In a couple weeks I'm meeting an old friend and I can't promise myself that I won't drink alcohol. If I do indulge, is it better to do it while carbing up or during the low-carb phase? I know I will stick to the diet no matter what I'm doing. But I'm not sure if I should skip the carb up that weekend or not.

Tough call. For sure it's very easy to get really smashed when you're in ketosis - no liver glycogen to maintain blood glucose. It's possible to have some fun on it, but ya gotta be careful. I've found it to be very hard to not make a munchie stop on the way back from a bar.

I've recently done some reading on how alcohol is metabolised, but before all the science, consider that one time isn't going to make a major difference. Anyways, assuming you're not drinking anything with sugar, you'll be lowering blood glucose, so in my opinion, it's best done when you've just carbed and actually need to lower blood glucose anyway.

last friday i did started my carb up and then hung out wth some friends and "had some fun". i figured it would be best to have the alcohol during my carb up.

I admit that I've been frequenting the fun, so to speak, probably more than I should. Changed the choice of fun from red wine to gin and diet tonic though, and noticed a difference - less residual water retention in the morning and I don't get the urge to jump off the diet and eat a tub of ice cream.

I've always gone for the red wine because a) I like it and b) it's reported to have all of those antioxidant qualities. However, I think there's something specific about it that plays a trick with water balance - after all, it is the preferred vascularity-enhancing agent among bodybuilders. Maybe it's the trace carbs, maybe it's something else...

I vividly remember a case when on a Wednesday or something, when I was in ketosis and with very low subcutaneous water, I had some wine and within minutes felt a rush of water under the skin. It wasn't exactly pleasant.

Anyone else's experiences?