How Does Alcohol Impact Your Skin and Hair?
06 / 01 / 17

How Does Alcohol Impact Your Skin and Hair?

It’s no secret that alcohol has a significant effect on the human body—an effect that spans to pretty much all bodily systems and parts. This includes both the skin and the hair, which can both deteriorate as a result of excessive drinking. In this post, we’ll review some of the most significant ways in which alcohol impacts your skin and hair—and we’ll also offer some tips for avoiding these negative effects.

Alcohol and Your Skin

The reason why alcohol has such a major impact on your skin is simple: It dries you out. Not only does alcohol have a dehydrating effect, but it also serves as a diuretic, which makes it harder to get rehydrated. And if you’ve ever struggled with dry skin before, you know what the results of this can be—redness, irritation, fine lines and pronounced wrinkles, even bad color. In short, drinking too much can cause your skin to lose moisture, which in turn causes you to look tired and sallow.

That’s just one of the ways in which alcohol has a negative impact on the skin, though. Something else to consider is that, when you drink too much, it depletes your body’s supply of Vitamin A—which in turn hampers your cellular renewal. The cosmetic effect of this is that your skin loses its healthy glow.

What’s more, alcohol opens up your blood vessels, which is why people whom drink a lot tend to look very red-faced and flush. Over time, your blood vessels can open up so much that you develop highly visible spider veins—not a look many people desire! In short, alcohol can ravage the skin; there’s simply no sense in which its cosmetic effects could be seen as positive.

What About Your Hair?

When it comes to alcohol and your hair, we find pretty much the same story: The effects are quite negative, and they largely stem from the fact that alcohol dehydrates your hair. Dehydrated hair, of course, tends to be very brittle. It tends to be limp. And it tends to break quite easily.

It gets worse, though. Regular alcohol consumption impacts the hair in other ways, including depletion of its zinc and folic acid. These are both critical nutrients for your hair to maintain its strength and shine, and it results in hair that’s easily damaged. On top of that, it increases the odds of hair loss.

Preventing Alcohol’s Ill Effects

The good news in all of this is that these side effects of alcohol consumption can all be avoided. The easiest way, of course, is to just stop drinking, though this isn’t really necessary. You can enjoy some alcoholic drinks without fearing major consequences to your skin and hair. The key, as ever, is moderation.

We’d recommend drinking responsibly, and we’d also encourage a few additional steps to keep your hair sufficiently hydrated. One step is to drink plenty of water. Simply put, drinking more water will help you to better withstand alcohol’s dehydrating effects. An action step you might consider is alternating one glass of water for every alcoholic drink you consume.

Another important step is ensuring a nutritious diet—rich in all the things that help keep your hair strong and healthy. Lean protein and iron are especially recommended. You could even take a supplement, like biotin, to give your hair the boost is needs.

We are big believers in rejuvenating hair masks, too, and would recommend using one following a night of heavy drinking. More than anything else, though, we’d simply urge you to remember how drinking impacts the skin and hair—and to be wise about your alcohol consumption.

Protect Your Hair and Skin

There’s plenty you can do to invest in the health of your skin and your hair. One final suggestion is to visit us at New Image to talk with a stylist about your particular hair health needs. We’d love to walk you through some of the options for keeping your hair healthy, hydrated, and strong. Join us at New Image to begin the conversation today.