Alcohol Messes with Your Blood Sugar Levels

Sugar/glucose is the main energy source for all tissues. The brain and muscles work exclusively off these levels in the blood. An athlete with compromised blood sugar levels cannot perform at any optimal level. Glucose comes from three sources: food, synthesis in the body, and break down of glycogen (the form of glucose that the body stores in the liver).

Hormones maintain a constant concentration of glucose in the blood, which is especially important for the brain because it cannot make or store glucose but depends on glucose supplied by the blood. Even brief periods of low glucose levels (hypoglycemia) can cause brain damage or affect the performance of the central nervous system.

Insulin and glucagons, secreted by the pancreas, regulate blood glucose levels.  Insulin lowers the glucose concentration in the blood, and glucagon raises it.  Because maintaining blood sugar levels is of extreme importance for your body, there are also other hormones released from the adrenal and pituitary glands to support glucagon’s function.

Alcohol messes with all three glucose sources and with the actions of regulatory hormones.

Most often drinkers don’t get enough glucose through their diets.  If you don’t eat, the glycogen stored in your liver will be used up within a few hours.  In addition, the body has trouble making more glucose because it is expending its energy metabolizing the alcohol.  Both of these effects of alcohol can cause severe hypoglycemia (low blood sugar) 6 to 36 hours after a binge drinking episode.

Even if you think that can’t happen to you because you ate a healthy meal, you are wrong.  Alcohol can still mess up blood sugar levels.  If that’s not enough, studies have shown that acute alcohol consumption can impair the hormonal response to hypoglycemia.  So not only do you develop hypoglycemia, your body also has trouble regulating and getting your blood sugar levels back to normal.

THE FACTS:

• Chronic drinking causes excessive blood glucose levels (hyperglycemia) blood sugar too high. This is followed by an overtaxing of the insulin system resulting in (hypoglycemia) blood sugar too low
• Chronic alcohol abuse can reduce the body’s responsiveness to insulin and cause glucose intolerance in both healthy individuals and alcoholics with liver cirrhosis
• 45-70% of patients with alcoholic liver disease are glucose intolerant or are diabetic
• Blood sugar levels must be maintained in athletes or performance is compromised
• Impaired glucose levels will affect fuel resynthesis, conversion and utilization
• Heavy drinking can impair normal blood glucose levels for up to 36 hours

This in effect means that an athlete will compromise the levels of blood glucose which maintains the physiological function for many pathways of our energy system yields. Thirty six hours of swings in these levels will also affect the ability of the muscles to uptake glucose from the blood and subsequently restore glycogen(stored muscle fuel) levels in the working muscles. During high intensity exercise or intermittent exercise (bursts of energy) ex. intervals, sprints, our muscle fuels last approximately 30-40 minutes. During steady state aerobic (low intensity) exercise, our fuels last 60 – 90 minutes. Following heavy drinking bouts these levels would be diminished greatly and of course fuel reserves would be greatly reduced. An athlete in this situation would run out of stored muscle fuels quicker, increasing the likelihood of quicker fatigue and loss of both power and speed.