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Hangovers

 
  

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STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK
19:07 / 17.02.05
You know that old joke about the best way to avoid hangovers being to keep drinking? True as fuck, that is.

As many of you may know, I have something of a, er, "problem" when it comes to booze. As a result, I'm really pulling out all the stops to try to cut down drastically. Last week I managed (almost) a week without, which was really fucking tricky, but which I was totally chuffed by.

The problem is... now I'm trying not to drink on at least three days of every week- a lot harder than it sounds, believe me. BUT an unfortunate side-effect of this has been that I am now getting hangovers the like of which I barely remember, and am forcing myself to resist the obvious solution (ie more booze, which ALWAYS works). Take today for example- I haven't had anything to drink so far, but I still feel utterly appalling after getting drunk last night (and it wasn't even a ludicrous amount of booze, really). I went to see my alcohol counsellor today, and mumbled my way through an hour of beer-talk while feeling like I wanted to die, and then spent most of the afternoon wrapped in a duvet with the radio on really quietly.

Are normal people's hangovers this bad? Lasting all fucking day? What else works?
 
 
Saint Keggers
19:12 / 17.02.05
Water..LOTS of water before ya goes ta sleep.
 
 
doozy floop
19:15 / 17.02.05
My hangovers have significantly worsened with age. They are occasionally crippling, and for a friend of mine they can last for multiple days, so you are not alone. For me, the only solution is a massive injection of fried food, which (to date) has always knocked the bugger on its head more or less immediately.

Scientifically speaking, I believe that this is because hangover molecules are killed off by the grease found in any caff that sells black pudding.
 
 
Bed Head
19:25 / 17.02.05
You’ve tried Alka Seltzer, right? Alka Seltzer, aka ‘fizzy-good.’ Sitting and watching and listening to the fizzing is a part of the cure, I think. Makes you feel nice.

But, yeah. An age thing. Yes. Arg.
 
 
Jack The Bodiless
19:26 / 17.02.05
Tis true. I started drinking a lot more recently, due to being able to afford it more than anything else, and rediscovered the glorious mornings after when you feel a little delicate, but basically sound. I drank over a litre of port last Friday night in about three hours (without the ameliorating effects of amphetamines, woo hoo!) and felt basically fine the next day. Just like back when I was a drunk. Which is a warning sign right there, really.
 
 
Jake, Colossus of Clout
19:38 / 17.02.05
It really is all about a pint of water right before you go to sleep. If I remember to do it, it never fails to kill my hangover or reduce it to "barely-noticable" intensity.

I have found my hangovers getting worse with age, too, though. But the water still works.
 
 
STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK
19:40 / 17.02.05
I am weak. Today will NOT be one of my non-drinking days. I now have beer.

I think the fried food thing is something to do with booze fucking up your cholesterol, which then needs replacing. Or I could be wrong.
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
19:46 / 17.02.05
Get some milk thistle from the health-food store and take it regularly. It'll help your liver cope with the booze, thus tempering your hangovers and helping to protect your liver from damage.

I used to use Andrew's antacid powder, but now I favour a very alkaline brand of mineral water (Vichy Catalan). Once your stomach has stopped revolving, salt'n'vinegar crisps and chocolate milk. Really.
 
 
STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK
19:50 / 17.02.05
I used to use Andrew's antacid powder

Oh, so THAT's why he hates us so much.
 
 
Loomis
21:05 / 17.02.05
The worst part of my hangovers is usually that my nose and sinuses get all blocked up (does anyone else get that?), so my best cure is a couple of cold and flu tablets. They work every time.

As do fresh bread rolls filled with crisps.

I never have stomach issues the morning after so even if I have a pounding headache my hangovers are always liveable. Something to eat and some fresh air, and some paracetemol or sudafed and I can function at a tolerable level.
 
 
w1rebaby
21:06 / 17.02.05
Nothing works. Water helps, two paracetamol before you go to bed, Zantac and so on, but if you've been boozing for as long as I have you're probably aware of all these things and do them already. There are some aspects - particularly restlessness and anxiety - that there doesn't appear to be any cure for at the moment, and there's nothing you can do except symptomatic relief as far as I know.

I've been drinking far too much recently since I've been stuck without job or flat, and I have a tendency towards excessive boozing anyway, and I've been having a hell of a time persuading myself that the solution to an evening without much to do is not a six pack and a bottle of wine.
 
 
unheimlich manoeuvre
22:43 / 17.02.05
the answer Stoatie is Marijuana. stops me boozing, i fall about laughing get the munchies and wake up feeling as though my head is full of cotton wool. beats the booze blues any day.
 
 
Triplets
23:51 / 17.02.05
I always pack a hangover kit before I go out, not to take with me (as I am not totally socially retarded) but to consume in full once I get back. No, I don't have merit badges, why do you ask?

Dr. Trips' Post-Boozerium Cranial Remedy Kit:

Can of soup left out on kitchen counter
Can opener
Spoon
Breads!

Upstairs in bag/on desk:
Bottle of mineral water w/ glass
200mg Ibuprofen
2 Nytol tabs
Packet of sugar
Glass

Packet of sugar + mineral water + glass = Electrolyte restorative potion thingy. As replenishing your 'lytes will really help you feel less fooked in the morning. If you're not a space cockroach you may want to substitute sugah-watah for bog standard Robinson's diluted orange. Works a treat.
 
 
Ender
00:19 / 18.02.05
back in my younger days I avoided the problem of alchol and its nasty hangovers all together, I smoked fuckin pot. Hell yeah. Blaze it up.

Now I am part time drug counselor. what a world.
 
 
Helmschmied
00:23 / 18.02.05
Jesus, congratulations Stoatie on going a week. I'm proud of you. It's been years since I've done that. I still get drunk every night even though I lost someone to alcohol poisoning just before christmas.
 
 
Alex's Grandma
03:01 / 18.02.05
This is purely annecdotal, I've no idea what the science involved is or anything, but apparently if you've been used to drinking every or most nights for, er, quite some time and then lay off for a while ( even a week'll do it, ) you lose your tolerance a bit, and so your ability to shake off the after-effects the next morning.

How true that is I don't know, but I definitely noticed a similar thing with dope - Having smoked that every night without fail for years and years I stopped for ten days for no particular reason, and then had the most embarrassing whitey after a fraction of what I'd been used to the next time I had some, winding up flat-out in a beach hut in Mexico with a crowd of people I'd only just met, it was all, er, not very cool.
 
 
Papess
03:26 / 18.02.05
CAn't type now. SHakinNG.
 
 
Smoothly
07:04 / 18.02.05
Anyone tried RU-21?
 
 
illmatic
10:16 / 18.02.05
I've noticed my hangovers getting worse and worse over the years, which is in part due to increased consumption. I never used to start drinking at 6.00 or buy bottles of wine after the pub (haven't done that for a while actually). Two tips - eat before, not after, drinking. After stops you feeling hungry and hungover in the morning but the killer molecules have still got in your system. Just a bowl of cheapo pasta works wonders. Second, avoid high strength lager. I'm retraining my palate onto bitter. All I need now is a beard and ruddy cheeks to be "london's uncoolest man".
 
 
illmatic
10:16 / 18.02.05
I've noticed my hangovers getting worse and worse over the years, which is in part due to increased consumption. I never used to start drinking at 6.00 or buy bottles of wine after the pub (haven't done that for a while actually). Two tips - eat before, not after, drinking. After stops you feeling hungry and hungover in the morning but the killer molecules have still got in your system. Just a bowl of cheapo pasta works wonders. Second, avoid high strength lager. I'm retraining my palate onto bitter. All I need now is a beard and ruddy cheeks to be "london's uncoolest man".
 
 
Jub
10:59 / 18.02.05
Hangovers are so guff. I hate them. Tend to be pretty hit and miss for me - that is, I'm not sure what I'm doing different. I can drink the same amount with varying degrees of hungoveredness. (?)

When you get older and your brain shrinks, apparently you don't get the crippling headaches which are due to your brain swelling. So, that's something to look forward to.
 
 
sleazenation
11:03 / 18.02.05
I have to concur with the (piss)artist formerly known as illmatic - high strength lagar is horrible chemical crap!Life is too short to drink bad beer...
 
 
Haus of Mystery
11:06 / 18.02.05
I drunk copious red wine amounts last night, and subsequently woke with the feeling that someone had coated the inside of my mouth with Marmite. Got through the pain barrier though, and now just in sleepy mode.
 
 
Jack Vincennes
11:09 / 18.02.05
When you get older and your brain shrinks, apparently you don't get the crippling headaches which are due to your brain swelling.

It's the nausea that really gets me, though. Urrrrrgh.

Occasionally I've taken coedine-based headache pills as a hangover cure -they work really well, but I try not to do that too much on the assumption that a fondness for opiates probably isn't something I want to develop. They're also strange in that they stop the headaches and the sicky feeling, but not the trembling or temperature fluctuations, which both feel as though they are happening, but to someone else.
 
 
Jack The Bodiless
11:11 / 18.02.05
And life is too bad to drink short beer.

Guinness. Guinness rarely, if ever, gives me a hangover.
 
 
Bear
11:23 / 18.02.05
I'm starting to think that hangovers are part of the pleasure in drinking, working through that terrible feeling knowing that it's only going to last a day (or two as the case now seems to be with me)

Trying different things to fight it is part of the challenge.

This Saturday past I had a really bad one but walking to the shop with an almighty wind rushing through me was an excellent feeling.
 
 
_Boboss
11:30 / 18.02.05
hangovers have more or less stopped me drinking at the weekends. will happily drink in the week and let work colleagues deal with me the next day, but am very disinclined to spend my own free time dealing with the shakes, the aches and the nearly-spits.

the best hangover cure is spliffs, comics, tea, and probably a bacon sarnie.
 
 
The Return Of Rothkoid
13:11 / 18.02.05
I think I'll have one tomorrow. But until then, might I suggest, as awful and evil as it sounds, that Mersyndol is a great cure.

Fact.
 
 
Axolotl
13:20 / 18.02.05
I've noticed my hangovers are less extreme now but last for much longer, which is kind of shit really. I used to wake up, feel like death for a couple of hours but it was all over by lunchtime. Now they last till 6 or 7 in the evening, or until I start drinking again, which ever comes fist.
When it comes to cures I have a many-pronged strategy, depending on how bad it is. Firstly is alka-seltzer - get the lemon flavour as they taste less rank than the normal flavour. This will ameliorate even the worst hangovers and cure minor ones. Then the cure may involve fried food, a bacon sandwich at the very least, but up to and including the full fries breakfast if I can face it. Once the worst is over I find some exercise can help flush the toxins out, though this is not an option on the worst hangovers. If all else fails I take to the sofa with tea and weed and watch telly or Simpsons DVDs.
 
 
Alex's Grandma
13:31 / 18.02.05
I find some exercise can help

I would do anything for a hangover, but I won't do that.
 
 
Bed Head
13:40 / 18.02.05
I find some exercise can help

Yes. And, like the man just said, no. I seem to remember, once upon an awful teenage summer job, having it explained to me how the best thing for a hangover was to sweat it out, by working very, very hard all morning. Any kind of molly-coddling would be absolutely the worst thing you could do, apparently. And then I was sent to work in the bottom of a skip, to shovel the endless truckloads of onions that were constantly being tipped in, before they buried me. Like some kind of bizarre nightmare.

Thing is, it worked, I think, but it’s not any kind of hangover cure I’d recommend. Stick together all the other advice in this thread, and what have you got? Nice meal before you have any booze, and drink water before you go to bed. Then a glass of fizzy-good first thing, followed by a lovely fried breakfast. Or Salt ‘n Vinegar crisps and chocolate milk. Or both, with a spliff. Perhaps you could also work cuddling kittens in there somewhere. But def. make your hangovers part of a nice routine. Embrace the hangover, draw the sting. You gotta rationalise these things.
 
 
Axolotl
14:18 / 18.02.05
I meant nice soft voluntary exercise and only once you feel ready. Like a bike ride mid-afternoon, not a 10 mile run with a full pack at 6:30 in the morning.
Bed Head: that onion job you had: Worst. Job. Ever.
 
 
Loomis
14:37 / 18.02.05
Nothing like being buried in onions to take your mind off your hangover.

I have always been rather annoyed with myself because my hangovers are usually unpredictable. I have sometimes experienced lethal hangovers after 4 pints but felt fabulous the morning after 2 bottles of wine. And vice versa. My brain is evolving like a hospital super bug to outdo any cure or pre-drink strategy I can come up with.

Mind you as long as it's a weekend then I don't mind being hungover and agree with bear that it's part of the fun. A nice day on the couch with the paper and some food and cups of tea with a nice blanket of fog over your consciousness and the pleasant aches that remind you you're alive.

And I always have my best nights out when I commence drinking while still hungover from the night before.
 
 
pornotaxi
14:43 / 18.02.05
I find some exercise can help

strenuous exercise certainly helps banish the day-after-the-hangover black dog effect, which seems to get worse the older you get.

either that, or a couple of bottles of chilled fullers organic honeydew.
 
 
Haus of Mystery
15:45 / 18.02.05
Oysters on ice are an amazing hangover cure. Preferably followed by a glass of champagne.

Seriously.
 
  

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