Alcohol and Weight Loss

This is a very common question I (and I’m sure a lot of other nutritionists/trainers) get asked. Everyone knows the way society is at the moment. People’s nightlife and social life are such a vital part in their day to day life. So what happens when they want to lose weight? Will their nightlife have to be put on hold?
When training for weight loss, the best and most effective way is to simply, train hard, diet harder. Someone’s diet during a weight loss program is key to succeeding, doesn't matter how much or how hard you train, if you feed your body poor nutrition, you’re not going to get the results your after. A lot of society now, drinks far too much, that’s just a fact. So how can someone who loves the nightlife, the clubbing, drinking, partying, lose weight? Short answer? They will have to either quit drinking or limit it. There is a term that is thrown around in the fitness world, and that is called ‘liquid calories’, and these can be damaging! People know that a chocolate cake from Starbucks will have a lot of calories and fat in it, but so many people do not know that alcohol is jam packed with calories! 
If your someone that goes out, drinking some glasses of wine/bottles of lager, then some shots, maybe some cocktails, and then staggers out of the club at 2am, starving, so you get drawn to the nearest burger van like a moth to a flame, you could be consuming way over 1500 calories in just that night! Add that to the calories you ate during the day, and I’m sure you could easily be over 3000 calories, and that is not good at all....A tactic many people use, is to hardly eat anything the entire day, so when they drink, they don’t go over the 2000 calorie limit (women) or 2500 calorie limit (men). This is just bad, bad bad bad. By doing that, your body is in ‘starving mode’, and it needs food. So when you guzzle down that alcohol, firstly, you will get drunk quicker, absorbing those bad calories, but also, whatever food you eat (and that tends to be fast food on a night out) your body will cling onto it, so that fat and grease in the fast food meal you eat, will stay on you.
So, my answer to this oh so common question? Its simple, you simply cannot lose weight and be healthy if your life revolves around alcohol and night clubs. People that have a few drinks just on a Friday/Saturday night, either with family, or a meal out somewhere etc, that is okay, as it is in moderation.