Hacker News Reader

Comment by bradleyjg | Hacker News Reader

That’s a great (surprising) reference. Intellectually I know functional alcoholics exist but it’s still tough to come to grips with that many people drinking that much alcohol.

I’m curious what it looks by age, geography, and household income.

View on HN

I'm in the top decile of that posted chart. Some weeks I'll be higher, some weeks I'll be lower. Usually lower, but always above the ninth. Posting on a throwaway for what should be pretty obvious reasons.

In the past week I've had about three bottles of gin in various cocktails, assorted craft beers of the IPA or imperial stout variety, a couple of whiskeys, and an aperitif most days. I've been drinking mostly while sitting in front of my TV with my iPad out, doing some light programming, working on photo editing, or playing games. Normally I'd spend more time at bars with friends, but it's not exactly a great time for that.

I don't drink before or during work hours, but most hours after work I've either got a drink or I'm making one.

I'm 30ish, I make decent money doing devops, and I like to think the quality of my work exceeds that of most of my peers -- I've certainly gotten feedback saying as much from line managers.

I don't want to be too specific about anything, but I am happy to answer questions, if anyone has any.

I appreciate the response. Mostly I hate throwaways but this is an appropriate use.

As I’ve gotten older (I’m 40ish) hangovers have gotten worse and worse. It’s now to the point if I have 4-5 medium beers on Friday night I can write off Saturday. Has your subjective experience of hangovers gotten easier over time?

I've have never had much in the way of hangovers in my life, with the exception of the few times that I have gotten nearly blackout drunk and spent the next day curled up around a toilet bowl.

I tend to drink more on Friday and Saturday nights, and I will wake up the next morning feeling seedy and in need of a big greasy breakfast.

Weekday mornings, if I have had more than usual (by my own standards) to drink the previous night, I will wake up feeling like I slept poorly, but no more than that. It'll take me an hour to get up to speed, and then I'm likely to go to bed earlier than usual that night.

None of this has changed noticeably over the past decade.

It may or may not make a difference that I am meticulous about getting 8.5 hours in bed each night, I don't know, and it may make a difference that I've always had a fairly high tolerance for alcohol's effects.

In my 20s-30s, a few beers or cocktails before dinner. Then a few bottles of wine (with friend, co-workers). Then scotch, or the like. At late 40s, I could write off the next day.

Now, a cocktail (lockdown has turned my wife in to master bartender). Glass of wine with dinner. Maybe a whiskey after. All good.

Have friends over, turns into a bit to much and write off next morning.

Not OP, but I drink quite a bit too. I discovered ZBiotics and it's made a very large difference in my experience with hangovers. I was also starting to feel worse hangovers as I aged (from being practically immune in my late teens / early twenties), but using ZB has taken me back to those levels. They're a YC startup, and the product is a GMO probiotic that produces the enzyme to break down acetaldehyde in your digestive system helping you cope with a much larger amount of alcohol than your body would naturally be able to do.

Important disclosure: I'm an investor in ZB. I use the product at least every other day and have done so for a few years.

Alternately there's NAC, which anecdotally I can say is a miracle if you're expecting to do a lot of drinking, and has some generally good reputation for this purpose and others (including, generically, as a nootropic).

It's a key ingredient in a lot of those commercial pre-drinking drinks. Cycteine itself is used as a combatant against Tylenol poisoning and it accelerates metabolism of acetaldehyde (at least in rats).

If nothing else, it’s a clever idea. I put in an order and we’ll see how it goes.

If you drink 4-5 medium beers everyday, you'd need to drink at least 10 to induce a hangover.

hangover's get worse when you are older, or when you are older you drink less regularly so you get a worse hangover?

The "hangovers get worse when you are older" tripe is a miscorrelation. Any ageing alcoholic can attest to that.

The majority drink hardest when they're in their 20s, start slowing down in their 30s, and all but teetotal as they progress through their 40s. Hangovers are all just a product of your tolerance.

It seems like calories would add up pretty quick, especially when you throw beer into the mix. Do you have any trouble with weight? Or is that you eat a lot less food to compensate? I suppose to some extent a cocktail in hand on the couch substitutes for snacks.

All of the above.

I eat less than the average bear, I am overweight (although not absurdly so), and don't snack while drinking. I will occasionally go a week or two in which I only have one or two beers, total, and I have noticed that my appetite is significantly larger on latter half of those weeks.

Weight is one of the primary reasons I am considering drinking less, although there would have to be quite the associated and significant lifestyle change for it to stick.

You see the trap you're setting yourself up for, right? Getting back in shape is a lot harder to do then just keeping in shape and it doesn't get easy when you get older. I just don't think that one naturally drinks less when they get older, and things just balance out in the end. You may be in a world of hurt. I am a little jaded as I've seen family members die of alcoholism that no one - not even in their immediate family, were aware they had. Their decline was surprisingly swift and sudden. I'm not drink free, but it seems you drink more in one week than I do in a year. I couldn't imagine writing off even half a day (anymore) because I drank too much the night before. Life is not that long. Anyways, off my soap box.

Not only they add up, alcoholic drinks tend to stimulate your appetite and often the only thing around is some ghastly fast food joint.

I was a rather hesitant drinker, having two to three glasses of wine a week. When I stopped drinking even that (on Apr 30), I lost several pounds over just five weeks. And they went off my midsection, the belt does not lie and neither does the mirror.

Even this relatively small amount of alcohol did something.

Beer has typically less calories than Wine at least for light beers which are the most common.

https://www.livestrong.com/article/138115-beer-vs-wine-calor...

That compares a can of beer to a .. at least large-side-of-medium (for home consumption, not charge-by-the-glass regulated sizes perhaps) glass of wine.

And even then the wine comes in pretty much in the middle of the beer range, you've just unilaterally decided that the less calorific beers are more common and drawn your conclusion on that basis..

Maybe that is true in the US, certainly causes a problem with ordering an IPA in the UK - I don't like the light fruity style of the American version, which is typically what you get from anything that would self-describe as 'craft', so it's a bit of a game of judging the branding for modern start-uppy craftiness vs.. imperialness (!) if not already familiar. (I digress..)

IMHO the real problem is that beer makes you want eat something.

3 fifths of gin in a week would destroy me for that same week, I would be worthless.

I learned recently that the booze industry would go bankrupt overnight if it weren't for the heaviest drinkers, those who consume the best part of a fifth of whiskey every day. See e.g. https://www.newsweek.com/americas-heaviest-drinkers-consume-...

Makes you realize the hypocrisy of "drink responsibly".

Drink responsibly is just for legal purposes. Every company owner wants their end users to consume more of what they make.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com