There Is One Preventive Measure That Is Absolutely Foolproof For Every Person In The World
Don't ever drink. You'll be guaranteed to avoid hangovers for the rest of your
life.
Since
99.9% Of The People Who Are Concerned With Hangovers Will Never Follow Method
#1, Then The Next Best Preventive Measure Is This
Never drink enough to get really drunk. That way, hangovers will be rare, if
not nonexistent.
From This Point On, We Enter The Mysterious Realm Of Experimental Preventives
The problem here is that all people are not alike in such things as size,
weight, metabolism, chemistry, etc. So, what works for me may not work for you.
But I offer these as good ideas to try when you've done what 89% of us do -
namely, said to hell with methods #1 & #2.
You've just opened your eyes to find yourself crumbled into a collapsed mess,
hopefully in a bed, hopefully in somewhat familiar surroundings, but, worst of
all, awake. Your mind gradually manages to reconstruct some sort of memory of
some portion of the previous night's activities. You feel like the worst part
of hell (this is the cue for the proverbial "I'll-never-drink-again"
declaration, one of the most pitiful demonstrations of bull$#!+ in all of human
behavior). You need help. Quick.
A little understanding of what a hangover actually is really comes in handy
here. It's a combination of a few physiological things:
Dehydration -
the alcohol has forced evaporation of a certain vital portion of the body's
water.
Nervous shock -
you're coming off the effects of a mild overdose of a depressant drug, so your
nerves are displaying the great Newtonian natural law of action/reaction by
going into a relatively hypersensitive state.
malnutrition -
pumping all that alcohol and liquid through your body has effectively flushed
away a significant supply of your storage of vitamins and nutrients, chemicals
which would stimulate natural defense systems, but you're running seriously low
on them now.
What you need to do is take some restorative steps to begin a recovery process.
This means doing the same things that you should have done in method #3 (it's
really too late now, but it can't hurt). It means rest and as little nervous
stimulation as possible. It also means trying to eat something that will help
to replace the nutrients you've lost. That really should be in the forms of
fruits/vegetables, NOT fatty, greasy junk, not dairy foods, something that
isn't too tough on the already beat-up digestive system. Bananas are great for
key vitamins. But I'll tell you what I've found to be a real miracle medicine
for me - tomatoes!
Strange but true. This came to me by pure accident. I was a suffering bastard
one day following a night of revelry, and I knew I needed some food, but I
found myself in a situation where I didn't really have any choice about the
lunch that I'd been served. It was a basic Italian-American dish that included
a tomato sauce (something like lasagna or spaghetti). In less than an hour
after eating, I felt rejuvenated, almost back to normal! I couldn't believe how
quickly I had gone from hangover hell to basically ok. I figured it was just a
fluke. But the next time I was in a similar situation, I deliberately tried it
again, and it worked! This sort of explains half of the reason that a Bloody
Mary is the standard morning-after drink. (The OTHER half, of course, is that
more alcohol - "hair-of-the-dog" - acts to relax your shattered
nerves and numb the pain in the head, but more alcohol is also a great step on
the road to alcoholism, not a habit I'd suggest.)
So, next time, try it. Maybe a little light pasta with a meatless, grease less,
tomato sauce. Cold gazpacho or a mild salsa may work too, but your stomach will
be in no mood for onions and peppers. A glass of V8 may be just the thing.
Citrus juices tend to bother the stomach too; but tomatoes are highly acidic,
so I can't explain that part.
Herbal Remedy Milk Thistle
A flowering plant from the Mediterranean, milk
thistle is an herbal remedy that has been used in one form or another for
thousands of years. It's available today in pills or as a tea.
A traditional view of milk thistle is as an
herbal remedy to help protect the liver and improve its function.
Laboratory research and clinical studies
indicate that an extract of milk thistle called silymarin can give humans and
animals some protection from the toxic liver effects of drinking alcohol. In
successful laboratory studies, the amount of silymarin used is about one
twentieth the amount of alcohol ingested. This translates into 900 milligrams
of sylimarin for each glass of wine or beer.
Like any other product, milk thistle can have
side effects you should know about. Here are some potential side effects of
milk thistle, according to the National Center for Complementary and
Alternative Medicine:
Milk thistle side
effects include a laxative effect, upset stomach, diarrhea, and bloating.
Milk thistle can
produce allergic reactions, which tend to be more common among people who are
allergic to plants in the same family (for example, ragweed, chrysanthemum,
marigold, and daisy).
What Not To Do If You Know Your Going To Be Drinking A Lot
Don't mix a lot
of different types of alcoholic drinks (liquor, then wine, then beer). Loudon
Wainwright wrote a song about this:
Drinks
before dinner and wine with dinner and after-dinner drinks
Single-entendre
Help me, Rhonda
Locate my cufflinks
Come with me and you all will see that it
all be alright
Rudolph the red-nosed wino will guide our
sleigh tonight.
Don't overdo it
with colored liquors (red wine, whiskeys, cordials, dark rum). A cheap red wine
hangover is absolutely THE WORST. Death without actually passing into the next
world.
Don't overdo it
with sweet blended concoctions. This is the classic mistake of high-school
idiots, dumb college undergrads, and basic novice drinkers (who will probably
never drink again). All of these sick sugary trendy drinks with cream of
whatever, and doughnut-flavored schnapps, and layers of nifty floating colored
syrups and liqueurs. Oh, please. Gag. Gallons of Coca-Cola mixed with hard
liquor. Imitation raspberry-flavored margaritas and "daiquiris".
(Raise your hand if you've ever even SEEN a real daiquiri.) The combination of
all of that sugar in the stomach with the mandatory alcoholic kick in the head
- the end-result is almost always the same. Most kids still have to learn the hard way. Some people
think it's a rite of passage to "adulthood". Yeah, right.
Hopefully this helps ease your day after in the new year, so you can tend to more important things, like those resolutions I'm sure you intend to keep.
