NA Beer, possible wave?

I’ve been feeling better lately. I decided to try a non-alcoholic Beer because I like the taste of beer. I have ZERO desire to drink alcohol. ZERO. I don’t plan to drink alcohol for at least 5 years once I’m healed, if at all.

 

Anyway, the beer was great, very tasty. But a few hours after drinking it, I had a warm and fuzzy feeling, very window-like. I felt really good. That night my sleep was horrible with sweats. However, I did eat some sausage that gave me a MSG reaction previously (I forgot about this before eating it).

 

So I’m not sure if the small amount of alcohol in the beer triggered this reaction or if it was the MSG sausage. Any input/opinions?? Non-alcoholic beer has 0.5% alcohol. So 10 of these beers equal one “normal” beer at 5% alcohol. I’ve drank kombucha and other drinks with trace alcohol with no problem. I know nobody will have an answer, but I’m just wondering your experiences with low alcohol in products. Thanks.

I found this. It acts on GABA... of course. Apparently hops have an effect on GABA and serotonin. The beer I had was very hoppy, which may explain why I felt good. 

 

https://ergo-log.com/non-alcoholic-beer-sedative.html

Or I can just use the search function and talk to myself. Thanks! Lol

Or I can just use the search function and talk to myself. Thanks! Lol

Hahaha. Yeah, I talk to myself a lot. 🤣 I've drunk a range of NABs and not had anything disproportionately bad so far. I mean, I constantly feel like I have the hangover from hell since giving up alcohol and benzos, so not sure I would notice! I quite like the Erdinger. Good taste, a lot better than Beck's blue, which is hideous. There's a wheat beer zero that is very hoppy. If you think it's that, maybe avoid the NABs for s while and see if it makes any difference. I haven't had any for a week though, and feel worse than I did before, so for me, I am not sure it makes much difference, but that's only me.

Thanks, JGT. I tried the Athletic Brewing IPA and it was excellent. Indistinguishable from a real beer. I’m wondering if I’m so sensitive to alcohol that it made me feel good by hitting the receptors like taking a benzo, then triggered a mini wave. But I could be overthinking it too! I’ll abstain for a bit and try one in isolation and see how I feel. There are some really good craft NA beers on the market these days. I hope I can drink them.

Thanks, JGT. I tried the Athletic Brewing IPA and it was excellent. Indistinguishable from a real beer. I’m wondering if I’m so sensitive to alcohol that it made me feel good by hitting the receptors like taking a benzo, then triggered a mini wave. But I could be overthinking it too! I’ll abstain for a bit and try one in isolation and see how I feel. There are some really good craft NA beers on the market these days. I hope I can drink them.

 

Thanks for the Athletic Brewing IPA tip. I had a quick look on drydrinker .com and I didn't realise just how much the industry has moved on. It's a shame that the regular highstreet pubs don't have a broader selection, the UK would certainly benefit from being nudged in that direction. But yeah, no harm in avoiding the NABs and LABs for a while and see if it coincides with an improvement with how you are feeling. Be very interested to know how it goes.

Thanks, JGT. I tried the Athletic Brewing IPA and it was excellent. Indistinguishable from a real beer. I’m wondering if I’m so sensitive to alcohol that it made me feel good by hitting the receptors like taking a benzo, then triggered a mini wave. But I could be overthinking it too! I’ll abstain for a bit and try one in isolation and see how I feel. There are some really good craft NA beers on the market these days. I hope I can drink them.

 

Thanks for the Athletic Brewing IPA tip. I had a quick look on drydrinker .com and I didn't realise just how much the industry has moved on. It's a shame that the regular highstreet pubs don't have a broader selection, the UK would certainly benefit from being nudged in that direction. But yeah, no harm in avoiding the NABs and LABs for a while and see if it coincides with an improvement with how you are feeling. Be very interested to know how it goes.

 

I just discovered the world of craft NA beer and there’s some promising stuff out there. I wish these beers would have been around 20 years ago and I would have had the awareness to drink them. I tried Athletic’s Smooth Ascent stout yesterday - wow. Exactly like a stout. Not too sweet, nice and bitter. It has a touch of caffeine, so some may need to be aware. I think the UK has more NA brews available than the US based on what I’ve seen. I’m glad this stuff is getting popular.

Hi DBM- just wondering how you are getting on with removing the NA beers. Interestingly, I had some yesterday and it coincided with feeling quite rough afterwards. However, I can't say it was anything other than a correlation, not a causation. And there were other things that it could have been- I'd pushed myself harder that day, so it might just have been coinciding with a more stressful day than normal. But there was a definite correlation. And I'm always sceptical of finding false positives when I am specifically looking for a correlation, so I wouldn't read too much into my one experience. If it keeps happening, then yes. Anyway, be interested to know how you are getting on, but I thought you might find this interesting- it's definitely worth further exploration. NB: should have said it was labelled as 0.0% (Peroni Libera)..

Hey JGT,

 

I’ve had one after we spoke and have abstained since. I can’t quite tell if it had an effect. I’ve been in a wave for a while now, so it’s not the beers that are doing it. I’m going to wait a bit longer before trying another.

 

I did find some beers labeled 0.0, and they’re decent.

Hi DBM, just thought I would let you have an update from this end. So I had been doing pretty well (even managed a couple of short runs), had some zero alcohol beers, and whilst it may be a complete coincidence, I've woken up feeling rough as anything- proper hangover feeling. No way am I going to be able to manage a run in the near future. So I am cutting the NABs too, just to see what happens. Hope things are going a bit better at your end. It will really suck if I can't manage the NABs, I've just found some really nice ones!

Sorry that happened, JGT. Exercise can definitely trigger waves. I haven’t tried any NABs since my last post. I plan to try them again soon. I wonder if the tiny amount of alcohol can affect our receptors? I’m sure it’s something we’ll just have to experiment with. There are so many good NABs these days, I agree that it would be a shame if we can’t enjoy them. I’ll let you know how it goes when I try them again. Hope you feel better.

I've just been experimenting with a alcohol free becks blue. I do miss relaxing with a beer. It was actually quite nice, and do feel a bit more relaxed! Placebo, or the 0.05% alcohol? I can't believe I'm that sensitive but it's possible I suppose.

 

I know it's a slightly old thread, but how are you finding the beers now? Or have you decided not to experiment anymore?

 

Be interested in hearing some recommendations

 

EDIT: with regards to OP,  possible wave from an alcohol free beer. Just been reading an article that says there's more alcohol in a banana than a 0.05% beer. Obviously anything is possible in WD, but I found that quite reassuring

 

Article: https://steadydrinker.com/articles/foods-drinks-alcohol/

 

Research paper: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5421578/

Hi @DBM and @Having a Mare!

 

Well, I've been treading a careful path on this aspect. And I'm also fairly wary of reading too much into correlations between my waves and possible triggers, because, let's face it, there are just so many possible variables. Having said that, I have been able to compare two, fairly common non-alcohol beers (as opposed to the low-alcohol ones, which I am avoiding altogether). Neither of these are particularly great taste, but they are all my local shop has and they are cheap, and I've not really gotten into buying stuff like this online yet. For what it's worth, I find the Heineken 0% a possible wave trigger. Let's face it, though, it's not exactly a gourmet lager, so if I can't drink it, I'm not going to lose a lot of sleep. But an equally cheap one- Bavaria- seems to not trigger me at all. It also seems to taste a little bit nicer. I know there are much nicer ones out there, and if it was something I was going to drink a lot I probably would get into buying it online, but for now, I am happy just to stick to the occasional Bavaria. I did have a few Peroni zero alcohol beers a while ago, and the taste was good enough, but they too seemed to coincide with me feeling a bit rank about an hour or two later. But my local shop doesn't sell them anyway, so I can't really conclude much on that front. Hope you guys are able to find some that you like and that are non-wave-inducing. 

 

Cheers! Jake

Hi @DBM and @Having a Mare!

 

Well, I've been treading a careful path on this aspect. And I'm also fairly wary of reading too much into correlations between my waves and possible triggers, because, let's face it, there are just so many possible variables. Having said that, I have been able to compare two, fairly common non-alcohol beers (as opposed to the low-alcohol ones, which I am avoiding altogether). Neither of these are particularly great taste, but they are all my local shop has and they are cheap, and I've not really gotten into buying stuff like this online yet. For what it's worth, I find the Heineken 0% a possible wave trigger. Let's face it, though, it's not exactly a gourmet lager, so if I can't drink it, I'm not going to lose a lot of sleep. But an equally cheap one- Bavaria- seems to not trigger me at all. It also seems to taste a little bit nicer. I know there are much nicer ones out there, and if it was something I was going to drink a lot I probably would get into buying it online, but for now, I am happy just to stick to the occasional Bavaria. I did have a few Peroni zero alcohol beers a while ago, and the taste was good enough, but they too seemed to coincide with me feeling a bit rank about an hour or two later. But my local shop doesn't sell them anyway, so I can't really conclude much on that front. Hope you guys are able to find some that you like and that are non-wave-inducing. 

 

Cheers! Jake

 

Hi Jake,

 

I've actually just bought some Bavaria because I read that they brew it in a way that produces 0 alcohol which is probably why you don't notice any ill effects. The same brewery make Cobra zero too, which if you like your Indian food a nice beer (full alcohol) that most Indian restaurants serve. Unfortunately seems to be hard to find tho

 

I'll wait a few days, but will try the Bavaria maybe at the weekend. One of the little things in life for me having a beer, makes me feel a little bit normal even though I'm far from it

Good to know about Cobra too! Thanks. Hope you liked the Bavaria, and were able to enjoy it without any bad effects. The festive period is definitely a time to make these discoveries!

 

I certainly like the taste of the Bavaria, and I used to love Cobra when I could drink, so I will look out for that too.

 

Happy holidays.

Unfortunately I think I'm having a reaction to the becks blue 0.05% which is basically nothing, more alcohol in a banana! Had a small bottle last night, woke up with a stuffy nose and bad stomach.

 

I'm gutted, was able to have a beer up until an AD setback. Now I'm beyond sensitive to everything! Water only for the rest of my life seems awful to be honest.

 

Oh well, hope you are able to enjoy them

FWIW, because I'm still on 2 mg valium, I take one non alcoholic beer at lunch every single day. I had a terrible benzo crash into acute in the summer of 2019 (my signature is more explanatory), and since then I've been mostly holding and very very slowly stabilizing. My sxs are easing extremely slowly and the NA beer doesn't seem to be affecting the recovery. I was terrified and I asked my psychiatrist about it and he said I could take one NA beer a day. Then I see some people taper with vodka and when I look at the amount of vodka, I think sometimes that's more alcohol than one NA beer, and those people taper successfully regardless. Like with everything else, this is very individual. You and I talked in the past and those days I hardly slept. Now I sleep between five and seven hours a night, and last night even eight, so I seem to be slowly healing in spite of the NA beer. I would never, ever, ever drink one glass of real beer, wine or anything alcoholic. I know it would ruin my brain. I'm that sensitized. But I think it's all about he quantity. Just my opinion of course.

I left these alone for a while because was in acute from an adverse reaction to an AD. Anyway really fancied 1 yesterday so had a small bottle of becks blue 0.05%. Definitely had a reaction to it, bad sleep, number arms. I can't believe it 0.05%... Before my bad AD experience, I could drink a normal beer. So gutted I can't even drink alcohol free now

So gutted I can't even drink alcohol free now

 

For now, don't lose hope.