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> He also noted that it doesn’t take excessive alcohol use ...

> “In the models we’re using, even drinking three to four beers after work several days a week can induce [bad stuff for sperm],” Golding said. “You may not feel inebriated, but your body is going through chemical changes.”

Vs. the CDC's current upper limit for "moderate" male drinking is 2 drinks/day, and they're very quick to specify that "a" beer is at most 12 oz. of 5% ABV (or 8 oz. of 7% ABV, or ...). One 16 oz. pint of 7.5% is two drinks.

That said, with how many acres of "skin in the game" it is to become a father - I'd say to abstain for 6 months. If nothing else, it sends a loud "I'm taking daddyhood d*mned seriously" signal to your wife.

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I would say that 3-4 beers several times a week is allot of alcohol.

It is an amount where I would definitely start to think that ones life would be degraded in certain ways by the amount of alcohol consumed.

Where I live the recommendations are that people that drink 10 or more units of alcohol per week should be provided support from the healthcare system to reduce their drinking.

It's in the eye of the beholder I suppose. I wouldn't consider that bad, but that's coming from a former hope-to-die alcoholic who would drink around a dozen units of alcohol on any given night. I also know others who drank at about that level. I was able to keep up a job at a tech company as well, though I'd say that job was degrading my life and the alcohol was more a result of that than the other way around. I'm certainly not under the impression that it was good for me; I don't drink at all any more.

>it's in the eye of the beer holder.

> I would say that 3-4 beers several times a week is allot of alcohol.

I agree, I drink on average 1-2 a month, it's going to be 3-4 this month because of extra family and friend gatherings because of the holidays and I'm already feeling like its excessive. The article doesn't answer if my level of drinking would require the same length of abstinence.

Thanksgiving through new years is the season for conceiving. September is by far the most popular birth month!

Exactly. Maybe I’m just a lightweight, but 4 beers is into ‘drunk’ levels for me. Doing that 2 or 3 times a week? Of course that’s going to have health impacts.

Regular drinking exercises your liver and keeps it at peak performance.

(I am not a doctor.)

(Also not a doctor.)

Your liver is pretty unique here, as most other organs don't grow back (they get covered in scar tissue if they grow back at all). You can donate your liver, they'll remove about half, and it'll be back to normal in about 2 months.

Makes you smarter too. Your brain can only operate as fast as the slowest brain cells, and alcohol tends to kill the weakest brain cells first. It's like culling the herd, you speed everything up.

(.../s)

Depends on the timeframe and body weight. For a 280lb guy 4 beers over 4 hours isn’t particularly noticeable.

As a 270lb guy who is also tall, with a healthy mix of muscle and fat... Two beers 12oz beers will get me a really nice buzz, if not quite tipsy.

I drink maybe once a month, though- it's pretty wild to notice how much more affected you are once you lose your tolerance.

Sure, knock back 2 12oz beers back to back on an empty stomach and that’s noticeable. But, I’m at the it’s warmed to room temperature long before I’ve finished side of things.

It's all about tolerance. Half a pint gets me quite tipsy now because I drink maybe once a month at best, a pint will get me past the sweet spot already. A few years back I could have half a bottle of wine and be in the same perceived state

Is it also age? As I got old (50s) I could feel it hitting more. It’s stronger now (60s)

>> but 4 beers is into ‘drunk’ levels for me.

Bro 4 beers in I would be actually sick, I definitely can't drive after 1 beer(nor would I want to). I literally don't understand how some people can chug 10-12 beers in an evening, like even ignoring the alcohol where does all of this liquid go?? I'll have two beers and the third one is literally a struggle to drink, it's just too much.

For most people, it's just tolerance. The more regularly you drink, the less effect it has.

> like even ignoring the alcohol where does all of this liquid go?

Into pee. You know how starting around the third or fourth round, everybody is getting up to pee every round or two?

Some of those people probably feel less from those 12 beers than you did from your one.

The volume part is trivial. Average human stomach is about half a gallon and it is not hard to drink a gallon over a few hours

I have drank average of 3 oz. per day (3 beers, or one healthy pour of scotch or bourbon), 5-6 days per week for the last 30 years. All blood work is normal. My parents drink significantly more than that are still healthy in their 70s.

> I have drank average of 3 oz. per day (3 beers, or one healthy pour of...

Maybe `sed 's/oz. per/drinks per/'` here? Though if they're 12oz x 8.5% beers, and the "healthy pour" is 8oz of 80 proof...

As pointed out by the parent comment, one strong 16 Oz can is already 2 drinks. Having 2 of those in a night or even slightly weaker ones puts you in the 3-4 drink range. I'm sure I'm not the only one with a habit of having 2 of those a few nights a week to tie a long day off.

That would likely classify you as a "heavy drinker" by CDC definitions.

> For men, heavy drinking is typically defined as consuming 15 drinks or more per week.

You're definitely not the only one.

https://www.cdc.gov/alcohol/faqs.htm

I mean assuming you're hitting about 3.5 drinks like that, you'd need to be doing it 5 nights a week to hit 15 and qualify as heavy drinking.

When I think of "beers" in America, I usually think of Bud Light or similar lightweight lagers that are usually in the 4-5% alcohol range. Drinking 3-4 of those over a few hours with food will not get most people very drunk at all, depending on bodyweight and tolerance.

I prefer IPAs which average closer to 7% and that higher alcohol concentration seems to make a big difference. Drinking 3-4 of those can get a person quite drunk.

There is an interesting explanation for this. Instead of thinking of apv what matters to your body is more the “retained alcohol” over a period of time. Your body can process something like a 4% beer every hour, so drinking one 4% beer an hour isn’t going to get you that drunk as your body is keeping up. Drinking a 5% beer though you start retaining 1% of beer an hour, but with a 6% beer you retain 2% per hour (twice as much alcohol) and you get twice as drunk. So for a 7% beer you will be 3 times as drunk. Rough math and everyone will be different, but you get the idea.

It seems you've been downvoted by people who get drunk on two Bud Lights, lol

I guess so! I mean hey, if you never drink and you weigh 150lbs and have an empty stomach and you chug two Bud Lights... you're gonna get drunk! But this is not the situation most people are in when we think of someone "having a few beers".

And maybe people have different ideas of "drunk"? I don't think simply feeling some effect from alcohol constitutes being drunk.

It's interesting to observe the varied attitudes towards the consumption of alcohol. If someone chooses to drink alcohol and it doesn't negatively impact other aspects of their life, it could be viewed as a personal choice rather than a matter of societal concern. Throughout history, many cultures have incorporated alcohol into daily life, often as part of their culinary traditions. It's important to remember that life is finite, and how one chooses to experience it, as long as it doesn't harm others, can be seen as a personal decision. However, it's also crucial to acknowledge that responsible consumption and understanding its potential effects on health and well-being are key considerations.

> If someone chooses to drink alcohol and it doesn't negatively impact other aspects of their life

Almost everyone who drinks has this view of their own alcohol consumption. They aren't always wrong about this, but certainly very many of them are. Even people who are very obviously experiencing negative consequences of alcohol use will confidently assert that this isn't the case.

> Almost everyone who drinks has this view of their own alcohol consumption. They aren't always wrong about this, but certainly very many of them are.

This just seems like a trap. "Alcohol doesn't negatively impact my life." "Well, that's exactly what an alcoholic would say!" So, you can't rely on the person's own judgment. But you can't rely on others' judgment either. For any level of alcohol intake, from 1 beer a year to a liter of vodka a day, you can easily find someone who says it's too much and someone who says it's fine (or at least 'it depends').

I'm not sure that makes it a trap, but no I would not trust anyone's view of the consequences of their own drug use. But the alternative is not to match their use against a number created by an uninvolved third party either. Probably a person's family and other close relations have the most useful perspective on their use and its effects.

I'm not a moralizing teetotaler or drug abolitionist here either. Recreational drug use is often fine, people can and in some cases maybe even should do it. But it should stop when the negative consequences reach a certain point, and it's probably impossible for an individual to have the perspective allowing them to see where they are relative to that point.

> I'm not sure that makes it a trap, but no I would not trust anyone's view of the consequences of their own drug use.

And I wouldn't trust about anyone else's view. It's either a feeling (when you have to rely on the "drug user", how they feel about it) or it is hard facts. Outsiders opinions are worthless.

Right, I'm saying an outsider doesn't have an experience of the user and so no grounds for any particular insight about them and their use and its effects.

Their family and friends however are not outsiders. They have hard facts about how the use affects them, which is often some of the most significant negative consequences of drug use. I don't think any single person is situated to confidently say that someone else's use isn't a problem. But in cases where it is a problem, family often have all the information necessary to know that it is.

They're diagnostic criteria intended for use by physicians, not for random internet people to diagnose others without even performing any kind of assessment.

If someone drinks one glass of wine a year, but their significant other gets upset about it (it's now "affecting their relationship"), is it them or their significant other that has A Problem?

rationalizing it is really dangerous. I had a friend who who used to say, "everyone has addictions."

yet many people still think that having 2 to 6 beers after work every day is somehow normal

"Normal" is a function of one's social environment, so for many people, having 2 to 6 beers after work every day actually is normal.

right, I guess I was meaning normal as in people do it because there's no harm in it at all

That's interesting; is it your perspective that people generally believe "that which is commonly done" to be equivalent with "that which is probably harmless"?

I don't see it that way at all, but my attitude about risk doesn't fit well with what I see in the culture where I live; perhaps the people I'm observing experience the world more in the fashion you describe.

it's a pretty normal and established occurrence I'd Say. I don't know if most people do that, but yes one way to rationalize or reassure yourself that what you are doing is safe is to look around at the wider group and see if people are doing it without worry.

90% of alcoholic drinks are consumed by the top 10%. Something like 40% of people don't drink ANY alcohol, another 10% a few times a year, 10% maybe once a month, the last once a week, and the final group, drinks 10-20 drink per day...

For anyone curious about a source, there's https://archive.is/j3lg3 . Though I still vaguely recall looking at the source data (now lost to linkrot) and thinking that they had misinterpreted it.

Aren't you missing the group in between the last two that has two a day?

Nope. It goes from 1 a week to 20 a day. Slippery slope I guess.

I couldn't help by reading your comment with Seth Mayers immitating Bernie Sanders in my head. Nor could I help posting this, sorry...

3-4 beers after work several days per week seems like a drinking problem imho.

A drinking problem isn't defined by quantity, it is when you have a problematic habit/dependence that you can't quit at will. There are plenty of people who enjoy a few drinks several days a week but can just cut back or stop completely when they want/need to because they don't have alcoholism.

I used to drink 3 beers almost every night. I cut down on it to lose weight and now have a single beer 2-3 nights a week and no alcohol other nights. Some weeks I have none. If I had an actual "drinking problem" i.e. alcoholism, I wouldn't have been able to do that.

That's like saying "repeatedly banging your head on the wall is not a problem; it's only a problem if you can't stop at will".

The latest science says no amount of alcohol is good for you. And there's plenty of evidence that any amount of alcohol is bad for you. Of course there is pleasure that comes with imbibing alcoholic drinks, unlike banging your head on the wall, but you are still damaging your body with every sip.

Unfortunately the words "alcoholic" and "addict" are difficult for people to accept and associated with only the worst cases. But I think addiction is far more common than we think.

I used to drink occasionally, maybe once a week, to slight excess which one might call "merry" or "tipsy". I would always sleep badly and feel terrible the next day. I would also eat essentially an extra meal after drinking (usually consisting of junk food). This would happen every single time and I observed that this commonly happened to others too on a regular occurrence. Knowing that these bad effects would ensue, continuing to drink made me an addict: I knew it was bad for me, but I did it anyway.

Substances affect different people differently. I can have 3-4 drinks in an evening without changing my eating or sleep habits at all and without feeling any different the next day.

Some people experience drinking-related issues other than alcoholism and I just don't want to conflate those issues with alcoholism. I know some actual alcoholics. It's different.

My measurement for this sort of thing is, "if there's none in my house tonight and I get a hankering, how willing am I to go out looking for it?"

Yeah. When I run out, I just add it to my grocery list and pick up some more the next time I go to the supermarket. Can't remember the last time I left my house specifically to buy alcohol.

With enough quantity it's a problem in itself even without alcoholism.

Before kids I had an active social life that could definitely be construed as a “drinking problem”. I’d argue that the benefits to my social life outweighed the harm to my health. IMHO, “problem” drinking is defined as the inability to stop drinking, i.e. a true addiction.

If you are regularly in social situations where you feel you can't participate without having several drinks, you have a drinking problem. It's still a problem even if it's driven by external pressure rather than an addiction.

By this definition, people who embrace high levels of alcohol consumption despite their obvious effects don't have a drinking problem, which seems a bit tentative to me. I would say someone like George Best very much had a drinking problem.

It is.

Depends on the beer. Measuring one beer as we donin Bavaria, in at least half litres, and meaning by multiple times a week more than three days, maybe. By measuring beer in 0.3 and 0.2 litres, ans assuming the average US beer, even doing so 5 days a week propably doesn't get into abuse territory by the alcohol amount alone.

In US culture/science, one "drink" or "beer" is 0.5oz of alcohol. Beer is often 12oz of 4% alcohol. Wine is 6oz of 9%. Liquor is 1oz or 50%, etc.

There are stronger drinks, but in this scientific context should be considered multi-drinks.

People not understanding this unit scale causes a lot of problems, like teens having 20-30oz pours of alcohol like it's (also ugh) soda or juice.

I wonder if European science and US science get muddied due to different "drij" sizes.

The average beer is closer to 5%, few wines are as low as 9% and nearly all mainstream liquor is exactly 40%.

I can't speak for all of Europe, but in Austria no-one speaks of "drinks" when talking about alcohol consumption. This concept of a standard "drink" size is foreign to me and I know it only from US literature.

> That said, with how many acres of "skin in the game" it is to become a father - I'd say to abstain for 6 months. If nothing else, it sends a loud "I'm taking daddyhood dmned seriously" signal to your wife.*

I'd read that as : Instead of following sound medical advice, he is making up rules based on single study of dubious quality. He will probably make up more rules once the baby is born. Run!

There is a lot of snake oil about baby care. You would get 2 or 3 different incompatible advice from different pediatrician.

An interesting one, is which food the baby can eat during the first year. The common element is honey because it's difficult to pasteurize. But each doctor, nurse, magazine, ... adds a few things to the list. And it's more interesting to compare common list from different countries, that have a different additional food that are very bad for the baby.

> If nothing else, it sends a loud "I'm taking daddyhood d*mned seriously" signal to your wife.

Also to yourself, surely? Why is the wife here being framed as the judge of moral character for the other parent? Men also have agency and the ability to self-reflect.

I quit for ~5 months with our first (we had spontaneous fraternal twins) and ~4 months with our second. It would've been longer but we conceived the first month we started trying in both pregnancies. It seemed self-evident to me, at the time, that I should do everything I could to "clean" myself up. I stopped eating fried food, stopped drinking calories besides milk, ate more fruits and vegetables, etc. My wife doesn't drink so she didn't have to change her lifestyle much.

alcoholism is a particularly harsh curse in the North of Europe!

A tourist went to Edinburgh Scotland for the holidays. So much whiskey and pub life all around. Herbal tea in hand, the tourist said "wow, its hard to get used to how much drinking there is here!" and the reply from a friendly local "hey this is nothing, you should see the Irish! they are certainly the worst drinkers". SO the tourist moved along to the big city Hamburg, where money is obvious and the ships are as large as anything in the world. In downtown bars, the working class and the financiers are all taking their fill. The tourist after going to the gym says "Germans in Hamburg seem to drink quite seriously" and a well-dressed local said "oh this is nothing, the Russians! the Russians are the worst drinkers by far" .. so the fast International train is waiting in the big Hamburg station, and the tourist goes to Copenhagen, land of the Little Mermaid and Christiana bike shops. Obviously beer is the fifth food group, and red noses are common. The tourist makes the same observation at the town square. A local replies "oh yes, Denmark loves their beer, but the Norwegians ! what a sight, they are certainly the worst alcoholics overall"

The tourist walked over an empty package of cigarettes and said "they are all a bunch of tankards to me"

in northern culture, the CDC's recommendation is laughable. Excessive drinking is a regular thing where its cold

Knew a fellow from Texas sent to manage a business in Russia for 6 months. He was in excellent cardiovascular health when he left. 6 months later he returned with 15 extra pounds of weight.

His story: arriving in Moscow he found it brutally cold and began to drink under friends' advice. He later reported back that "you need to drink vodka and eat like crazy to keep warm and keep you body weight up" in that cold climate.

Anyone else heard this? Does alcohol perhaps keep all the bad stuff(lipids et al) in your blood in solution better in cold weather?

I find that hard to believe. I spent a winter in Helsinki, which is roughly 2 to 4 K warmer than Moscow, and you barely spend any time outside below -15°C (5°F), why would you do that? It's probably dark anyway.

What probably did happen is that he spent a lot more time indoors and not doing sports if he's not an avid gym rat.

> Anyone else heard this? Does alcohol perhaps keep all the bad stuff(lipids et al) in your blood in solution better in cold weather?

No, but it sounds like a great excuse for alcoholism.

I lived 2 years in Sweden, I just bought a good winter coat. Somehow that an a few good sweaters/base layers were enough to keep me warm without hammering my face every evening. But that's just me I guess.

Two questions:

1. what would be "a good winter coat" in that environment? I'm curious b/c I once found myself in upstate NY in winter with Texas clothing and it was near-fatally inadequate.

2. I've heard the phrase "get hammered[drunk]" but not "hammering my face". Searching for that sent me down a rabbit hole, i.e.,

https://duckduckgo.com/?q=hammering+my+face&t=operav&ia=web

I assume you intended the former meaning, that is, "getting drunk"?

1. You don't know how to pick clothes? Just make sure you pick something wind and water proof that covers your junk. Clothes are often rated for specific temperatures.

2. Legit can't tell if you're serious here? Yes I took the idiomatic "getting hammered" and made it my own with "hammering my face". You really couldn't infer the meaning based on the context of this thread where we discuss alcohol consumption?

Alcohol actually lowers your body temperature slightly, making you feel more comfortable in the cold. The big problem is that the alcohol metabolises straight into the citric NADH, which means your body converts the rest of the food you eat straight into fat.

The eating part is as you can see above relates but it has been demonstrated that the mitochondria in your brown fat burn significantly more energy after cold exposure, so it makes sense you would be hungrier.

As others have alluded, alcohol is a vasodilator. Your blood vessels dilate so you end up with more blood flow to extremities and the surface of your skin. So you feel warmer, but you're actually cooling your body off faster. Vasoconstriction is your body trying to keep your core body temperature up, so drinking alcohol is weakening your body's defenses to the cold.

Alcohol is very caloric. A single shot of vodka can have 100 calories. Also it can increase blood flow to the skin, making you seem warmer than you actually are, at the expense of your internal body temperature.

> A single shot of vodka can have 100 calories.

Using the standard 7 calories per gram of alcohol, the alcohol content of a 12 oz 5% beer (equivalent of a 1.5 oz 40% shot) is 117 calories (12oz x 28g/oz x 5% x 7 Kc/g).

That’s just the alcohol and an average beer would have been more from the additional carbs.

If your vodka shot has only 100 calories, that’s either a weak pour or some weak vodka!

Counter-argument:

[0] https://www.fitbit.com/foods/American+Vodka/740555260

[1] https://www.greygoose.com/faqs/how-many-calories-are-there-i...

If you look at any 40% vodka, you'll find a 1.5 oz shot clocking in at 96-98 calories.

That’s using the metabolized estimate of about 5.8 calories per gram which assumes about 80% of the caloric content is extracted.

No, but it makes you feel warm and has a ton of Calories, both of which jive with your fellow's observations.

Alcohol makes you feel warm, but crucially it doesn't make you any warmer and by bringing blood closer to the skin makes you get colder faster.

Maybe for you. Moving to Finland and seeing that a six pack cost as much as a month's worth of breakfast was all the motivation I needed to kick the stuff.

Shame about the war. If not for that you could just cross the border over into Russia and obtain it much cheaper.

Pretty sure Finnish people jump on a ferry to get cheap booze from Estonia instead. Just like Estonians jump on a bus and get cheap booze from Latvia. Where Latvia goes however, I do not know.

It is too late my friend. I only wish to cross the itäraja to buy even cheaper breakfasts

Estonia is still accessible (and they drink more than Russians, on average).

Some of us live in free and warm countries with no matriarchical nanny state. Gov't doesn't take half my income, and doesn't charge me an arm and a leg to have a beer.

I moved from the US of A my man lol

An excellent choice, I would have picked eastern europe, south america, or asia instead of finland tho.

Sure, and during COVID we kept the liquor stores open--so alcoholics in withdrawal weren't a problem when we had bigger fish to fry. Do you think that's a good thing?

Less about mere "dry drunks" -- which refers to someone who is sober but still stuck in the behavioral traps that led to drinking -- and more about the medical support required for abrupt detoxing from alcohol.

Point taken, edited.

It's probably some deep DNA-induced craving. In the summer I barely want to drink. When it's cold... I want to drink. Maybe it's the Slavic chunk of my DNA.

See also: the recommended 2000 calorie diet

>Vs. the CDC's current upper limit for "moderate" male drinking is 2 drinks/day, and they're very quick to specify that "a" beer is at most 12 oz. of 5% ABV (or 8 oz. of 7% ABV, or ...). One 16 oz. pint of 7.5% is two drinks.

Doing maths when drunk is fun, and the cdc be damned. Nobody understands the difference between one drink, and two drinks = one drink, as well. We all work in pints and litres. What damage/ fun is a 500ml of 9% beer costing me? Half a pint of 4.8%? Nobody asks for 8oz of beer. Do they......?

Your average glass bottle or can is 12 oz. That's not some arbitrary measurement, it's literally the most likely size for you to get. Sure most people aren't asking for an (imperial) cup of beer, but the idea is to recognize how much you're actually drinking.

> Your average glass bottle or can is 12 oz.

True, at least in my part of the US. Though larger cans seem to be a growing trend. And "on tap" beer is very often served in other sizes.

OTOH, 5% ABV seems to be anything but the norm.

> That said, with how many acres of "skin in the game" it is to become a father - I'd say to abstain for 6 months. If nothing else, it sends a loud "I'm taking daddyhood d*mned seriously" signal to your wife.

The key is finding wife who takes having children more seriously, it's not that difficult.

I'm not sure what you mean. In the scenario GP is talking about, I read it as the wife already being serious about having children and not drinking is one way for husband to show he is also serious about it.

Correct...except there's also the "she is unsure, his behavior might be persuasive" scenario.

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