Alcohol and Your Brain (Short Term)

One spot that it hits in particular is the central nervous system which contains your brain and spine. Alcohol can hit your brain very fast, that’s why you can feel light headed or relaxed after just one drink. Alcohol affects the nerve cells and the communication between nerve cells. This slows everything down and that’s why our emotion, judgment, balance, memory, speech, and anger levels are off after drinking. Your brain is still developing until you reach the age of 20-25 and alcohol can do some irreversible damage to your brain.

            One part of your brain that is affected is the cerebral cortex. The cerebral cortex controls our senses and our inhibitory center. This explains why when you are intoxicated you are very talkative, confident, and socially inhibited. This also causes your thought process and judgment to be off. Another part of the brain that is affected is the frontal lobes. The frontal lobes control planning, forming ideas, making decisions, and using self-control. That is why people who are drunk usually can’t control emotions and urges, they sometimes act without thinking, and they can be very violent and act completely out of character.

            The Cerebellum is also affected by alcohol. This part of your brain controls coordination, being aware, and thinking. This is people who are intoxicated usually can’t walk or lose balance easily and fall. The Hippocampus is also affected by alcohol. The hippocampus is where memories are made. When alcohol hits this part of your brain, you may have trouble remembering things you have just heard, or even worse, you could blackout and not remember what happened the next day.

            The Hypothalamus is the small part of the brain that does a large number of the body’s housekeeping chores. After alcohol hits the Hypothalamus, it increases blood pressure, hunger, thirst, and the urge to urinate. While those things increase, body temperature and heart rate decrease. Last but not least, alcohol also affects the Medulla. The medulla controls the automatic action such as heartbeat and the right body temperature. Alcohol chills the body so, drinking outside and in cold weather is a bad idea. That could cause hypothermia. Hypothermia is the condition where your body temperature drops way below normal. Some people go into a shock and many even die from this.