Stop Doing This by Age 60 To Protect Your Memory, Neurologists Say

“Your health is your wealth” sounds like a cliché. However, taking the adage to heart can make your golden years, well, golden, especially when it comes to memory and overall brain health.“Your habits today shape your brain’s future,” notes Dr. Kevin Sheth, MD, the director of the Yale Center for Brain and Mind Health. “The brain is like a savings account—what you put in or take out now compounds over time.”He notes notes that healthy habits, like exercise and good nutrition, are like deposits into your bank account. They pay off down the road. However, poor habits can damage brain cells, disrupt connections and lead to memory problems later. Dr. Sheth and two other neurologists agree that one common habit is particularly harmful to memory. Here, they share the one thing to stop doing by age 60 if you want to protect your memory—consider it an investment in your future.

What To Stop Doing by Age 60 To Protect Your Memory, Neurologists Reveal

Neurologists are begging people to stop drinking alcohol excessively by age 60 to lower their risks of memory-related issues, including dementia. “Excessive alcohol slowly erodes the brain’s memory machinery, making it harder to store and retrieve information as you age,” Dr. Sheth shares.

Indeed, you may know about the short-term effects that drinking too much can have on your memory (a blackout). However, chronic excessive drinking can cause your brain to age more quickly than you do.

“Alcohol is a neurotoxin that can negatively impact the brain,” warns Dr. Neda Najimi, MD, a neurologist at Kaiser Permanente in Maryland. “Over time, drinking can shrink and kill brain cells, especially in the frontal lobes, hippocampus and cerebellum. These areas control memory, judgment, personality, communication, movement and emotions.”

5 Long-Term Risks of Excessive Drinking

Neurologists went inside your mind to share the long-term risks that excessive alcohol use poses to your memory.

1. Alcohol shrinks your brain tissue

Alcohol serves as the literal opposite of a “growth mind(set).” “Alcohol dehydrates and damages brain cells, especially in areas like the hippocampus, which is critical for forming and storing memories,” Dr. Sheth says. “Over time, this shrinkage weakens your ability to recall events or learn new things.”One 2022 study of more than 36,000 middle-aged and older adults suggested that even one or two alcoholic drinks daily could change the brain’s structure. Researchers noted that these changes were more pronounced in heavier drinkers.

2. It disrupts your brain’s communication system

Dr. Sheth explains that neurotransmitters are the brain’s chemical messengers, and your ability to recall previous events (and where you put something) relies on them. However, he notes—and a 2024 study backs this up—that alcohol can “mess with neurotransmitters,” like glutamate and GABA.This imbalance impairs how brain cells talk to each other, making it harder to lock in long-term memories,” he shares.

3. Alcohol reduces blood flow

What does blood flow have to do with brain health? A whole lot. “Chronic drinking narrows blood vessels, starving the brain of oxygen and nutrients,” Dr. Sheth says. “This can lead to brain cell death, especially in areas tied to memory.”One 2025 study pointed to tons of previous research suggesting the effects of alcohol use on blood flow and brain health, including memory.

4. It can cause nutrient deficiencies

Blood flow helps provide nutrients to the brain. However, alcohol can also deprive the body of nutrients in another way.“It can also use up the body’s resources that it needs for brain health, so that the brain gets starved of those vitamins, like thiamine—vitamin B1,” warns Dr. Daniel Lesley, MD, a board-certified neurologist at Remo Health. “That can lead to severe damage to parts of the brain that take care of memory and balance.”He adds that the effect of alcohol use is the most dangerous when someone is already eating poorly, sharing, “They aren’t getting the vitamins they need, and they’re using up whatever reserves of those key nutrients they have.”Dr. Najimi says that, in severe cases, alcohol can contribute to Wernicke-Korsakoff syndrome, explaining, “Wernicke-Korsakoff syndrome [is] a disorder caused by vitamin B1 deficiency that makes it difficult to form new memories and may cause confusion, vision problems and difficulty walking.”

5. Alcohol doesn’t help other body parts, either

As a reminder, your brain doesn’t operate in a vacuum. The health of the rest of your organs can impact your memory.“Alcohol can damage parts of the body that are crucial to brain health, like the liver, pancreas, blood vessels and heart,” Dr. Lesley explains. “Because of damage to those parts, the risk of strokes, brain bleeds and vascular damage increases markedly.”Dr. Najimi adds that chronic alcohol use can increase blood pressure and the risks of diabetes and obesity, none of which is good news for the brain.

What Qualifies as ‘Excessive’ Drinking?

Dr. Najimi echoes the CDC guidelines for excessive alcohol use: “For women, this means more than four drinks in a single day or more than eight drinks in a week,” she says. “For men, it is more than five drinks in a day or more than 15 drinks in a week.”However, Dr. Najimi points out that binge drinking also counts as excessive drinking.“That means drinking more than four drinks within two hours if you are a woman, or more than five drinks within two hours if you are a man. Even if it happens only occasionally, binge drinking can still put stress on your brain and body and raise your risk of long-term health problems.”

Those risks become more pronounced as you age. “For those over 60, even lower amounts can be risky due to slower metabolism and increased sensitivity,” Dr. Sheth says. “A rough guide: more than one to two drinks per day regularly is concerning for brain health.”

Signs You’re Drinking Too Much—And Where To Find Support

Beyond the numbers, Dr. Sheth notes that red flags that you’re drinking too much include:

• Memory lapses or blackouts after drinking.

• Needing more alcohol to feel the same effects (tolerance)

• Drinking despite problems at work, home or with health.

• Mood swings, irritability or trouble sleeping.

• Neglecting responsibilities or hobbies for drinking

Help is available. Dr. Sheth suggests speaking with your primary care doctor, who can help you find addiction specialists and support groups like Alcoholics Anonymous and SMART in your area.

With the right support, you may also learn it’s best to tweak other aspects of your life to make drinking less more achievable. Dr. Lesley shares that what that looks like varies.

“It may mean avoiding places in which everybody is drinking, especially if they’re drinking heavily, so you don’t have to choose to limit yourself to ‘just’ one or two drinks,” he says. “It may mean not keeping alcohol in the house, so it doesn’t feel tempting to ‘have just one or two’ when you’ve had a hard day.”

These small changes can add up—and pay off later in life. “Keeping yourself from being forced to make the choice makes the choice easier, and acquiring the habits and routines that keep you healthy makes living a long and illness-free life more likely,” Dr. Lesley explains.