I was having a glass of wine most nights when I got my Oura Ring. Not a lot, or so I thought. Within weeks the data told a different story. My HRV baseline runs in the nineties. On mornings after drinking, even one glass, it dropped to the thirties or forties. Every time. Without exception.

That data started a three-year experiment I didn't plan to run. And on December 31st, 2024, I eliminated alcohol entirely.

What I expected was clarity. What I got instead, and what eventually led me to the p-tau217 test, a reinfected root canal, and a completely different understanding of why a clean baseline matters, is the story this episode tells.

The research on alcohol and Alzheimer's has shifted significantly in the last few years and most people haven't caught up to it. The apparent protective effect of moderate drinking has largely collapsed under methodological scrutiny. The 2025 ALBION study found that light-to-moderate drinkers had nearly three times the odds of amyloid-beta positivity compared to abstainers. Not heavy drinkers. People who would never describe themselves as having a drinking problem. For APOE4 carriers specifically, one prospective study found that drinking at least once a month was associated with seven times the dementia risk compared to never drinking. Same behavior. Completely different biological outcome depending on what's in your DNA.

This episode covers what the research actually says, why the APOE4 picture is categorically different from the general population, what eighteen months of not drinking actually cost me socially, and the thing I least expected to learn about why elimination matters beyond optimization.

Show Notes