A glass of wine every night?

I’ve got cancer & was shocked to learn that alcohol is classified as a Group 1 carcinogen, with a dose-dependent link to several cancers, including head and neck, liver, breast, and colorectal cancers. But it seems in life that everything that you enjoy seems ultimately bad for you.

A standard glass is 175ml, which is a quarter of a bottle.
Many people have a large glass, 250ml, which is a third of a bottle.

OP's 1 glass a night seems perfectly healthy to me. I would recommend trying to keep to 5 nights a week though - this would keep her well within the 14units per week limit

It is a habit and not a good one. There is a reason you are doing it otherwise you would be happy with a fancy fruit juice or some non alcoholic wine. You are drinking it because it relaxes you and alters how you feel. Otherwise why drink alcohol at all? If it was for taste there are some excellent non alcoholic options on the market. You are drinking it for the feeling it gives you. You do it every single day of your life so it’s a habit. Volume is not the issue here, it’s the constancy. You are getting something out of it other than taste and you are relying on that every day.

@OrangeYaGlad absolutely. But as PP put it, normal and ideal aren't necessarily the same thing.

I'm not sure you understand the word normal. It means what is the norm, which is literally defined by what large numbers of people do. 🤨

It's over the units.

It's habit forming.

When you drunk regularly you have a tendency to increase the amount over time.

@OrangeYaGlad the OP didn't ask what was normal for huge numbers of people. They asked was her nightly glass ok from a consumption point of view.

There is also a conception (not sure how accurate) that smoking rates are high in Paris. It doesn't make it healthy.

Yes, the biggest risk factors for breast cancer are being a woman and getting older. Like a lot of health issues, the biggest risks are things we cannot change.

That's not to say never do anything healthy of course or just drunk all day and eat donuts blah blah.

Putting that in bold before anyone jumps up and down "glorifying obesity snarl snarl - irresponsible ROAR" 😂

You have to actually look at those risks in context, not just baldly like that.
So sat one drink a day raises my chance of breast cancer by Y amount. But being overweight raises my chance of breast cancer by Y x 5, lets say. So if I lose weight but also drink wine every day, my chance of breast cancer has reduced, not increased.
And that's before you get into the myriad other factors that can play into individual risk factors AND the fact that you haven't defined the increase (Y) at all, which could be a tiny tiny increase not really worth considering 🤷‍♀️

Isn't that fairly obvious? Someone says X thing is not normal, the response is X is perfectly normal to huge numbers of people, ie the french.
It literally answers the question. What do you mean, so what?

I'm always slightly baffled by the retort 'the French do it!', as if that settles the argument once and for all. Firstly, like PP I'm not convinced it's even true. But even if it is....so what?!

Haha. Sound advice 😁

Eh?
I genuinely cannot recall what you said.

There are zero health benefits to alcohol of any type. The “red wine is good for your heart” research was funded by alcohol producers and completely flawed

True. Studies have shown that women who drink just one alcoholic drink per day are at an increased risk of breast cancer. And the risk goes up exponentially with increased consumption. Alcohol impacts estrogen levels and women who have had breast cancer are advised against drinking as it is thought to increase risk of recurrence.

Many countries are revising their guidelines to reflect updated science.

I'm not saying people shouldn't drink. That's an individual choice; we all balance risk v/s benefits when it comes to health. But it is a risk factor for breast cancer that women should be aware of.

(And anecdotal stories of "my gran drank a bottle a day and lived to be 110" are pointless. My own mother was a heavy smoker for many decades and enjoyed excellent health. Doesn't mean that smoking doesn't cause cancer and a slew of other diseases. She just got lucky.)

Lots of people here seem to be conflating what's normal with what's ideal.

I think a lot of it is because we can have some very black and white thinking about it. You see it with so many things. Just think of framing it as “if you are drinking more than the guideline you are in the wrong and doing something bad” vs “drinking more than the guideline isn’t optimal and can increase your risk of x/y/z so it would be great to cut down a bit” Most people if they hear a response like the first get defensive and don’t really listen as they just feel criticised. They’ll instead rationalise what they are doing as they don’t want to feel wrong or bad.

The reason people keep saying drinking in excess of NHS guidelines is 'absolutely fine' is because they don't see the impact over time and there's no bit of 'software' or otherwise that tells them the cause of anything.

If someone gets overweight, it's the processed food. It is never 'the wine'.

If someone gets seriously ill (and I don't want to type it in case of being accused of wishing ill on people, but we've all seen the link on here) - then it is purely down to "bad luck". It is never the wine.

People will rationalise out alcohol use over anything else, because they feel it 'takes the edge off the day' and 'they deserve it'.

Ah a comedian I see.....

I feel rather sorry for you - do you have nothing better to do?

I agree with this. We tend to all have at least some bad habits.
I don’t eat over much UPF or drink but definitely have become sedentary and am overweight.
On the whole it would be optimal for all of us to stop bad habits and we would be healthier if we did.
I think we get overly judgemental and overly defensive about these things. I have no doubt I’d be better off losing 3 stone and eating less chocolate and butter. I’ve also no doubt the OP would be better off cutting down to having an occasional vs daily glass of wine. That we have some bad habits doesn’t mean we are horrendous people though and ultimately we are more likely to improve our habits if peoples are understanding and sympathetic that we are all human and imperfect.
For what it’s worth OP might be worth trying some mindfulness about drinking so you just check in and think why you want a drink before you open a bottle. If you realise you don’t really it’s just habit you can always put it back and not drink it. This is of course much easier said than done. I’m working on it with my bad eating habits and I fail as much as I succeed. Still progress not perfection should always be the aim :)

Remind me what you said and I'll tell you.

Why do you drink it, why do you like it?

Theres a whole spectrum between teetotal and alcoholic, using the 'not an alcoholic' line is a red herring.

The real questions are - Is this level of drinking too high? It is above NHS guidelines in both amount and frequency.
Does this level of drinking have risks for health? Yes.
Is this self-medication or habitual drinking? Only the drinker or those close to them can answer.

There are zero health benefits to alcohol of any type. The “red wine is good for your heart” research was funded by alcohol producers and completely flawed. It’s a myth perpetuated to keep people drinking.

www.news-medical.net/news/20240725/New-study-debunks-the-health-benefits-of-moderate-alcohol-consumption.aspx

@Zusammengebrochen

What was funny about what I said please?

I honestly never get these questions – it's simple maths. Do what you want it life and I love a drink as much as the next person, but yes it's too much.

Max 14 units a week
Aim to at least 2-3 breaks throughout the week

You're drinking every night
You are drink large glasses (187.5m) a day
So you are consuming 1 and three-quarter bottles of wine a week = 17.5 units

Yes, by UK guidelines it's too much.

I absolutely adore wine 😂albeit I only tend to drink on a Friday & Saturday, but if that means I die at 80 rather than 90 so be it, I'll take the wine!