Does Drinking Alcohol Dehyrate the Body?

Does drinking alcohol dehydrate the body? As humans, we have been drinking, making, and selling alcohol for thousands of years. Yes, it does dehydrate your body. Alcohol is a diuretic, meaning that you urinate more frequently than usual. Not only do you get rid of the alcohol, but you also take a great deal of excess water and body fluids too. In our brains, we have a small gland called the pituitary gland. It is divided into two sections, anterior and posterior. Since drinking alcohol dehydrates the body, the volume of water in your body will be lower than normal, but the same amount of salts remain, only in a decreased amount of water. Due to the decreased amount of water, the salt is more concentrated. In our bodies, we have detectors that can recognize the amounts of salt and water in our bodies. If these detectors get the message that you are dehydrated, they send signals to the posterior pituitary gland. The pituitary gland produces ADH, which tells your body to stop urinating to preserve the excess water in your body. Alcohol reverses this process by reducing how much ADH we produce, which causes us to urinate more frequently. Lastly, even if one drinks plenty of water while drinking alcohol to avoid this dreadful dehydration, unfortunately it’s not that simple. Our bodies will only hang on to a very small amount of that water, between one-half and one-third. Along with the other water stored away in our bodies, it will go out through our urine. Although drinking water may help a little, you will still experience the dehydration after a long night of drinking.