If a person realizes that he cannot remember anything the next morning after drinking, this means that he either drank too much, or signals the development of alcoholism. In the latter case, alcoholic amnesia can affect the addict even with a slight degree of intoxication. A person, discovering that he does not remember anything from what happened during a booze or binge, feels extremely uncomfortable and asks the question: “How to restore memory after brain poisoning with alcohol?”
Causes of poor memory
After alcohol is absorbed into the bloodstream, brain cells are poisoned. For this reason, the first symptoms of intoxication are clouding of consciousness, dizziness, and loss of coordination. According to studies, a dose equal to the use of 100 g of vodka can disrupt the work of about 8 thousand human brain cells. In addition, ethanol inhibits the action of some receptors in the brain tissues and causes overexcitation of others, which leads to blocking of memory.
One of the reasons why neurons are damaged is a lack of nutrition, since ethanol blocks the supply of oxygen, nutrients, and glucose, which is the body’s main source of energy, to the brain cells. Instead, the blood transports toxins and ethanol breakdown products to neurons, which leads to brain poisoning. In addition, ethanol has the ability to penetrate into neurons and affects the development of pathological processes in them.
Do not forget about the effect of ethanol on the blood composition, which is responsible for the transport of nutrients to the cells. It causes red blood cells to clump together, leading to the formation of clots (blood clots), which can take several years to dissolve. That is why, if such a blood clot closes a vessel in the brain (even peripheral), it will cause tissue necrosis.
Some researchers compare the effect of alcohol on the brain with a concussion, which was triggered by a mild traumatic brain injury. Alcohol poisoning of the brain also disrupts the functioning of various brain cells. For example:
- in case of disruption of the cells of the occipital part, coordination of movements is disturbed;
- when the cells that are responsible for human behavior are damaged, the feeling of shame disappears, the person becomes cheeky, vulgar;
- when the hypokama (the part of the brain that is responsible for fixing memories) is disrupted, memory lapses are observed. This happens because the hypokam is unable to record information due to alcoholic steroids, which inhibit this function. Therefore, a person discovers that he cannot remember anything from what happened during a binge, and all attempts to restore the events that happened to him during alcoholic intoxication are doomed to failure.
Pathological damage to brain cells leads to a large number of problems. That is why a person not only loses his memory, but also behaves inappropriately. How exactly – largely depends on the dose taken. The drunkard often becomes agitated, ceases to control himself, sticks to the opposite sex, wants to fight, draws attention to his person in different ways.
Types of amnesia
There are several types of alcoholic amnesia:
- Alcoholic palimpsest – characterized by partial memory lapses, when a person, having sober up, realizes that he is not able to remember some episodes. Sometimes a person is able to forget only a few minutes, but sometimes amnesia covers a much longer period. The appearance of this symptom usually indicates the initial stage of alcoholism. That is why if a person began to notice blackouts in memory, an urgent need to take measures to get rid of alcohol addiction.
- Narcotic alcoholic amnesia – this is the name for the complete loss of memory that occurs during a strong stage of intoxication, which makes the drunk always sleepy and falls into a very deep sleep (this form of amnesia occurs in both alcoholics and ordinary people).
- Total amnesia – happens with alcoholism of the third degree. At this stage, alcohol and memory are incompatible: the alcoholic completely forgets about all the events that happened to him while drinking alcohol, even if he drank a little.
Thus, if the stage of intoxication is small, and a person does not suffer from alcoholism, he usually remembers everything that he did while intoxicated. But if a person has drunk a lot, or is an alcoholic of the second or third degree, then memory loss after alcohol will happen all the time. Sometimes there may be partial failures, but complete amnesia of intoxication is also possible, when, having sober up, a person understands: he cannot remember anything from what happened during the binge.
How to improve memory
If earlier it was believed that neurons damaged by alcohol cannot be restored, now scientists have come to a different conclusion and believe that this is possible. True, only on one condition: you need to stop drinking.
Unfortunately, it is impossible to restore the events that could not be recorded in the memory due to the state of alcoholic intoxication. If a memory lapse, when a person realized that he cannot remember anything from what happened during a booze, is a consequence of a one-time alcohol abuse, then in the future amnesia will happen only with repeated drinking of alcohol in large doses. The consumption of alcoholic beverages in small quantities will not appear in memory, but you should not get carried away, since frequent drinking is a direct path to alcoholism.
The only thing that can be advised to an alcoholic if he can not remember anything about what happened to him during a drunkenness is to give up alcohol. It helps to restore brain cells, improve intelligence, mental activity, memory. At the same time, alcohol must be abandoned altogether: if an alcoholic breaks down even after a long period of sobriety, memory lapses will repeat. Alcohol and good memory in alcoholism are incompatible concepts.
Unfortunately, it is not easy to get rid of alcohol addiction on your own. Even if an alcoholic manages to hold out for six months, a year or even several years, if he takes a sip of alcohol at least once, it is highly likely that he will break down.
In this case, it is advisable to consult a narcologist. He will prescribe drugs that help remove alcoholic toxins from the body, normalize blood circulation, and relieve pain.
In addition, vitamin and mineral complexes are useful for restoring the normal functioning of the body, stimulating immunity, and improving brain activity. Particular attention should be paid to thiamine (as vitamin B1 is called). Its lack is often observed with alcohol abuse, leading to damage to the cerebellum.
This results in various disorders of brain activity: impaired coordination, palsy of the optic nerve, psychosis, irritability, depression. If this condition cannot be eliminated, the person may break loose and return to the bottle, which will aggravate the damage caused by alcohol.
Various logical tasks will be useful for memory recovery. These stimulate thinking, concentration, and promote memorization. This trains the brain cells and allows faster recovery of the parts of the brain that are responsible for memory and assimilation of information.
With proper treatment, if a person is determined to get rid of addiction, avoids contact with alcohol, uses medications prescribed by a doctor, trains memory, the body’s work is gradually restored. This also applies to damaged brain tissue.