Cravings, Decoded – Part 5 of 7
Part 1: What Causes Alcohol Cravings
Part 2: The Craving Escalation Cycle
Part 3: When Mental Cravings Feel Physical
Part 4: Double-Barrel Alcohol Cravings
Part 5: Hidden Triggers That Mimic Alcohol Cravings ← you’re here
Part 6: How to Weaken and Destroy Cravings (For Good)
Part 7: Practical Tools for Managing Alcohol Cravings
Cravings aren’t always what they seem.
Sometimes they’re something else entirely, masked by your body and misread by your brain.
You might think you’re being pulled back into old drinking urges, but what you’re really feeling could be a blood sugar drop, emotional exhaustion, or even the side effect of a medication your brain hasn’t adjusted to yet.
This doesn’t mean you’re doing anything wrong.
It means you’re human, and your system’s still learning how to live without alcohol.
The Mind-Body Confusion
What we feel in our body can be misleading. Here’s how cravings and physical discomfort get tangled.
Cravings aren’t just thoughts, they’re physical sensations too. We feel them in our chest, our gut, our throat, and our jaw.
When that sensation kicks in, our brain often says, “This is familiar. This is when we drink.”
But here’s the catch.
Your body reacts the same way to real cravings and false alarms.
Real cravings: driven by thoughts, emotions, or triggers.
False cravings: driven by things like hunger, fatigue, or dehydration.
The body feels off, the brain mislabels it, and the result is confusion, self-doubt, and often, a drink.
Low Blood Sugar, Fatigue, Dehydration
Many “cravings” are just physical signals your brain doesn’t know how to interpret yet.
Common culprits include:
- Hunger or low blood sugar
- Caffeine crashes
- Dehydration
- Poor sleep or fatigue
- Hormonal shifts, which can be huge for some people
Each of these can cause:
- Irritability
- Restlessness
- Shakiness
- Foggy thinking
- A sudden urge to fix the feeling
If your body’s out of balance and used to alcohol as the “fix,” your brain will reach for it, even if the real solution is food, water, or rest.
I remember one afternoon, out of nowhere, I felt lightheaded, irritable, and restless. My first thought was, “I want a drink.” because it felt like a full-blown craving. But the real culprit was that I hadn’t eaten since the night before. So, I grabbed something to eat, had a glass of water, and twenty minutes later, the urge was gone. Just like that.
It wasn’t a genuine craving. It was low blood sugar. And from that point on, I started questioning every craving more carefully.
This is more common than we think.
How Your Brain Associates Relief with Alcohol
So why does the brain reach for alcohol even when that’s not the real problem?
Because it’s been trained to. Over time, our brain’s learned to associate any form of relief, whether physical, emotional, or mental, with alcohol.
Feel off? Drink.
Feel tense? Drink.
Feel tired, hungry, or overwhelmed? Drink.
Even if we’ve started to break the habit, that association can still fire.
So when your body says, “Something’s wrong,” your brain replies, “I know what helps.”
Except it doesn’t, and we have to teach it a better answer.
Medication Side Effects
Physical states aren’t the only issue, chemical signals can also confuse us.
Medications are another hidden factor.
Some drugs, especially painkillers, antidepressants, anti-anxiety meds, or anything with codeine, can alter your mood, energy, or perception.
That shift can mimic a craving or even trigger one, especially if the med causes:
- Emotional dullness
- Nausea
- Irritability
- Mental fog
- A faint buzz or altered state
All of those sensations can overlap with withdrawal or familiar pre-drinking states. And if your system’s adjusting to a dose change, you may feel slightly off for days, even if you’re not aware of it.
When you add all of this together: hunger, fatigue, dehydration, even medications, it’s easy to see why so many of us mislabel what’s really happening.
The Risk of Mislabeling
When we don’t recognize what’s really going on, we can misinterpret the entire experience.
Instead of asking, “What’s happening in my body?”
We jump straight to, “Why am I craving again? What’s wrong with me?”
That mislabeling leads to:
- Shame
- Discouragement
- False urgency
- Poor decisions
We can’t afford that kind of confusion, not in early recovery, and not when we’ve worked so hard to get here.
That’s why learning to spot the difference isn’t just helpful, it’s essential.
Why This Distinction Matters
When you recognize that a craving’s not actually a craving, something important happens.
You stop feeling powerless.
Instead of battling something imaginary, you address what’s real:
You eat.
You rest.
You hydrate.
You breathe.
You settle.
And that moment becomes a powerful reminder:
You don’t have to drink to feel better. You just have to decode the signal.
This distinction restores your confidence. And confidence is what turns coping into momentum.
How to Tell the Difference
So how do we sort real cravings from all these imitators? Start here.
Use this quick gut-check:
- Pause before reacting.
- Scan your body: When did I last eat? Have I had enough water? Did I sleep last night? Am I tired, tense, sick, or over-caffeinated?
- Name the feeling. Is this urge specific to alcohol, or is it more like a foggy signal that something’s wrong?
Often, once you address the physical need, whether food, rest, or movement, the craving dissolves.
It wasn’t a craving. It was a body-brain misfire.
It Feels Real, But You Can See Through It
This isn’t about pretending cravings don’t exist. It’s about recognizing that not everything that feels like a craving is one.
The more often you stop and question what’s really going on, the more skilled you become at navigating those moments.
Over time, that skill turns into trust.
You stop fearing the noise.
You stop reacting to the confusion.
You start feeling steady, because now you see the difference.
That’s not just recovery. That’s emotional mastery.
— Brent