Alive For Go-Ahead Men : A Delhi Press Magazine

The world’s first cocktail party might have taken place in Mesopotamia, some 5,000 years ago, if researchers are to be believed. American scientists have found some earthenware along the Tigris river that show traces of tartaric acid (an element which is characteristic of the grape fermentation), honey, apple juice, and brew barley (a sort of beer ante litteram). Thus, the “hangover” has also been our companion since that time. It is commonly accompanied by a headache, nausea, a depressed mood, a smarting sensitivity to light and noise, and other nasty “morning after” symptoms, like feeling wobbly and feeble.

You can sense something circling above! If you have really overdone it, you might even be able to see them: Vultures, ready to pick at your poor, wretched body, as it lies sodden with yuletide alcohol!

Or, you might be wrecked with self-inflicted, hangover pains — throbbing head, raging thirst, mindnumbing nausea and a body that has turned to jelly. You long for a potion that turns carrion back into living flesh, before the vultures tuck in! After a night of carousing, you are woken up in the morning by a pounding headache and an excruciating pain in the joints. You feel exhausted, anxious, irritable, depressed.

Some people believe that an alcoholic hangover is discomfort from which the sufferer does not deserve any relief; that these symptoms are good punishment for having overindulged in alcohol the previous night. There is no real cure for a hangover except enough time for the toxic effects to wear off.

What really happens during a hangover? During a drinking binge, alcohol drugs the brain cells. When levels of the drug start falling, the brain protests and needs time to get used to its absence. That is why, the bar-tender’s remedy for hangover — yet another hard drink — seems to relieve the suffering briefly. The congeners (pronounced conjuh- nurz), that create the different tastes of various alcoholic drinks, have a toxic effect on the brain, too. So, mixing drinks creates a build-up of congeners. That is why party-hoppers are likeliest to wake up with a horrible headache.

Dehydration is a major cause of hangover misery, causing a severely dry mouth, a pounding headache and a very confused mind. Can you be dehydrated after guzzling so many drinks? Yes, because the body spends 8 parts of water to burn one part of alcohol.

One alcoholic drink, for all practical purposes, is equivalent to one ounce of hard liquour, 6 ounces of wine and 12 ounces of beer. The vomiting and gas is often the result of pouring alcohol into a stomach filled with only a handful of nuts and wafers.

Add to this, a lack of sound sleep. You may have slept like a log, but the heavy passing-out is actually a dreamless, coma-like condition, that does little to refresh the brain.

Usually, a hangover begins several hours after the last drink, when the blood alcohol level begins to drop.

Symptoms normally peak when the alcohol level is zero, and may continue for an entire day.

Hangover is the sum total of effects of alcoholic and non-alcoholic factors, such as:

Toxic chemicals, such as congener methanol, formed during fermentation in most alcoholic beverages, are responsible for headaches and vicious hangovers.

Use of drugs, especially nicotine, through cigarette-smoking.

Personality traits, such as neuroticism. Negative events and feelings of guilt.

Contrary to popular opinion, combination of different alcoholic beverages is unlikely to worsen hangover. And, if you have had a hangover, you know it is something you never want again. So, what can you do to avoid it? Drink less, of course!

Time-tested remedies

Forget black coffee or fried breakfasts. Salvation may have arrived in an unlikely form — volcano ash.

A British firm is about to market a new cure, based on lava-formed stone, imported from Turkey and Australia. The volcano dust or “zeolite” acts as a natural detoxifying agent and has already been used internationally for purifying water, treating animal feed and attending victims of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in Bulgaria.

Before you reach out for a painkiller for the hangover, here is a warning: Alcohol and pain-killers may lead to stomach ulcers. Instead, try out these home-made remedies (supplemented with enough water consumption) to ward off or get rid of the hangover:

“A major cause of hangover is the depletion of potassium from the body. Potassium-rich bananas can help you get rid of headaches and dehydration,” says Dr Sakshi Chawla, senior dietician, Fortis, Noida. The fruit is also high in magnesium (which helps relax the pounding blood vessels) and tryptophan, an amino-acid, that can make you fall asleep!

Vitamin-C increases the rate of alcohol breakdown in the body. “Drink orange juice or lemonade. The vitamin-C in it will speed up the metabolism of alcohol by the liver,” advises Dr Verinder Anand, senior consultant, internal medicine, Moolchand Medcity, Delhi.

Coconut water is rich in potassium and natural electrolytes, which get depleted with consumption of alcohol. “Drink a glass of coconut water before going to sleep or when you wake up, to replenish the lost electrolytes,” says Dr Venkata Rao Abbeneni, internal medicine, Apollo Hospitals, Hyderabad.

“Have a bowl of curd or a glass of butter-milk before you go out drinking. This will slow the absorption of alcohol by coating the lining of your stomach,” says Dr Chawla.

A breakfast of eggs and toast can help. “Eggs are packed with cysteine, an amino-acid that clears all the destructive chemicals, that build up in the liver when it is metabolising alcohol,” says Dr Manoj Rai, internal medicine, Apollo Hospitals, Bilaspur.

Dr G.L.Arora of Herbal Cure Centre, Delhi, has some very interesting advice to give — pressing the tip of your nose at regular intervals.

“Press it for a minute, give a gap of half-a-minute, before pressing it again. Repeat the procedure for a while and experience the relief!”

Eat your rice grains, cereals, peas and nuts. They are all stuffed with vitamin B1, which helps you metabolise the grog and stabilises the nervous system.

Visit an Italian restaurant. Through extra-virgin olive oil and the liberal use of fresh tomatoes, the Italians have learned the secret of getting real plump without getting heart disease and curing hangovers at the same time.

Your body might have been 90% water before you went out but it feels like 20% now. Get to the tap and drink, drink, and drink. Drink until your stomach is so full, it hurts. A few minutes later, your mouth will be dry again and ready for more.

Drink non-alcoholic, non-caffeinated beverages to alleviate depression. Caffeine can worsen symptoms, as it is a diuretic and increases urine production.

Get out for a walk. The fresh air will make you feel better and the exercise will increase your heart-rate and help your headache and body aches.

Of course, nothing cures better than sleep. Or, just relax doing stuff you enjoy. Just keep drinking water and taking naps.

An American company recently announced it is developing a drug which, it claims, can sober people up within minutes. The human metabolism normally takes about 8 hours to break down 8 units of alcohol (4 pints of beer or 8 glasses of wine).

A large dose of the new drug, called Detoxahol, can clear all alcohol from the bloodstream within a few minutes.

So far, the drug has only been tested on animals. There is no alcohol in the world which will not give you a hangover.

And there is no way to prevent a hangover except not drinking.

People process alcohol at different rates, depending on many factors: weight, gender, age, and what they eat with the drink. The amount of alcohol that gives a woman a high, for instance, may not affect a man as severely.

High IQ scores may do more than separate genius from those of lesser intelligence; they also tell how prone you are to a hangover. Scottish scientists now say that smart people are less likely to suffer after a heavy night out. Researchers suspect that this is because smarter people are smart enough to stay off binge drinking.

Hangovers tend to get worse with age. Drinkers over 40 not only suffer more acutely from a hangover, they take more time to recover than they did when they were young. Curiously, women recover faster than men.

Preventive measures

Anti-hangover steps have to be taken, if you are bent upon drinking. The body can oxidise only one alcoholic drink per hour. Drinking slower than that minimises later discomfort. A few glasses of water between and after drinks prevent the sick feelings that come from water imbalance.

Eating something substantial before drinking slows down alcohol absorption and saves the stomach lining from irritation. The next morning, honey and dry toast is probably the best breakfast because the concentrated fructose in honey helps the body burn the alcohol faster.

Usually, hangover symptoms disappear in 8 – 24 hours. A really bad hangover may not just be about the morning after; it may linger on for days. The end result of binge drinking can at best be described as “sick”. It is a heavy-headed, swollen feeling, the day after. You wake up only to wish you hadn’t! The events of the night before are a muddle and the only thing you can be sure of through all that haze is that you must have made a fool of yourself.

The American humourist, Robert Benchley, once wrote: “The only cure for a real king-size hangover is death!”