What makes a beer belly how it is, round and hard? What makes it different from a normal stomach or a soft(fat) stomach?
In: Biology
You’ve gotten a lot of good info here, especially from u/McKoijion.
However, to add to his answer, it’s not just that alcoholic beverages have calories. Also important to note is that alcohol is an endocrine disruptor.
Your endocrine system is a system of chemical messengers (hormones) secreted by endocrine glands that circulate through the blood and have various effects on the body, especially metabolic ones.
Alcohol has been demonstrated in studies to throw off the balance of certain hormones in the body:
1. Alcohol stimulates the generation of fat. It does this by forcing glucose (sugar) into the blood, which triggers the release of insulin, which stimulates the body to make fat and store it.
2. Alcohol stimulates your body to release cortisol, which over the long term can have metabolic effects, including weight gain.
3. Alcohol interrupts the release of testosterone (very simply put; it actually inhibits the release of luteinizing hormone, which inhibits testosterone production). Testosterone aids males in burning fat, so inhibiting it promotes weight gain.
4. In heavy drinkers, alcohol appears to interfere with the release of thyroid hormones, which slows down metabolism. However, this does not seem to affect moderate drinkers.
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