-How to Remedy a Hangover -

Michael's Universal Hangover Assessment Tool

• #1. A low grade hangover might typically follow 2 or 3 glasses of red wine drank the night before. Upon wakening the next morning one might experience a slight brain fog along with a dry mouth and a very slight headache. Not too noticeable, but enough to move a few steps slower throughout the day.
• #2. A two scale hangover might be observed after an evening of imbibing a couple of margaritas along with a couple of beer chasers. Not the wisest drink combination but it happens all the time. Noticeable effects would be a dry cotton mouth along with a dull headache and a feeling of general discomfort or uneasiness, along with an "out of sorts" feeling.
• #3. Here we step up the pace a bit. We start the evening with a couple of martini's at Jacob's Jazz Bar. Next we catch the new rock band at Louie's Club, have a couple of Rum 'N Cola's and bust a move on the dance floor. Whoa... it's starting to get late so how about capping the evening off with a nice sweet drink - how about a coffee and Khaluah? The next morning the alarm goes off at 7:00 AM - Ugh ! You wake up with a noticeable headache, slight feeling of nauseousness but able to "hold it down." Eyes are bloodshot and feel like sand was kicked in face last evening. A "brain fog" is most apparent and thoughts evolve about phoning in sick today, but best not. Knock down some coffee and only arrive 10 minutes late to work.
• #4. What do you know, it's Friday night and everyone just got paid. The gang says let's head "downtown" and party like it's 1999. The girls want foo-foo umbrella types of drinks so we join them. We start the evening with a girly drink containing a combination of Silver Tequila mixed with Midori Melon Liqueur - and wouldn't you know - it was served with a little red umbrella. Ummm - the drink actually tastes pretty good, so we order another round. Brooke asks us if we've ever tried a "501 Blue ?" No - but let's give it a go. Drinks arrive - mmm this one tickles the palate - Vodka, Schnapps, Curacao Blue mixed with 7-up ? Whatever the combination it goes down like some type of liquid gold - so we order up another round. O.K. girls, enough of the foo-foo drinks, so the guys order a pitcher of cold Guiness Stout. And another pitcher or two are soon on their way. It's 2:00 AM, and just guessing, the group must have knocked down a minimum of at least 8 drinks each.
Flash forward: Thank God it's Saturday....wake up at 6:00 AM with a splitting head ache and the bed seems to be rotating at about five revolutions per minute. Soon out of bed and off to the bathroom...blahhhooom - right into the stool. A cold sweat soon starts to break out and small droplets of last night poisons are dripping from the forehead. Back to bed - back to sleep. Wake up at high noon - head ache still there, and eyes are blinded by the light of day. Sofa surfed most of day and nothing much accomplished.

• #5. A number five hangover is not recommended as it's not a pretty sight - in fact it's down right ugly. No way Hosea ! But they do occur ever day. This time, without delving into the "night before" activities, we will assume that about a dozen drinks or so were consumed. Now for the ugliness: Time line 2:00 A.M. - Hit the sack and all of a sudden a smarthy hyena crawls out from under the bed and begins it's rabid attack upon one's senses. The bed immediately begins to swirl in a rapid 180 degree circular motion - oh no, not the dreaded tilt-a-whirl ride at two in the morning. Can no longer hold down the shrimp cocktails from several hours prior - try to make it to the bathroom - almost there...blahhhoom - thank god for hard tile floors. Oh well, what's one more chore for tomorrow. Hang head over stool and try to get last remnants out of intestines. No can do - dry heaves clutch at stomach and contort intestinal walls in agonizing pain. Now sweating profusely although chilled to the bone. Decide to grab a hanging bath towel and bed down on the bathroom floor. Yuk - pretty revolting. Sad state of affairs for a relatively intelligent being. Wake up at approximately 4:00 AM - bones ache from sleeping on hard tile floor. Drink a glass of tap water and stumble back to bedroom. Flop on the bed and a  slow spin starts again. Fight off a new round of the whirlies and sleep until late. Wake up with splitting headache and queasy tummy - entire day wasted due to recuperation from light case of alcohol poisoning.

  
  Hangover Remedies - Good, Bad & Otherwise

  
  
  There are a myriad of different over-the-counter hangover remedy products that are available via the internet, drug stores and convenience stores. I have personally sampled 6 different products over the course of the past several years. Three of these products, which I won't mention by name, gave little to no relief. These I would place in the category of snake oil. The other three I'll list by name and the results that I experienced with each product. It is not the purpose of this report to either endorse or recommend any particular product, but to  offer an unbiased opinion based upon my personal experiences. The following 3 products are fairly well known and can be purchased online and at various national drugstore chains. I will also give a basic C.P.E.D. (cost per effective dose) according to the manufacturer's suggested retail price and dosage. *Note: I have not experienced any product that is 100% effective in combating a #5 hangover. Keep in mind that with a number five hangover you are actually suffering from alcohol poisoning. Any of the below listed products may make you feel a little better, along with keeping your system hydrated with lot's of water and 24 hours of rest is about the best that you can do.

  
  # 1. FixStrips - The Fix Strip product seems to be very effective for combating a # 1 through a # 4 category hangover. The cost is about $1.33 for a four strip serving (less than the cost of a Red Bull.) A package typically retails for around $3.99. One of the things that I most like about Fix Strips, is that you take the strips upon waking the next morning after a night of drinking. Many of the other OTC products ask that you take their product throughout the evening while drinking and/or take before you go to bed. In this author's opinion it seems that they are asking you to make some responsible decisions while you are in the process of acting in an irresponsible manner ? The flavor doesn't exactly taste like cotton candy, but more like some Danish salted candy - but hey, you didn't seem to mind the taste of the half dozen tequila shooters that you drank the other night.
  

  Fix Strips come in a convenient cassette that contains 12 strips. The recommended dosage is 4 strips upon waking the morning after drinking. The strips are dissolvable and are placed between one's cheek and gum. The ingredients enter your system via your buccal membrane and thereby give this product the fastest delivery system available short of an I.V. When I have Fix Strips on hand I'll typically keep a cassette in my night stand drawer along with a 16 ounce bottle of water on the lower shelf. Immediately upon waking, after a night of drinking, I'll take four of the strips, let them dissolve and then chase with as much water as I can drink out of the 16 ounce bottle. I will generally lay back down in bed and rest for another 10 - 15 minutes. Then I am up, out of bed and am good to go ! I The several times that I've tried Fix Strips, I have had very good results in reducing my hangover symptoms from little to none.

  
  # 2. Chaser - The Chaser hangover product comes in a caplet form. I have had relatively good success with Chaser in warding off a # 1. # 2. and a # 3 hangover. It might be good for a number # 4, but one would have to take up to 6 caplets (which I have yet to try.) Each caplet costs approximately .67 each. The recommended dosage is to start the evening off with 2 tablets and if drinking more than 4 drinks, take another two tabs later in the evening. So if one takes the recommended dose of 4 caplets per drinking session the C.P.E.D., would be around $2.68 (less than the cost of an imported bottle of beer.)
  

  The last time that I took Chaser I started the evening by taking 2 caplets shortly before the 1st drink arrived. It is recommended to take another two caplets after the fourth drink, but I forgot and ended up remembering to take the other two tabs before I went to bed. The Chaser product has been on the market for a number of years and I've had fairly good results with it the several times that I've taken it.
  

  # 3. RU-21 - The RU-21 tablets seem to be effective if you take enough of them. The recommended dose is to take one tablet for each drink consumed. So for this report we'll base our cost per dose on taking 6 tablets which would work out to about $2.10 for our C.P.E.D. I purchased my first bottle of RU-21 tablets last December and had a good chance to give them a try during the Christmas holidays. Attending a Christmas party, I started the evening off by downing 3 tablets with my first glass of champagne. (Something about taking a tablet out of a container and downing a pill with each drink might make your hostess wonder what's going on - so this is why I downed the 3 tabs with the first drink.) I continued drinking champagne until I had consumed 3 drinks. I then switched over to scotch on the rocks and then consumed several more drinks. Luckily, I remembered that I needed to take another round of the RU-21's, since I had now around 6 drinks. At that time I dropped another 3 tablets and continued on with the evening. All in all I would estimate that I had somewhere in the neighborhood of 6 or 7 alcoholic beverages spread over the evening. I hit the rack at about 2:30 AM and had a fairly good nights sleep. Slept in until late morning and woke up feeling not too bad. I would rate the RU-21 product as good, but you do have to remember to take your "medicine" throughout the evening.
  

  
  Found Hangover Remedies

  In this section I'll review a number of "found" hangover remedies. For the last several years I have maintained a file of "hangover recipes" that I've found on the web and have tested each one to varying degrees. The following list of remedies are "as found" on the net and are proceeded by my comments.

  
  

  • "Make sure before you go to bed after a heavy night of drinking that you take an antioxidant supplement, a vitamin C and drink at least 3 glasses of water. In the morning, your symptoms will be reduced. However, follow up the next morning by drinking a large glass of strong coffee. Alcohol is a depressant and coffee is a stimulant. Additionally, be sure to eat some eggs WITH their yolks. The yolks contain antioxidants which are critical to healthy liver function. 1 aspirin can also help reduce the inflammation caused by drinking. As always, be sure to take your daily dose of regular vitamins with your eggs and you should be feeling better in no time."

    I have tried this recipe several times and it seems to be fairly effective in combating a light hangover.

  • "At the end of the night *chug as much water as you possibly can (minimum 1 litre)*chase with a big swig of pepto bismo *follow up with a minimun of 5 chewable vitamin C's and 2 tylenols*continue to drink water throughout the night whenever you wake up *trust me, this will prevent the hangover as much as possible."

    I have tried this with varying results - somewhat effective in combating a light hangover. Here one must be careful in taking too much Tylenol (acetaphetamin), as the combination of Tylenol and alcohol is pretty tough on one's liver.

  • "Chop a whole banana put in blender add 1 tablespoon clear honey plus half pint milk blitz in blender drink it all settles stomach. This blend puts glucose back in body works every time."

    This will indeed put some potassium and glucose back into one's system - but cure a hangover - not. However, if you are only bothered by an upset stomach, this could be an easy ticket."

  • "Everyone has heard of PEDIALYTE it is the drink they give little kids when they are sick...I have discovered though that this works wonders on hangovers due to the large of amounts of electrolytes... you can drink one cup or two cups prior to bed and follow up with the same in the morning...they also have ice pops that work the same."

    I doubt "if everyone has heard of Pedialyte," but there is much validity with this therory - the Pedialyte liquid tastes like crap and you might have a difficult time in getting it down. The Fix Strips product that I mentioned in the over-the-counter products, contains a heavy dose of electrolytes along with other ingrediants that are much easier to "swallow" than Pedialyte.

  • "Drink pickle juice and tomato juice."

    I actually tried one time. I mixed a small can of V8 juice with about 2 oz. of dill pickle juice and took two aspirins - did it work ? It could have been my imagination or the fact that I only had 3 or 4 glasses of wine the night before, but I did seem to feel a tad better.

  • "The worst part of a hangover is the stomach ache (gut rot.) Throughout the many years and many many parties the 1 thing I have found that helps is Dr. Pepper. In the morning before you eat take 2 advil and drink a warm Dr. Pepper. It helps with the headache, keeps it at bay if it has not arrived yet and calms the stomach so you can eat. Since starting doing this quite a few years ago I have not had an actual hangover. Many times it goes away before it gets here. :) "

    I guess one would be out of luck if they didn't care much for D.P. I really think that just about any carbonated drink will aid with an upset tummy. Of course I've gone the route of a cold Pepsi in the morning along with several Advils which is alway a good standby for a light hangover.

    In conclusion: A hangover is kind of a personal thing. While one remedy will work for one person it may not work for another. Experiment and try some of the above recipes, you might find that one will easily work for you. Now - always remember one thing - NEVER NEVER DRINK AND DRIVE ! If going out with a group always have a designated sober driver. If no one want to be a designated drive - call a taxi... keep in mind that Taxi fare is a whole lot cheaper than a D.U.I. Plus the life you save might very well be your own !!! Cheers - Michael