I was just sitting here looking at my fingernails (I’m in need of a manicure. 
) and I noticed that the bump on my knuckle caused by osteoarthritis looked much smaller than it used to. On a whim I googled to see if there was possibly a connection between the arthritis and alcohol consumption and lo and behold…
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4823794/
I guess I can add this to my list of physical improvements since quitting .
Oh wow. I was diagnosed with the other kind of arthritis rhumatoid. I constantly hope the inflammation will start to subside after I’ve been sober for a while. Do you have pain?
You sure it was not gout?
Booze… beer especially causes gout, that will mimick arthritis in the joints.
I don’t know…dr said osteo. All I know is I used to have a huge bony bump on my knuckle and now it’s much smaller. No more gnarly grandma hands.
Did that bump send crazy pain throughout your body when you bumped it against anything?
Not crazy pain…it was more localized pain, and it could hurt to press on it.
It wasn’t daily pain either… more periodic. Repetitive use could bother it, as did weather.
All I know is doctor said osteoarthritis.
So not being overly knowledgeable about gout I did a quick google about “gout vs osteoarthritis”. It did say that arthritis was commonly the last knuckle before the fingernail…I’m pretty sure that’s what I’ve got.
Mostly I thought it was interesting to see the relationship between alcohol consumption and arthritis. It is something that would have NEVER crossed my mind. It just seems like further evidence that the human body should never consume this poison.
May be off topic - but i have severe health anxiety and general anxiety as well. I always have a fear of suffering from some dangerous disease.
Many people have said me to stop googling your symptoms and diseases and medications…but i still sometimes do
Well to an extent it’s not good.excessive googling of web md could drive anyone mad. However its good for all of us to see the correlation alcohol has with many diseases. Afterall its been linked to cancer in general now and not just liver cancer.
It’s not smart to ignore the pains in your body either.They are there for a reason to let you know something isn’t right.
A lot of my pain has cleared up since quitting alcohol. It didn’t go away over night I’m about 10 months sober.
Alcohol just kills your insides and messed your body upl completely so we should definetly talk about how quitting has helped us. It also messes up your mind as well.
Thanks for the link @VSue . There is a lot of arthritis in my family history and I would like to avoid it as long as I can. I hope my body is repairing itself now.
I am really worried about this. Since August I have had pretty severe hip pain every single day. I have 2 chronic kidney diseases, one that can take calcium from my bones causing pain. I read lots of articles on heavy alcohol use causing necrosis of bones, so thats alarming. Glad to see this and hear other experiences. I’ve been drinking almost every night because ironically alcohol helps more than anything else. I read that it can ease pain of rheumatoid arthritis, but obviously isnt advised.