength from 1-propanol.
I would like to know what quanties of alchol were used in these studies. If i have 2 drinks in 4 hours, is that a health issue. If i do that 3 times a week, is it a problem.
26:09 " Alcohol causes metabolic problems and in particular a host of problems ." BINGO !
You have to quote the whole sentence in order to make any sense.
thx Ben
Good morning
“I’ve taken far more than alcohol has taken from me.” Winston Churchill
Can Benzodiazipines work the same as alcohol? I take a .5 mg with melatonin and GABA every night to get to sleep. I have high blood sugars in the morning, I am type 2 and I have hypothyroidism. I can't seem to lose weight on keto.
As you probably know, Dr Annette Boz calls benzos “alcohol in a pill.” 😂
Going to quit drinking. Only been a couple days now but it’s about time!
Alcohol is poison, avoid.
You have to wonder, why would we be wired that way?
Even in small amounts. The idea that two glasses of red wine a day is good for your heart has been debunked. Canada's guideline is down to two a week being safe.
My hdl goes to 100 and my insulin drops and my triglycerides are 90 when I drink and I have no idea why. If I don’t drink it all switches… I wish someone could explain it because my doctor cant.
Alcohol spikes insulin? Thay might explain the fact that when I go to the bar and drink one or two hard licqour drinks, my cgm shows my blood glucose going down. I had not ingested any carbs previously or while ddrinkiing.
I’m 64, working class, still working, hard life, I’m tired , it’s been one BS thing after another. A couple beers on the weekend with friends and a ball game is the only time I feel like living. Sorry, but that’s the truth.
I appreciate your position. I'm 77 and am fixing what I screwed up on for year. So in your life situation, you may start to know diabetics (type 2), maybe people on dialysis, losing their vision from glaucoma, or MacD, or fatty liver contemplating a transplant. I had a wake up call last year...and I want to avoid these and other associated problems with hyperinsulinemia. Get a Fasting Insulin and A1C test and see where you stand...right, wrong or indifferent...mine is next week. I may have a Michelob Ultra Pure Gold, or low sugar/alcohol wine with supper tonight. Best wishes
Addicts, who cares? No one asked.
As you think, so shall you be. You need to follow Joe Dispenza! 🩵🩵🩵
You should definitely enjoy yourself with your friends and quaff a few beers. Life is for living and if you stick to low carb or carnivore during the week you’ll be doing A LOT better than the great majority! 💪
Sugar, sleep, substrates, and swelling.
Does any of this matter if you're a healthy weight and in a deficit
I'd say yes. Science isn't fair. Many people aren't going to know if it matters until they get their bloodwork done. Many health conditions have a large genetic component, including obesity, diabetes, high cholesterol, and high blood pressure. Some people live healthy lifestyles, don't drink, and still have insulin resistance or prediabetes.
Wow, I can only imagine an 8 hour night. Good luck, hope it works for good.
So, why the postprandial glucose is lower if i drink wine?
Lets say 150ml or 20ml ethanol.
During covid, I was always spraying my hands with pure ethanol; would this have affected my insulin resistance or does it have to be consumed internally to have some damage done.
What can I take or do to lower cortisol? Mine is very high and it's affecting my insulin level making it high. I am under a lot of stress. Husband going through Cancer treatment I am worried about everything. My doctor wants me on meds. I believe eating a clean food diet. Vitamins and minerals also natural meds. I have never drank alcohol. So what should I take for lowering my cortisol? Thankyou very much in advance!
What I found most beneficial was to prioritize sleep and work to support that.
Why aren't you on meds? Eating a clean food diet won't help with this condition. Vitamins and minerals aren't natural meds. You could do this for years and not see any improvement.
Exercise helps a lot with stress. I walk at least 5 miles a day.
You need to find God, believe me it will change your life 😊
Conclusion: Sporadically drink alcohol in moderation and AVOID carbs as much as possible when drinking, and also when not drinking 👍🏼
I got 'just avoid alcohol' from that.
You should certainly be aware that cancer is a metabollic desease..
So i drink no sugar liquid wi t h vidka. Ben said alcohol by itself does not illicit an insulin response. So 2 drinks a night, 4 nights per week, should not be a problem. My blood sugar us liwer when i drknk. Soooooooooo??????
Wow! Very good. Now we need some clinical context to put this knowledge into action. What level of chronic consumption is pathogenic? And, if we, for example, stop all alcohol consumption , how long will it take to reverse the negative impact? Is there permanent damage?
Alcohol and fructose are hard on the liver and blood sugar
How much does Dry Red Wine influence insulin resistance? When Dry red Wine is made, the goal is for all the sugar to be converted into Alcohol.
What are you talking about? Have you tried drinking alcohol and measuring your blood sugar? Does it fall too much? Why? And how do we secrete insulin if we don't have a sugar spike?
Alcohol stop the liver from releasing glucose into the bloodstream (a process called gluconeogenesis), but doesn't stop the pancreas from secreting insulin to cover said glucose. Insulin without glucose results in lower blood glucose level.
@@JasonBuckman Insulin without a sugar spike does not exist.
I didn't know ignorant people are subscribed to this channel. You are one of them. 😮
@@Dr.vip08055 Ummmm ... Dr. Bosworth has done research showing insulin levels rise when both protein and fat are consumed ... so your statement "Insulin without a sugar spike does not exist" is not supported by research
@@Dr.vip08055if you take a drink which has an artificial sweetener in it your pancreas will output insulin to cope with the glucose Spike it is expecting from the sweet taste in your mouth.
But your drink has no glucose.
…what affects a billion people is IRON Anemia…can you do a lecture on this condition…?
Dear Dr Bikman,❤ I hope you can cover the dairy consumption and why many carnivore MDs here on RUclips advise not to consume dairy. I don't think it's realistic for many people. To give up dairy (having given up sugar, grain etc). It can be too much limitations. But what is your opinion?
"don't think it's realistic for many people" to give up their last addiction... I love dairy, took me 5 years to stop consuming it, not fun because I'm a sugar/carb addict.
@@Hiker_Mike Glad for you. I still think it's not realistic.
What's realistic, I think, is subjective and dependant on one's goals and motivation. There is always a cost/benefit to giving up, nor not, anything. Does it get you closer to your goal, or further away ... and by how much ... are you willing to accept the consequences.
@@EvgeniiaDolinenko I'm not happy about not eating what I want. I ate anything I wanted until I was 40, along with lots of exercise, I was able to keep the fat off. Now I'm 64 and I can't eat any carbs/sugar without gaining weight. It really sucks but it's normal for most of us. Giving up my last favorite thing (dairy) really sucks but I want to keep the fat off and keep my A1C in the good range. I agree with you, for most people it's not realistic to stop addiction w/o some kind of assistance. Take care.
Eh, dairy is easy to give up if you go pure beef. Cheese is addictive so if you don't eat it you don't crave it.
Beer belly, covers half of that.
🙏
❤❤❤
wonder if a glass of red wine,125ml is bad? how about the polyphenols in it?🍷
Fire can be pleasant at a distance but don't play with it.😊
@@Tezzzaaa better answer the question,I didn't ask for recomendations
@@MrLuba6a it's a simple quip analogy Mr. Snappy. A good one too. I'm referring to it's addictive, personality changing qualities pertaining only to your first question... it IS like playing with fire. The second question no-one knows about, there is only weak associative hypothesis... but personally I'm doing exceptionally well without exogenous polyphenol input.
@@Tezzzaaa One night I measured my glucose and it showed 115 ml. I drank a glass of red wine (125ml) and after half an hour my glucose showed 95ml...how come? If RED WINE IS BAD?
@@MrLuba6a Ben is saying that insulin is stimulated but the ethanol interferes with the livers glyco-neogenesis (ability to make sugar) and can cause blood sugar to drop to far. Combined with raised insulin trying to store not release sugar it's not good. He's looking at it from a low carb perspective also. It's more nuanced than good or bad.
Even artificial sweetener in the mouth stimulates insulin and causes blood sugar to drop. When you exercise hard ur blood sugar can double or more even as a zero carber. It's temporarily raised for a reason so blood sugar per se isn't the main problem. It's frequent exogenous interference in the glucose chain mechanism that Ben is pointing out. A single glass one off will do little harm in the same way that grazing your knee does little 'harm' but you wouldn't do it on purpose. There's a lot to take in here, I've watched it 3 times and still haven't got it all.🙂
💚🏜️💚
Alcohol will also, at least excessively, destroy your hormones, especially for women
But Dr. Bikman what if.................? Every person that likes alcohol.
I did once like alcohol. Unfortunately it did not like me back. 😢
When the scientist also has a religious bias against the compound being studied...not that Alcohol is good for you, but I'm 🤔
I doubt very much that any religious beliefs bias the integrity of Bens scientific research. Plus his considerable intelligence to analyse data. You may be biased yourself to cope.🤔
When alcoholics come to the comment section
Also Jesus Christ transformed water in wine. Your ignorance is appalling. Abstain not only talking about nutrition and metabolism but mainly about religion.
@@suprememasteroftheuniverse How bout you learn English before you come onto our platforms...your translator isn't working well.
Does he not have eyebrows?
Lack of eyebrows is a sign of genious.
Alcohol deficiency?
I'm the one who gave up alcohol because it's too harmful for the whole body. Even before i got to learn about insuline.
I just realized that resveratrol thing or what benefits they claim, i dont need them.
You NEVER made any reference to the quantities of ethanol required to cause this effect. So I am not placing a lot of value on your theories.
What happened to your hair, dude?
So you spend the first 5 minutes talking about these effects of alcohol and then you suddenly say that it's not the alcohol. It's the carbs in the sugar that are consumed with alcohol. Man, be clear on what you're talking about in the title of the video
Thanks!
Thank you, David, for your kind gift. Not expected, but noticed and much appreciated.
“I’ve taken far more than alcohol has taken from me.” Winston Churchill