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Read “The Homeostasis Trap: How Alcohol Hijacks Our Nervous System”
We can feel calmer after the first drink and take that as proof that alcohol lowers our anxiety.
And that’s only the beginning of the cycle. If we look at the whole night and what happens afterwards, alcohol-related anxiety can show up at three different points.
We won’t all feel every phase in the same way, but many heavy drinkers will recognise at least part of this pattern.
Phase 1: anxiety while we’re still drinking
The first drink slows things down in the nervous system. We might feel less tense, less self-conscious and less bothered by whatever was worrying us.
That feeling might not last long. We could become restless, lose the relaxed feeling or start thinking about the next drink before the current one is finished.
And that can feel like we just want to keep the night going. Sometimes we’re already chasing the relief from the earlier drink.
One drink changed how we felt, and now another one seems necessary to keep that feeling going.
Phase 2: anxiety later that night or the next day
As the alcohol wears off, the calmer feeling starts to go too. But our nervous system can still be pushing in the other direction, leaving us feeling more alert and unsettled than we want to be.
We might wake early with a racing mind. Our heart can feel as though it’s working harder. We could be sweaty, tense, irritable or unable to get back to sleep.
Then the thoughts join in: “Did I say something?” “Why did I drink that much?” “How am I going to get through today?”
Some of that anxiety could be about what happened. But poor sleep and alcohol wearing off can make every thought feel worse.
Phase 3: anxiety between drinks or during withdrawal
For regular heavy drinkers, that unsettled feeling can continue after the obvious hangover has passed.
We might feel on edge, shaky, sweaty, sick, unable to concentrate or just not right. Other times, it can feel more like irritability, poor sleep or a general feeling that we need something.
Another drink can change those feelings quickly. Alcohol can then start feeling less like something we want and more like something we need.
That’s how the drinking and withdrawal cycle keeps going. The next drink changes the feeling, even though alcohol wearing off helped cause it.
And if we’ve already arranged a stopping plan because withdrawal risk applies to us, we follow it.
Why the three phases are easy to miss
The relief comes first. The anxiety comes later.
So alcohol gets the credit for calming us down, while work, sleep, our personality or what happened the night before gets blamed for the anxiety. And when another drink changes the feeling again, it becomes even easier to believe alcohol is helping.
That’s part of the chemical anxiety trap. We keep using alcohol to change a feeling that alcohol is helping to create.
Seeing the whole cycle
The first drink might have taken the edge off for a while. That part was real, but it wasn’t the whole result.
When we include what happened while we kept drinking, later that night, the next morning and between drinks, alcohol starts looking very different.
It gave us relief for a while. Then the anxiety came back, and the next drink started looking like the answer.
— Brent
Next in the Series →
👉 Alcohol and Depression: The Other Side of the Chemical Trap