I’ve also noticed that I respond well to homemade sourdough bread, which contains enzymes that pre-digest much of the starch. I used to eat a lot of whole wheat bread (the worst offender), pasta, and cereal. Ever since I started eating meals consisting of whole foods, I’ve felt much better and become leaner. You can replace flour products with “slow carbs” – i.e., foods higher in complex carbohydrates that digest slower, providing longer-lasting energy, curbing cravings, and reducing insulin spikes.
Colorful Fruits and Vegetables
Water helps flush toxins from your body in the form of waste, and can help offset fluids lost during withdrawal in the form of sweating, vomiting, and diarrhea. Avoid heavily caffeinated beverages like coffee, sodas, and dark teas, since these drinks may worsen dehydration when going through alcohol withdrawal. Bright, colorful fruits and vegetables like red and yellow peppers, blueberries, and oranges are high in carotenoids — pigments that give these foods their vibrant hues. Carotenoids act as antioxidants that fight free radicals, including alcohol toxins. A diet high in colorful fruits and veggies can flush alcohol from your body more quickly, and provide you with countless nutrients that can accelerate your recovery. Dark leafy green vegetables are high in folate, also known as vitamin B9.
Reduced Heart Disease Risk
- Whole grains, such as oats, brown rice and quinoa, are essential to a recovery diet as they are rich in B vitamins and fiber.
- Eating a diet rich in fried and fatty foods may increase your risk of developing gallstones, which can increase your risk of gallbladder disease, such as porcelain gallbladder and cancer.
- Even if those studies turn out to be false, I’ll still take cheat days.
- B-complex vitamins, particularly B12, contribute to a healthy metabolism.
- Happy hour, holiday parties, hanging out after a long day— all of these things come with the expectation to drink.
John C. Umhau, MD, MPH, CPE is board-certified in addiction medicine and preventative medicine. For over 20 years Dr. Umhau was a senior clinical investigator at the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism of the National alcohol recovery diet Institutes of Health (NIH). All Addiction Resource content is medically reviewed or fact checked to ensure as much factual accuracy as possible. We are committed to healing everyone who enters our doors from the inside out.
Foods Rich in Iron
If large enough, they can also block the bile duct and cause infection, or pancreatic duct and cause pancreatitis. Gallstones can also increase the risk of gallbladder inflammation and gallbladder cancer. If you have your gallbladder removed, you may experience diarrhea, bloating, and farting in the first few weeks after surgery.
- Your liver has enzymes that work like special tools to help metabolize (break down) different toxins that enter your body, such as alcohol.
- These nutritional deficiencies can make it harder to recover from alcohol addiction and create other health problems.
- People often need to address past trauma or familial issues during this time.
- Today, the woman is no longer taking antifungal medications, but she remains on a very low-carb diet after having a relapse.
- Finally, the substantial amounts of fiber in cruciferous vegetables can keep you regular, improve your gut health, and help you regulate your blood sugar levels.
- Because many factors can affect how much fluid your body needs, always ask your doctor or treatment team how much water you should be drinking each day.
- A positive mood is also affected by proper nutrition because it can positively affect an individual’s outlook on life–lessening the risk of relapse in some cases.