With summer right around the corner, it’s officially time to get your shit in gear and shed those extra winter pounds that hide perfectly under a sweater but make you look like a beluga in a bikini. Lucky for you, this isn’t your first rodeo so you know what to do: get your ass in a SoulCycle class; trade the pizza for a salad; and cut back on the drinking, which fucking sucks but what other option do you have? “Just give up alcohol and carbs,” those smug sober people who have no fun say. “It’s so simple; you’ll drop 10 pounds like that!” Except it’s not that fucking simple when every weekend I have to choose between having a good time and not offending everyone with my crop top body. Well, betches, science has thrown us a life preserver. A ray of hope. A light at the end of the tunnel, if you will. I’ll stop with the platitudes and get to the point: according to some new research, alcohol doesn’t make you gain weight. At least, not necessarily. You can just call me your very own blackout betch fairy godmother for bestowing you with such good news, thank you very much.
So here’s the deal. Throughout the years, betches like us have been wondering if there’s any way we can black out Wednesday through Saturday without getting fat, and there’s been a ton of conflicting research. Finally, some hero at the New York Times researched a shit ton of different studies about alcohol and weight loss. The general consensus is that moderate consumption of alcohol, so like a glass of wine a day, is not going to keep you from having the body of a Hadid. (It’s your exorbitant cheese consumption and total lack of willpower that’s going to keep you from having the body of a Hadid.) It’s important to note, however, that “moderate consumption of alcohol” doesn’t exactly mean you can get shitfaced three days a week and lose weight, but it’s better than nothing.
And some more bad news, because fuck it: binge drinking—which is defined by lame-ass experts and your mom as consuming five or more drinks in one night—was linked to a higher obesity risk. In other words, despite how much you drunkenly tell yourself otherwise, yes calories count even when you’re drinking. They also count on the weekends. So stick to the skinny shit: A glass of wine, vodka soda, Patron on the rocks, straight vodka shots—you know, the standards—and then maybe you can manage to stay drunk and thin all summer long. You’re fucking welcome.