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Celebrating the first day of 2023 with a hangover?
If so, you might be looking a method to ease your misery. There are certainly many so-called hangover cures, some dating back centuries.
“The ancient Greeks believed that eating cabbage could cure The hangover, and the Romans thought a meal of fried canaries would do,” said Dr. John Brick, former chief of research at the Center for Alcohol Studies, Education and Training Division at Rutgers University in New Jersey, author of “The Doctor’s Hangovers”. Manual. »
“Today some Germans believe that a hearty breakfast of red meat and bananas cures a hangover. You might find French people drinking strong coffee with salt or Chinese people drinking spinach tea,” she said. “Some of the more unusual hangover remedies are used by some people in Puerto Rico, who rub half a lemon under their arm . »
In truth, the only hangover cure is time, according to the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism.
“A person would have to wait until the body has finished eliminating the toxic byproducts of alcohol metabolism, rehydrate itself, heal irritated tissue, and restore immune and brain activity to normal,” according to the institute. This recovery process can take up to 24 hours.
Are there things you can do to make your transition easier? Perhaps, the experts say, but many common hangover “cures” can make a hangover worse. Here’s how to separate fact from fiction.
Having another drink, or the “hair of the dog that bit you,” is a well-known hangover cure, isn’t it? Not really, experts say.
The reason some people think it works is that once the calming effects of alcohol wear off, the hangover brain becomes overstimulated. (It’s also why you wake up in the middle of the night after your body has metabolized alcohol.)
“You have this hyperexcitability in the brain after the alcohol wears off,” said Dr. Robert Swift, a professor of psychiatry and human behavior at Brown University’s Warren Alpert Medical School. in Providence, Rhode Island.
“If you look at the brain of a person who has a hangover, even though that person feels tired, their brain actually is. excited,” he said.
Consuming more alcohol normalizes the brain again, “because you’re sedating your excited brain,” Swift said. “You feel better until the alcohol goes away and the cycle somehow repeats itself. »
The answer is yes, depending on your hangover symptoms, Brick said. If you’re a coffee drinker, skipping your morning cup of coffee can lead to a lack of caffeine in addition to a hangover.
But the coffee it can irritate the stomach lining, which is already inflamed from alcohol, Brick said. So if you’re feeling nauseous and nauseous, coffee can only make it worse.
“If you’re hungover, have a quart of coffee,” Brick suggested. “See if you feel better: It takes about 20 minutes for the caffeine to start having a noticeable effect.
“If coffee doesn’t make you feel better, stop drinking it. Obviously, this is not the cure for a hangover.
Forget eating a greasy breakfast early in the morning after a night of drinking—you’re adding insult to injury, Swift said: “Fatty foods are harder to digest, so it’s probably best to avoid them. »
Eating fatty foods also doesn’t make much sense. The alcohol we drink, called ethyl alcohol or ethanol, is the byproduct of fermenting carbohydrates and starches, usually some kind of grain, grape or berry. While it can make tasty beverages, ethanol is also a solvent, Brick said.
“It cuts stomach fat the same way it cleans grease from oily parts of cars,” she said.
Instead, experts suggest using food to prevent a hangover, by eating before you have that first drink.
“Consuming foods high in protein and carbohydrates can significantly slow alcohol absorption,” Brick said. “The slower the alcohol gets to your brain, the slower the ‘shock’ will go to your brain. »
Alcohol dehydrates, so a headache and other hangover symptoms may be in part due to narrowed blood vessels and a loss of electrolytes, essential minerals like sodium, calcium and potassium that your body needs.
If you’ve been throwing up, you’ve lost even more electrolytes, which can lead to fatigue, confusion, an irregular heartbeat, digestive issues, and more.
Replacing lost fluids with water or some type of sports drink with extra electrolytes may help improve hangover recovery, Swift said.
According to experts, taking over-the-counter pain relievers can be dangerous, especially if you take too much while intoxicated. Taking an acetaminophen, such as Tylenol, can further damage an overworked liver, while aspirin and ibuprofen can irritate the stomach lining.
“You should never, ever take alcohol with acetaminophen or Tylenol,” Swift said. “You can actually cause liver damage from a Tylenol overdose. »
But aspirin, ibuprofen and naproxen are “theoretically” acceptable, he added.
“Although they tend to be anti-inflammatory in the body, they can cause stomach inflammation,” Swift said. “Don’t take them on an empty stomach; always take anti-inflammatories with food.
While most alcohol is absorbed by the liver, a small amount leaves the body unaffected through sweat, urine and breath.
Get up, do light stretches, and walk around and drink lots of water to encourage urination, Brick said.
“Before you go to bed and when you wake up, drink as much water as you can comfortably handle,” she says. You can also take a multivitamin “before you shower in the morning (to) replenish lost vitamins, minerals, and other nutrients.”
If you prefer something warm and soothing, Brick suggested broth or other homemade soups.
“These will also help replace lost salts, including potassium and other substances,” he said, “but they won’t get you sober faster or improve deficiency from intoxication or a hangover.
Store shelves are full of so-called hangover cures. Unfortunately, there’s no evidence that they work. In 2020, researchers published what they called the “world’s largest randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled study” of supplements containing vitamins, minerals, herbal extracts, and antioxidants, and found no real improvement in symptoms of the disease. hangover.
Even if one solution works, it probably won’t fix all of your symptoms, experts say.
“The effects of alcohol and alcoholic beverages are so complicated, so complex,” Swift said, “that any solution might treat one or two of the symptoms but it won’t cure them all.”
What works for a hangover? Time. It will take time for your body to release all the toxins that are causing your misery, experts say. And the only way to avoid a hangover is to abstain.
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