The truth about hangovers

The cause of a hangover is obvious – it’s simply drinking too much alcohol.

Alcohol is a diuretic, which speeds up the loss of water from the body. Being dehydrated causes some nasty hangover symptoms because your body is desperate for water.

You get a headache because your body tries to make up for the shortage of fluids by stealing it from other parts of the body. When it’s taken from your brain, this organ shrinks as a result, and this pulls on the membranes that attach it to your skull.

Alcohol can also irritate stomach linings, leading to nausea and vomiting, which can make dehydration worse.

Frequently going to the loo depletes the body of important nutrients like potassium and magnesium.

When your liver breaks down alcohol, it produces compounds called acetaldehyde that are actually 10 to 30 times more toxic to the body than alcohol itself.

Alcohol also breaks down the body’s store of glycogen in the liver, expelling it via urine. This is a key energy source, so a lack of it leaves you feeling tired and weak.

TRUE or FALSE?

Drinking red wine is more likely to give you a hangover than white wine.
True

That’s because red wine (along with dark spirits like rum, brandy and whiskey) has higher levels of congeners. These substances are by-products of the fermentation process and can wreak havoc on your body. White wine and clear spirits like white rum, gin and vodka have fewer congeners and cause less frequent and less severe hangovers.

Mixing alcoholic drinks makes your hangover worse.
True

Different types of alcohol have different congeners, and combining these impurities can give you particularly severe symptoms. Drinking beer with wine or spirits can also make you feel worse the next day because the carbonation in beer speeds up the rate at which your body absorbs alcohol. You then have less time than usual to process all the different toxins, so you’ll suffer even more.

You feel shattered the day after drinking because alcohol affects the quality of your sleep.
True

Booze interferes with the production of a natural stimulant called glutamine. When you stop drinking, your body tries to make up for the shortage of glutamine by pumping out more than you need. T

his is usually right around the time you’re trying to sleep, and the extra glutamine stimulates your brain, preventing you from having deep, restorative sleep. This is why you feel exhausted the next day.

Severe glutamine rebound can cause anxiety, restlessness, high blood pressure and the shakes.

Drinking more alcohol when you’re hung over (“hair of the dog”) eases the nasty symptoms.
False

It may feel like it, but you’re only delaying the inevitable. You start feeling the symptoms when your liver has finished metabolising alcohol and starts breaking down the toxins it leaves behind. The more you drink, the more toxins your liver will have to deal with, and the worse you’ll feel later.

Black coffee improves the symptoms of a hangover.
False

on paper it seems that coffee is a great idea because it contains caffeine, a stimulant that helps overcome fatigue and also reduces the size of blood vessels.

This counters the effects of alcohol, which can make blood vessels in the brain swell, contributing to a headache.

However, caffeine’s stimulating effect wears off, leaving you feeling even more tired. And because it is also a diuretic, like alcohol, it’ll make you even more dehydrated and your hangover symptoms worse.

Eating fatty food when you’re hung over will make you feel better.
False

There’s a greater likelihood that they’ll irritate your stomach and make you feel worse when you’re already
feeling terrible.

However, tucking into a fry-up before you start drinking may be one way of preventing a hangover. Having a full stomach before you hit the booze can lessen the effects of alcohol because it slows down the rate at which it’s absorbed into the blood stream.

Fatty foods in particular stick to the lining of the stomach for longer, which gives your body more time to process the alcohol you subsequently drink.

Eggs are a good idea for breakfast when you’re feeling the effects of drinking the night before.
True

Like other foods, eggs provide energy, which you’ll need after a hard night out. But what makes them really special is the large amounts of cysteine they contain. This is a compound that acts on the nasty toxic substance acetaldehyde, potentially helping to mop-up the leftover toxins and easing hangover symptoms.

WATER, THE ULTIoATE HANGoVER CURE

If many of the symptoms of a hangover are due to dehydration, then it makes sense to stay hydrated by drinking plenty of water.

And don’t wait until the morning after  – having one glass of water after every alcoholic drink will slow down drinking, giving your body more time to process the booze.

Having a large drink of water before you go to bed will help fight dehydration once your body finishes breaking down the alcohol.

If you have any symptoms the next day, keep drinking water and add salt and sugar to the glass. This helps to replace the sodium and glycogen you’ve lost.