Alcohol, Stress and Your Well-Being
The Center for Great Expectations
Providing trauma-informed treatment for substance use and mental health disorders.
Written By: Dr. Debra Ruisard, DSW, LCSW, LCADC
Stress is a commonly shared experience in our world today. Financial pressures, family dynamics, relationship conflicts, politics, climate change, health concerns, traumatic experiences and many more conditions and situations create stress for human beings. And our natural human instinct is to find relief from the ruminating thoughts, overwhelming emotions and physical tension that come with chronic stress. Alcohol use is one way to find relief. Many individuals consume alcohol to stop their racing thoughts, numb distressing emotions and calm their tight and tense bodies. But at what cost???
More and more research has shown the negative impact that alcohol has on our health, including the recreational drinking that many people do on a regular basis. A recent NYT article highlighted the roughly 140,000 deaths per year in the USA from excessive alcohol use. But it also brought to light the detrimental impact of moderate and recreational drinking on our health(1). However, as our world gets more stressful, our alcohol consumption rises. During the COVID pandemic we saw a rise in both alcohol use and alcohol-related deaths as people struggled to cope with fear, isolation and loss(2).? For women in particular, the use of alcohol to cope with stress has increased over 84% since 2007 and there are greater physical health risks for females who consume alcohol on a regular basis(3). Stress does not necessarily lead directly to alcohol consumption, but the data shows that there is a strong correlation. Genetic factors and a history of past trauma can influence turning to alcohol to cope with stress(4). For so many of us, the urge to have that glass of wine or cold beer after a long stressful day is hard to resist. Why? Because it works – alcohol temporarily brings relief from the stress.??
Beyond the consequences to our health, drinking can also negatively influence work performance, relationships, sleep patterns, and social relationships if it crosses the line into excess. Ultimately using alcohol to cope with stress can create more stress in our lives and the solution becomes the problem. However, reducing or eliminating alcohol from our lives is not an easy endeavor. In our culture, alcohol is usually an expected component at most social functions and a staple in many households. And when we are tired, stressed and feeling like we need help to relax, our best intentions to not drink quickly fall away.?
Intention, willpower and social support can all be helpful, however it often takes more than that to avoid the lure of alcohol. Consider the role of our nervous system in both stress and alcohol use. Under stress the nervous system is on high alert, scanning the environment for danger. This survival strategy is built into every human body, designed to keep us alive. After the danger is gone, the body presumably can relax. However, in this modern, stress-filled world the danger is ever present and our nervous systems get locked into high alert. The ability to relax eludes us.??
As a depressant, alcohol relaxes the nervous system. If we want to reduce or eliminate alcohol as a stress reliever, we need to find other effective ways to relax our nervous system. Breathing is the most accessible tool we have. Changing your breathing pattern to make your exhale longer than your inhale for a few rounds of breath slows your heart rate and naturally calms your nervous system. Movement is another useful strategy, and it doesn’t always have to be an intense work-out. Daily walking, yoga, or gentle stretching can lower the overall activation of your nervous system and build more resilience for handling stress. Physical touch is a third way you can intentionally calm your nervous system – a long hug from a loved one, a massage, a hot bath, a weighted blanket – anything that feels good on your body can dial down your activated nervous system when you are stressed.
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Life is stressful and we can’t control that. But it is possible to have some control over our response to it. These simple body-based coping strategies can relax the nervous system, bring a felt sense of relief and perhaps reduce our dependence on alcohol as a stress reliever.??
[2] https://covid19.nih.gov/news-and-stories/risky-drinking-alcohol-use-epidemic-inside-covid-19pandemic#:~:text=It%20was%20really%20no%20surprise,often%20to%20cope%20with%20stress.?
[3] Peltier, M. R., Verplaetse, T. L., Mineur, Y. S., Petrakis, I. L., Cosgrove, K. P., Picciotto, M. R., & McKee, S. A. (2019). Sex differences in stress-related alcohol use. Neurobiology of stress, 10, 100149.?