Alcohol - know your limit
Christiane Fux studied journalism and psychology in Hamburg. The experienced medical editor has been writing magazine articles, news and factual texts on all conceivable health topics since 2001. In addition to her work for, Christiane Fux is also active in prose. Her first crime novel was published in 2012, and she also writes, designs and publishes her own crime plays.
More posts by Christiane Fux All content is checked by medical journalists.Many drink alcohol because it is relaxing, easy-going and fun. Maybe with a few per mille in your blood you are no longer so shy and have more confidence. Everyday stress and annoying parents are usually forgotten for a few hours when they are intoxicated. But these are far from the only effects of alcohol. In addition to the supposedly positive effects, the negative consequences for your health are fatal.
If everyone is drinking, I will drink too
Whether for a birthday party with your best friend or in a club with friends - alcohol is an indispensable part of such evenings for many. And even those who don't actually like alcohol often drink along anyway. Because if you don't drink anything, you can quickly be seen as "out" or a brake on fun.However, those who give in to peer pressure or who like to reach for the bottle anyway damage their health enormously.
This is how alcohol works
Depending on age, weight and drinking habits, the initially pleasant effect of alcohol from around 0.5 per mil is increasingly overlaid by unsightly things. The first thing to change is your behavior and mood. While you feel great, the reality is that you are becoming increasingly numb. Your movements are more uncoordinated, the language becomes sluggish and you are less able to assess situations.
Nausea and bad sex
From around one per mille you are very drunk. The face turns red and the pupils dilate. The likelihood increases that you will feel sick. Inhibitions disappear and you become more emotional. Some drunk people get tearful or aggressive. And even if you may feel great - you may have pissed off others for a long time. Because those who are drunk often babble to the others. Some do things they are ashamed of the next day. This also applies, for example, to sex with people with whom you would never have had anything sober. In men, the higher the alcohol level, the greater the likelihood of not getting an erection. Girls too get less of the pleasure because of their clouded senses.
Drunk into a coma
At the latest with two to three per thousand until you are completely drunk. You stagger as you walk and slur as you speak. Hear, see, taste - all sensory perceptions only function to a limited extent and you hardly notice what is happening around you. Sometimes the film tears so that the next day you can't remember what you said or did - or how you got home in the first place. Serious symptoms of intoxication occur with more than three per thousand. Breathing and pulse become so weak that a coma or even death threatens.
Lethal combat drinking
Binge drinking or binge drinking, where you get drunk until nothing works, is not a fun leisure activity, but life-threatening. In 2015, around 22,000 children and young people ended up in hospital because of alcohol poisoning. There have also been deaths from too much alcohol.
The good news is that 2.2 percent fewer adolescents had to be treated as inpatients than in 2014. So the trend towards binge drinking seems to be declining. Nevertheless: the numbers are still twice as high as at the beginning of the 2000s. Apart from the binge drinking, however, the young people are apparently becoming more sensible overall. At least that was the result of a child and adolescent health study in 2012 and this trend is still continuing. Accordingly, adolescents smoke and drink less overall than ten years ago.
Danger of addiction and long-term consequences
Alcohol is a drug that is physically and mentally addictive. Prolonged alcohol abuse damages the liver, brain and heart. The likelihood of many diseases is increasing, including impotence and cancer. Because the organs and brains of adolescents are not yet mature, alcohol is particularly dangerous for them. If you drink a lot, puberty can be delayed and your ability to concentrate and remember things can suffer - and with it your school grades. The risk of becoming addicted is also greater in adolescents than in adults.
Alcohol makes you fat
After all these horror images, another property of alcohol may sound banal: Alcohol makes you pretty fat. One gram contains more energy with seven kilocalories than in sugar, which has only four kilocalories. For example, a 330 milliliter bottle of beer has around 140 kilocalories, and a 125 milliliter glass of wine has around 100 kilocalories.
Sweet mixed drinks make you particularly fat. A can of energy drink (250 ml) plus 30 ml of vodka contains around 200 kilocalories. That's more energy than two bars of chocolate. Such drinks are particularly tricky, because because they are so beautifully sweet, you drink them like lemonade.
Statutory Regulations
The Youth Protection Act is there to protect children and young people. It prohibits the sale of alcohol to anyone under the age of 16. From the age of 16 you can buy beer and wine, but not harder drinks containing brandy such as rum, vodka, whiskey or schnapps. This also applies to mixed drinks containing spirits.
Children and young people under the age of 16 may only stay in a restaurant in the presence of a parent or legal guardian. Night clubs are completely taboo.
If your older friends buy alcohol for you or give you something, they are making themselves a criminal offense. If you are found drunk, it can be interpreted to mean that your parents neglected their upbringing duties. You can then run into difficulties as well.
You can find more information and help here:
- You can get anonymous help at the "number against Kummer": 0800-1110333. The advisors there can also give you advice on where to go for help.
- http://www.kenn-dein-limit.de
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