“One is still going, one is still going in”: If the evening goes like this and too much alcohol causes the film to tear, there will be a rude awakening the next day. What exactly is happening there? And how dangerous is a film tear? An addiction doctor and psychiatrist provides information on this.
Another round of schnapps, another beer – and it happened quickly. one is gone A film break. According to the “Know your limit” initiative, how quickly you get it depends on how well your body tolerates alcohol.
Women are more prone to film tears than men because they often have a lower body weight. The risk also increases if you drink large amounts of alcohol in a short period of time. High-percentage drinks such as schnapps or vodka, but also punch and liqueur, tempt you to do so.
Addiction doctor Andreas Jähne reveals in an interview what exactly happens in the brain when the film tears – and what three reasons speak for not letting it come to that in the first place.
What happens if the film breaks?
Alcohol has a sedative effect in higher doses. That means: It makes you tired and ultimately hinders the functionality of our brain, so that it can no longer store new information. So it’s similar to a classic fainting, where you don’t know what happened afterwards.
The effect of the alcohol builds up slowly. There is a gray area where not all information really reaches the brain, but individual pieces of memory are still formed there. At first we don’t even notice that certain information is no longer reaching us.
When the affected person then falls asleep, not everything is 100 percent gone. Even then there are still individual spotlights, i.e. scraps of memory. Those affected sometimes only become aware of them again a few days later, such as smells or images. But what it is exactly – this is coincidence.
How dangerous is such a film tear?
First, the sheer amount of alcohol is harmful to the liver and other organs. Secondly, we lose several thousand brain cells with every high, which the body cannot compensate for in the long run.
And thirdly: During this time, those affected are of course helpless – as if they had been given knockout drops. What happens during a film break cannot be controlled or undone. It can lead to falls or accidents in which one injures oneself. Or that someone gets hypothermic because they are outside without a jacket.
What consequences should one draw for oneself from a film tear?
You should think carefully about whether you want to take the risk of this happening again. You should realize that even if things went well once, that doesn’t necessarily mean that things will go the same way the next time.
About the person: Andreas Jähne is a specialist in psychiatry and psychotherapy and an addiction doctor. He is Medical Director and Chief Physician of the Oberberg Specialist Clinic Rhein-Jura and the Oberberg Day Clinic Lörrach.
