Drinking alcohol after you are 55 is different

Have you used to turn off the lights at a party while singing? Or a little less exuberant: were you able to drink a few glasses of wine or bottles of beer before? Now that you are 55+, alcohol is becoming less and less enjoyable. One consolation: you are not alone in this. There is an explanation for that. Tip of the veil: something with body composition and slower organs.

We often do not want to hear and know, but from 55ste changes your body. The biggest external change we can point to is the change in fat distribution. Where the buttocks and breasts tend to melt away, the belly and hips seem to become rounder. The same applies to men, except for the part regarding the breasts.

Inside viewer

Inside, your body also works differently from a certain age. Thus the resistance decreases. Organs work slower. Decrease the regenerative capacity. Reduces hormone production. Responsiveness decreases and blood circulation slows down.

More fat, less water

All of these changes also affect your alcohol consumption. The ratio of fat and water in your body changes, increasing the concentration of alcohol in the body. The breakdown and elimination of alcohol by the stomach, liver and kidneys is also slower. Alcohol therefore does more damage. Source: vvn.nl.

The hangover comes later

And if you have looked too deeply into the glass when you are in your fifties or older, you will have to pay for this the next day with a hefty hangover. And that bothers you more than your twenty-year-old niece. That's how it works: a young person who drinks has less hangover the next day, because his liver breaks down the alcohol faster. Alcohol is broken down into acetaldehyde in the human body by the enzyme alcohol dehydrogenase. As you get older you have less of this enzyme, making it more difficult for the body to break down alcohol and therefore takes longer.

Did you know…

Over-55s drink more often than young people on average?

- do they drink more often every day?

- you see this most strongly in people with other unhealthy lifestyle habits, such as smoking and little exercise and in men who drank excessively at a younger age?

-loneliness, stress, illness, death (of partner), informal care, missing daily structure and insufficient knowledge about alcohol use are the reasons for drinking (more)?

 

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