What is Alcohol?
Alcohol is a psychoactive substance that affects the brain and nervous system by slowing down communication between brain cells. The type of alcohol found in beer, wine, and spirits is called ethanol, and it is produced through the fermentation of sugars by yeast.
Once consumed, alcohol is quickly absorbed into the bloodstream and carried throughout the body, where it can influence mood, judgment, coordination, and behaviour. Because alcohol is a depressant, higher amounts can impair thinking and physical function, and repeated or heavy use can lead to health problems, dependence, and addiction.
Alcohol’s Neurotoxin Properties
Alcohol, specifically ethanol, is a psychoactive substance that acts as a neurotoxin, meaning it can damage nerve cells and interfere with normal brain function. Once alcohol enters the bloodstream, it crosses the blood–brain barrier and affects the central nervous system by disrupting communication between neurons.
This interference alters the balance of brain chemicals involved in mood, judgment, memory, and coordination, which is why alcohol can impair thinking, slow reaction time, and reduce self-control. At higher levels, alcohol can suppress critical brain functions that regulate breathing and heart rate, increasing the risk of serious harm.
Repeated or heavy alcohol use can have longer-term neurotoxic effects on the brain. Over time, alcohol exposure may contribute to changes in brain structure and function, including memory problems, reduced cognitive ability, and difficulty regulating emotions.
Because the brain adapts to repeated alcohol exposure, tolerance and dependence can develop, reinforcing continued use despite negative consequences. Understanding alcohol’s neurotoxic properties helps explain why excessive or prolonged drinking can impact both mental and physical health and why early awareness and education are important.
Its Effects
Alcohol affects people differently. General effects are a feeling of warmth, flushed skin, impaired judgment, decreased inhibitions, muscular incoordination, slurred speech, memory and comprehension loss. In states of extreme intoxication, vomiting is likely to occur, possibly accompanied by incontinence, poor respiration, a fall in blood pressure, and the case of severe alcohol poisoning, coma, and death.
Drinking heavily over a short period of time usually results in a “hangover” – headache, nausea, shakiness, and sometimes vomiting, beginning 8 to 12 hours later. Learn more about the effects alcohol has on the body here.
A hangover is due partly to poisoning by alcohol and other components of the drink and partly to the body’s reaction to withdrawal from alcohol. Long-term use of alcohol affects a person’s outlook on life.
Alcohol Information
Combination of Drugs & Alcohol
Combining alcohol with other drugs can make the effects of these other drugs much stronger and more dangerous. Many accidental deaths have occurred after people have used alcohol combined with other drugs. A person shouldn’t have cannabis, tranquillizers, barbiturates, sleeping pills, or antihistamines (in cold, cough, and allergy remedies) with alcohol.
People who drink regularly become tolerant to many of the unpleasant effects of alcohol and thus can drink more before suffering these effects. Yet even with increased consumption, many such drinkers don’t appear intoxicated.
Because they continue to work and socialize reasonably well, their deteriorating physical condition may go unrecognized by others until severe damage develops – or until they are hospitalized for other reasons and suddenly experience alcohol withdrawal symptoms. Find out more about addiction to alcohol.
Psychological Dependency
Psychological dependence on alcohol may occur with regular use of even relatively moderate daily amounts. It may also occur in people who consume alcohol only under certain conditions, such as before and during social occasions.
This form of dependence refers to a craving for alcohol’s psychological effects. Although not necessarily in amounts that produce serious intoxication. For psychologically dependent drinkers, the lack of alcohol makes them anxious and, in some cases, panicky.
Long-term alcohol abuse poses various health risks, such as liver damage and an increased risk of heart disease. Fetal Alcohol Syndrome may result from a pregnant woman’s drinking alcohol. This condition causes facial abnormalities in the child, as well as growth retardation and brain damage, which are often manifested by intellectual difficulties or behavioural problems.
Alcohol Information and the Right Rehab Centers
When does casual consumption of alcohol turn to dependency drinking or an “out of control” drinking? Alcohol is the most sinister of drugs. There is a thin line, usually imperceptible, between social use and addictive use.
Alcoholic dependent people rely on alcohol as a key component of their personality. Without a drink, they simply cannot “be themselves.” If this is the case, then checking into an alcohol treatment center would be the right thing to do. Life is possible without alcohol.
Do You Need Help?
If you are looking for an alcohol treatment center for someone with a drinking problem, we can help. We have contacts with drug and alcohol treatment centers servicing Canada. It is important to know that not all drug or alcohol rehabilitation methods are alike. There are some that will meet your specific needs and guarantee better success. Let us help you find the right alcohol rehab center and get you started on the road to recovery.
Carole Pelland
Substance Abuse
Digital Marketing Administrator
& Author
