Candy6900's Journal, 23 Feb 16

Good direction. 

Nice downward trend beginning to form on your chart. I am pleased for you.  

Thanks to both of you. The trend is only interrupted by copious evenings of wine, it's therefore a bit yo yo ish, but it is nevertheless gently downward isn't it. The wine really does have to stop! 

I TRY to limit my wine to the weekend. I am more or less at target but tend to trend upwards on a Monday but head back down by Friday. If I didn't indulge I would be steady at target but would be miserable without my fizz! (although happy with my weight) A quandary! 

It's the insulin resistance that the wine causes, over and above the simple calories, so so wish I didn't like wine so much! 

I don't know much about the insulin thing. I know all the other dangers of alcohol though! How can something so good be sooooo bad?! I try to eat well and exercise regularly to help counteract the damage. I am a pretty healthy specimen really.  

It acts in a similarly to sugar, promoting insulin resistance which promotes weight on, sadly and as I drink another glass! 

Oh well, try and keep the food diet good at least! I want to keep seeing the downward trend. 

I'm really going to have to be a little more disciplined next week and adopt your weekend wine only policy otherwise the downward trend will flatten out, and I've such a long way to go. I've exceeded my calories today and yesterday only because of wine, without which I would have been nicely under calories wise. 

It does help restricting the wine until the weekend. I usually have a great big glass of fizzy water with a slice of lime at wine o' clock during the week and that gets me past the craving.  

I just bought some pure grape juice, I'm going to try a little fizzy water with it and see if that tricks me successfully! 

Hi Candy, My hubby was drinking 1-2 bottles of red wine a night following his last heart attack March 2013 to calm his nerves not thinking it was damaging his liver at the time. He had gained 2 stone (28lbs) he stopped drinking 8th Feb '16 and has lost most of it which was fluid. He now drinks water instead but, he still drinks far too much tea which is also bad. Try your best to leave the wine out of your diet as it causes so much health problems as it has done m with my hubby...I drink about 2 mugs of tea with milk and sweetener a day, sometime 3 a day, 2 cups Pure green tea, 2 Ribena and, mostly water other times. Good luck with your diet, persevere and you will get there. Best wishes Astra! 

Oops! Sorry that should read 6th January 2016 

Thanks so much Astra, after this weekend I'll adopt Bunty's plan of no weekday drinking. 

How very interesting. I had no idea that alcohol affects insulin, so I read up a little on it. I have one small glass 125ml red wine with my main meal, which happens to be my breakfast :) This is taken from medicinenet.com - I have no idea if they are well regarded or not, but seems to be reasonably well put together website. "The greatest impact is seen in those who drink heavily on a frequent basis. .. Over time, excessive alcohol consumption can decrease insulin's effectiveness, resulting in high blood sugar levels. One study showed that 45% to 70% of people with alcoholic liver disease had either glucose intolerance or diabetes." So the negative effects of alcohol consumption on insulin and blood sugar clearly comes with excess, not with alcohol per se. Fascinating stuff. 

Live damage particularly is as a result of alcohol, but non alcoholic fatty liver disease can cause similar, symptomless, terminal damage without any drinking. That's why it's a good idea to request Nick Sherrons predictive 'Traffic Light' LFT's as the normal ones requested by GP's are in some conditions, including sclerosis. By the time the conventional tests show you have it, it's frequently too late. Any alcohol consumption, even moderate consumption, because it can cause insulin resistance, can also cause weight gain over and above what you might expect from an innocent 85 calorie glass of wine. 

Oh dear :( I have very low carbohydrate intake as I can't tolerate grains, pulses or seeds. I don't like sweet either, even many veggies are too sweet for me, and I don't eat processed food apart from wine, tinned fish and cheese... From what I have read so far I don't think I have any danger foods or lifestyle for fatty liver disease, and I have good self control so my small glass of wins always stays at that - just one small glass, some days none. Can it be true that I am doomed even from that one small innocent glass? Oh, Shiraz on FS is 124 kcals so it gets worse!! I get that the type of food I eat is more or less likely to make me lay down or burn fat over and above the raw kcal level, and I know alcohol is used preferentially in the body if it is there. When does a small 125ml intake become an invisible and dangerously moderate amount? Thanks for your help :) 

No, it's just that even a small amount of alcohol can trigger insulin resistance and promote some weight gain out of all proportional the small amount of calories. It's not that a small amount is harmful to the liver, just that alcohol can be a powerful weight gain trigger. Non alcoholic fatty liver can develop irrespective of diet, it's like diabetes, symptomless. I think the best, most accessible books that give an excellent overview of the effects of food, 'the Virgin Diet', 'the Diet Delusion', and 'the end of Illness'. 

I have Diabetes Type2. My medication for that is 1,500 Metformin per day. I do have a drink Christmas day. I always allow myself the one drink, a double vodka and one of those small bottles of orange juice. No more than that. Other than that, I don't drink during the year. When I have a drink I don't take my medications because there would be no point as the medication wouldn't be doing its job plus it can be dangerous.