If You Abuse It, You Lose It
The best way to detoxify is to stop putting toxic things into the body and depend upon its own mechanism.
Dr. Andrew Weil1
Tobacco
As we have discovered in previous chapters, oxidation is damaging to the tissues of the body; therefore, anything that increases oxidation will accelerate aging. Tobacco is well documented to increase cancer risk, heart disease, stroke, lung disease, and circulatory problems and to alter immune response. But tobacco use also produces many oxidizing molecules and impairs the body’s antioxidant enzymes. Thus, tobacco use also accelerates aging.
One evidence of the accelerated aging caused by smoking tobacco was documented by Dr. Daven Doshi and colleagues, who compared the skin of identical twins—one who smoked and one who did not. The twins were fifty-two years old at the time of the examination. They had spent their first two decades of life together, lived in the same latitude, and had similar sun exposure and jobs. The examiners used a standardized six-point scale to grade the level of skin damage of each twin: 1 = mild, 2 = mild to moderate, 3 = moderate, 4 = moderate to severe, 5 = severe, and 6 = very severe. The twin who did not smoke was rated at a 2 while the smoking twin’s skin was rated at a 5!2 (Pictures of these twins can be seen at http://archderm.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=654484.)
Illegal Substances
Yes, tobacco accelerates aging, and so do all illegal substances of abuse. Methamphetamine is perhaps the quintessential example of an illegal substance that accelerates aging. Methamphetamine damages the blood-brain barrier, the tight junctions in the vasculature that prevent damaging molecules from entering the brain. This allows for increased influx into the brain of oxidizing molecules that increase oxidative damage to the brain.3 Additionally, methamphetamine itself directly affects signaling systems in the brain, resulting in increased oxidative stress and neurotoxicity.4 The bottom line is that such substances accelerate aging and are damaging to the brain. (As a picture is worth a thousand words, I encourage you to visit rehabs.com, type “explore” in their search engine, and then page down and click “Before and After Drugs (Meth): The Horrors of Methamphetamine” to compare the before and after pictures of individuals who have used methamphetamine. The aging effects are undeniable.)
If you are one of the millions who are struggling with some chemical addiction, I encourage you to contact your health-care provider, call a help line, speak to your clergy—do whatever is necessary to get into professional addiction treatment. Chemical addiction is a disease with devastating consequences to your brain, but there is effective treatment available. Don’t wait, get the help you need today! If you don’t know who to call, then call the SAMHSA (Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration) Help Line. This is a free, confidential, 24-hour, 365-day-per-year treatment referral service. The number is 800-662-HELP (4357). If you need the help, GET IT—call now!
Alcohol
While tobacco and illegal substances are fairly straightforward regarding their damaging impact on human health, alcohol is a different matter. There is substantial research on alcohol and its impact on health, but much of it is contradictory. I will break down the research into what is undisputed and what is still unclear and suggest some guidelines for a healthy approach to alcohol.
What is not disputed is that any alcohol consumption during pregnancy is damaging to the developing fetus.5 It is also undisputed that heavy alcohol consumption (2.5 beers or thirty-six grams of alcohol per day or more) is damaging to body and brain, accelerates aging, and contributes to increased risk of dementia.6 Alcohol consumption in quantities that lead to drunkenness is oxidizing and unhealthy. And it is generally understood that alcohol consumption during childhood and adolescence interferes with normal brain development. Studies have documented differences in various brain structures in people who have used alcohol during the developmental period compared to those who have not.7
Where things are less clear is for those adults who are mild-to-moderate drinkers. Overall the data suggests that those who drink mild-to-moderate amounts of alcohol have lower risk of dementia and cognitive decline than either problem drinkers or total abstainers.8 It is not fully understood why this is the case, but other research has suggested some possibilities. Problem drinkers, those who drink heavily and in whom alcohol has caused health, social, occupational, or other life impairments, and those who abstain from alcohol completely have higher rates of cognitive impairment from vascular causes (strokes and microvascular damage).9 This suggests that mild-to-moderate alcohol consumption may reduce the risk of vascular-related dementia. Other suggested reasons for the cognitive decline in problem drinkers are the direct neurotoxic effects of heavy alcohol use, which cause changes in brain structure, and brain trauma as problem drinkers are more prone to accidents and injuries. Additionally, problem drinkers suffer from deficiencies in essential nutrients, contributing to further body and brain problems. It has been known for more than a century that thiamine (vitamin B1) deficiency in chronic alcoholics causes a form of dementia known as Korsakoff syndrome. Deficiencies in other vital nutrients may also play a role in cognitive decline in problem drinkers.
There also appears to be a difference in health based on the type of alcohol one drinks. The most beneficial effects of mild-to-moderate alcohol consumption are experienced when drinking wine, and the most damage occurs from drinking spirits (distilled alcohols).10 This may be due to the fact that wine, red more than white, contains many antioxidant molecules such as polyphenols and flavonoids, which are lost in distilled spirits.11 This leads to the possibility that the health benefits found in alcohol are not from the alcohol itself but from the various antioxidant compounds found in it, and these benefits persist despite the alcohol, not because of the alcohol. This is supported by studies that demonstrate that the same health benefits are observed in alcohol-free wine.12 Further support for the idea that the benefit to the brain may not be from the alcohol itself comes from research documenting that low-to-moderate alcohol consumption does not reduce the risk of cognitive decline. The researchers who found alcohol consumption was not associated with cognitive benefits suggest the reason some studies found what appeared to be a benefit “may have been due to inclusion of former drinkers in the abstainers reference category.”13
Another confounding fact with alcohol use is its long-term impact compared to its immediate effect. The immediate effect of alcohol is relaxation, euphoria and sedation, impaired response time, and reduced motor control, which are experienced with either a buzz or intoxication. These effects occur because the alcohol physically interacts with the neuronal membranes, altering the functioning of the neurons in real time. As the concentration of alcohol goes up, the more neural membranes are affected and the greater the intoxicating effect. As the alcohol is cleared the physical impact on the neurons is removed, and the effects of intoxication clear. However, alcohol also activates a cascade of second messengers inside neurons that cause delayed effects. Like kicking over dominoes, these second messengers send signals down to the DNA within the neurons of the brain’s alarm circuitry (amygdala), altering gene expression that causes the alarm circuit of the brain to be more reactive. In other words, during intoxication one feels more relaxed because of the immediate physical effects of the alcohol on neuronal membranes, but once the alcohol clears one can experience increased anxiety due to the alteration in gene expression in the amygdala.14 This can be one factor that contributes to an increased craving for more alcohol.
With all these variables in mind and considering how the body is designed to prevent alcohol from reaching the brain, it really does raise the question of whether there are genuine brain-health benefits from alcohol. When we consume food and drink, it passes through the mouth, down the esophagus, into the stomach, and then into the intestines for processing and absorption into our bloodstream. The blood then transports the processed ingested substances throughout the body. But immediately after absorption into the bloodstream and before distribution throughout the body, the blood travels directly to the liver. And the liver is chock-full of various enzyme pathways designed to metabolize and render inactive a wide variety of potentially harmful substances. The body is built this way to prevent potential brain-altering toxins from ever reaching the brain and impairing functioning. In order for a substance to impact the brain it must first get past the liver.
One enzyme pathway contained within the human liver breaks down alcohol into water and carbon dioxide. This is because alcohol is a by-product of some bacteria living in the gastrointestinal system.15 The body is designed to protect the brain, to keep it highly functional and alert. When we eat carbohydrates some of them are metabolized by the bacteria in our gut, forming small amounts of alcohol. This alcohol is absorbed with the rest of the nutrients and transported to the liver, where the liver detoxifies the alcohol into water and carbon dioxide. The water is excreted in the urine and the carbon dioxide exhaled from the lungs and, when things function normally, no alcohol reaches the brain. Perhaps mild-to-moderate drinkers gain benefit from the antioxidant molecules in the wine they drink, but because of the enzymes in the liver that detoxify the alcohol, the alcohol has minimal impact upon the brain itself. But heavy drinkers bombard their bodies with frequent and damaging amounts of alcohol, causing a wide variety of health-compromising effects, including accelerated aging and cognitive decline.
Putting it all together, then, we can draw the following conclusions regarding alcohol:
LEARNING POINTS
ACTION PLAN: THINGS TO DO