I would like to know too! When I drink more then to drinks the scales goes way up but after a few days of not drinking it's back down. Maybe this is their one day or night to "go crazy" and thn it evens out?

Methinks you answered your own question.

F.

For the first year of my weight loss, I drank beer every Friday and Saturday night. And not a little bit of beer, either. I drank 6 pints each night. I would typically see a loss (from dehydration, I think) by Sunday morning. Then a bump up of a pound or so on Monday, then a gradual decrease in weight by Friday to start the whole thing over again.

I have since quit drinking beer because I was drinking way too much and I started drinking way too much every night when I traveled for business. I was also falling face first into large amounts of unhealthy food. When I did that, I gained as much as 8 pounds in a week.

Not only have I stopped drinking beer, I've also got a different job that doesn't involve travel. So, I guess the moral of my story is that I used to be able to drink beer and still lose weight but not anymore.

I lost about 30 pounds a couple years ago while drinking on average 6-8 pints Friday and Saturday night. I have no idea how I did it. My eating was healthier than it had been but I was way over drinking the calories I was saving from food. I can't say the same thing now. I can have a beer or a glass of wine but the odd time I've had 3 or 4 drinks which is still way less than what I used to drink my weights up by 4-5 pounds for a week!

I drink most days and have lost weight. The trick is to skip dinner.

The main problem with alcohol is not the calories from the alcohol. It's the calories from the bar food you feel compelled to eat when drinking alcohol.

I can happily drink on an empty stomach but many people can't.

If you can do that then happy hours and weight loss go hand-in-hand.

They balance it out in other ways, as you surmised. You ask the same question that people would ask if they saw my husband eat dinner: "How can he eat such big meals and still not gain weight?" The answer is that he only eats two meals a day, doesn't snack at all, and only occasionally eats sweets. He gets annoyed at me because I refuse to eat some of the butter-laden dishes he prepares for dinner, but the truth is I could eat them---if I were willing to forgo sweets and other goodies. I'm not, though. Most times, I would rather have a chocolate croissant for breakfast or some Sea Salt Caramel Gelato after dinner than fattening "real" food. Thus, I am more than willing to have broiled salmon for dinner if I can have some ice cream afterwards. It's all about balancing out the calories.

This! I apparently no longer have an off switch for beer and eat like crazy when I drink it. Oddly enough, I can have a mixed drink or a glass of wine and be fine.

Alcohol itself can't be converted to fat, so you wouldn't gain weight from it. It's the fatty foods you eat with it that cause the weight gain.

If you were to drink vodka, whiskey, tequila, dry wines, or other low/no sugar alcohols and only ate lean protein, you wouldn't gain fat. You wouldn't lose fat either as alcohol halts fat loss. However, you might drop a little on the scale since alcohol is a diuretic.

Isn't there a trend among young people (usually female) who don't eat so they can drink binge as much as they can?

Anyways, there are not that many older people who can drink as much as they want and not gain weight.

But, then, that may not be due to biology. When you're young, you can only afford one thing--eat or drink. For some, they choose only to drink. When you get older and earn an actual income, you can drink *and* eat. Then you gain weight.

I know a lot of women that drink alcohol a lot and still are stick thin. Granted they are stay at home moms and spend hours at the gym. I think they can drink due to their increased calorie burning.

I am now thinking of giving up my beloved wine and switching to vodka & club soda with lots of lime. That's also what they all seem to drink. I am a lightweight though and 1 drink should be enough for me.

This is completely false. Alcohol has calories. Excess calories cause weight gain.

I'm probably one of those who drinks and stays thin. When my friends see me drinking on the weekends they probably think that I have a fast metabolism or something but in reality I can't have it all. What I mean is I'm very strict with my rules for eating healthy, I rarely miss a workout and I walk a lot. There has to be a balance.

I don't allow myself to eat when drinking, again just trying to find a balance. You have to choose what you really want and what you can live without but you can't have it all without consequences.

I also think that perceptions sometimes are very subjective. My friends normally say that I eat a lot, and it's true that during meal time I eat until I'm satisfied but I don't spend the whole evening snacking on crisps, cookies or sweets as they do, so in the end it comes to the same, you have to balance it all.

Drinking has never affected my weight that much, weirdly. Granted, I stick to red wine only (not for any reason other than I don't like most other alcoholic drinks besides wine with the exception of the occasional margarita). Sometimes I've stopped drinking wine just to see if it has any affect on weight loss, and nope. I still lose or don't lose at the same rate whether or not I have my glass or two of wine.

Now I often whine about needing to give up my evening wine because the extra calories can't help, especially now during a time when I have put on some pounds (and the weight I've put on is really because of eating habits, that's the only thing that changed over the past year), but whether I drink a glass of wine or not has never had a significant effect on my weight. I've drunk a few glasses of wine and still lost weight when I'm doing everything else right (eating healthy/clean, exercising). At my very heaviest adult weight, I didn't even drink at all at that time. So I really do think that it really is all about calories in/calories out and how you distribute that between healthy food and treats!

I used to be 108lbs and drink every night. You don't gain weight on 1000 calories of alcohol when you don't eat any food. On days I would eat, it would be a grilled chicken burger with no sauce and a side salad with no dressing.