Top Hangover Cures

 It goes without saying that the best hangover cure ever is not to drink yourself into oblivion.  Not all drunks are created equal.  Your size, shape, gender and genetics dictate how fast you succumb to the forces of alcohol.  When dumped or suddenly single, many people have a tendency to binge-drink, as if alcohol will solve all your woes.  The sad reality is that alcohol only creates new woes.  But as a guide, if you consume five drinks a night, or three drinks in the space of two hours, then you could be binge-drinking.  Women tend to get drunker quicker than men, with Asian women getting drunk the fastest of all.  Colourless drinks are kinder on the body than dark-coloured drinks.  Red wine gives a far meaner morning headache than white wine.

Alcohol is a huge dehydrator and blocks hormones in your kidneys which control your bathroom visits, so that means you have to pee so much more and lose more water than you take in.  A way around this which I have found is to drink one glass of water for every glass of booze you consume.  It definitely eliminates the headache when you finally wake up the next day.  Pain relievers like Aspirin, Tylenol and Excedrin, can help with hangover headaches but don’t actually mix well with alcohol and can do some damage to your liver.  You’d do better to drink a sports drink like Gatorade.  Eating something also coats the lining of your intestines and this also works to cure hangover pains.

Okay, so you didn’t heed my advice, went out and got completely slammed and now there’s a little man inside your head going ape-shit with a jackhammer.  Your stomach feels like you spent all night riding the world’s worst rollercoaster backwards and at this stage death would be a welcome relief.  What can you do to feel better?

1.       Wonderful Water – if you are able to focus before falling into bed, then drink as much water as you can possibly pour down your throat.  Besides combating the symptoms of dehydration, water will also flush out some of that excess alcohol out of your system.

2.      Marvellous Munchies – eat before you go to sleep.  I recommend making yourself a fried egg on toast whatever the time of the morning or night.  There’s just something about that egg yolk that makes you wake up feeling like a million dollars.

3.      Criminal Coffee – when drinking avoid coffee like the plague no matter how much you might crave a cup.  Coffee contains caffeine which is a diuretic and will dehydrate you even more.  Stay away from milk and other dairy as well as that will just increase your queasiness.

4.      Sexy Spices – some people swear by eating the spiciest food possible to confuse your stomach so, that it forgets you over-indulged on the alcohol.

5.      Hair of the Dog – then there are some who believe that the best way to combat hangover symptoms is to have a drink the minute you wake up.  I’ve found Harvey Wallbangers to be particularly successful at this, but it could be because of the orange juice in it and the vitamin C.

6.      Obey your Thirst – even if it feels as if the parrot in the bar climbed inside your mouth and shat in it; you will feel extremely thirsty.  Don’t fight it thinking it’ll make you even more queasy, give in to your thirst but be selective in what you drink.  Ginger Ale is always good, as are sports drinks and juices.  Coconut water, when the fruit is too young to have formed milk, if you can get hold of it is supposed to be amazing.

7.      Gravitate to the Grease – eating something greasy is really good at clearing out the toxins you accumulated during a heavy night of drinking.  The fat will also give you a much-needed energy-boost, so you need to temporarily forget about the calories.

8.      Painting the Porcelain – in my experience, hugging the toilet bowl and throwing up is one of the best hangover cures ever.  You get rid of all the toxins instantly and wake up feeling refreshed when all around you feel like death.  Just make sure that after you’ve finished vomiting, that you drink plenty of non-alcoholic liquid and brush your teeth before you go and sleep.

9.      Terrific Tomatoes – many hangover-regulars swear by the power of the mighty tomato.  Whether you eat it raw, in soup or as pasta sauce, or ketchup on your eggs, tomatoes will ease your symptoms.  It’s probably because they are so rich in vitamin C which gets severely depleted after a night of boozing.  Of course, you might want to just stick to the tomato juice and have a Bloody Mary.

10.  Sizzling Sex – believe it or not but sex helps to prevent a hangover in the morning, the more physical the sex the better.  It has to be because of the exercise that gets your blood flowing.  After an energetic workout, remember to drink a pitcher-full of water, and then relax into a pleasant slumber.

The world’s weirdest hangover remedies

In Outer Mongolia they suggest pickled sheep eyes in tomato juice.  Can you imagine anything worse than some eyes staring up at you from the bottom of your glass when you’re drunk?  I think it’s actually the tomato juice that cures the hangover, not the eyes.

In the Old Wild West of America, they advocated making a tea from rabbit droppings and then drinking it.  Although rabbits are vegetarian so I guess that makes the tea a herbal remedy, there is just something about drinking a tea made from poop that makes my stomach turn.

In Sicily, men believe that chewing through a piece of dried bull’s penis will cure your hangover.  I’ll rather stick to beef jerky or South African biltong if it’s all the same with you.

In Haiti they use voodoo and stick thirteen black pins in the cork of the empty bottle that caused all the problems.

The ancient Romans used to dine on sheep’s lungs and two owl eggs when they woke up after a heavy night of drinking.  Seriously, hen’s eggs and steak will do me fine.

So as not to be outdone by the Romans, the ancient Greeks used to eat deep-fried canaries to cure their hangovers.  I think anything deep-fried will do, I can’t see why it has to be a canary.

In Poland they recommend you raid the larder and drink the juice from the jar of pickles.  Apparently the vinegar is good for you and your hangover.

In Puerto Rico, they recommend that you rub a slice of lemon in the armpit of your drinking arm.  They say it prevents dehydration.  Me, I’d rather just drink a glass of water.

In the Netherlands, they believe that the minute you wake up feeling the effects of a hangover, you have to down two beers as quickly as possible to counter-act and alleviate the hangover effects.  I can see many young men choosing that cure!