The first rule of improving your diet is avoiding ultra-processed foods.

Opt out of food with a label full of words you can't pronounce.

With food, opting out is easy. Buy whole ingredients, cook at home.

It's not so easy with alcohol.

Brewing your own is an awesome hobby, but most people aren't going that route so you're stuck buying a packaged product and since Alcohol doesn't require ingredient labels, it's difficult to know if you're drinking ultra-processed junk.

Normalized hangovers make it worse. When you expect to feel bad, you stop questioning whether the drink itself was the problem.

"How come when I go to Italy, I can drink all day and not feel bad?" I hear that all the time.

Drinking ultra-processed alcohol makes you feel worse, the same way eating ultra-processed food does compared to a meal made from whole ingredients.

Pay attention to how your body responds to different drinks. You can feel genuinely good after drinking. Most people have no idea that's possible.