Table of contents:
- How to prevent a hangover
- 1. Know the limits of your hangover
- 2. Avoid alcoholic drinks with congeners
- 3. Drink lots of water
- 4. Get enough sleep
- 5. Eat a healthy breakfast
- 6. Take supplements
- 7. Choose beer, avoid liquor
Some people may experience a hangover after drinking alcohol. A hangover occurs when the effects of alcohol wear off and you end up experiencing various symptoms such as headache, thirst, dizziness, nausea, and loss of appetite. There are people who experience a hangover so badly that they cannot do their activities, some are still able to continue their day as usual. Well, you can prevent a hangover from last night's party with the following tips and tricks.
How to prevent a hangover
Here's how to prevent a hangover, or at least reduce the symptoms of a hangover getting worse.
1. Know the limits of your hangover
The severity of a hangover increases with the amount of alcohol consumed. So, the best way to prevent a hangover is to drink alcohol in moderation. When you feel uncomfortable, stop drinking alcohol.
Also, you need to know to what extent you can drink alcohol before you get really drunk. The reason is, the amount of alcohol consumed by each person until they reach a hangover varies.
Some people just drink a little already drunk, but most people can probably drink a lot without showing any symptoms. About 23 percent of people drink alcohol to excess, but it doesn't seem like a hangover.
2. Avoid alcoholic drinks with congeners
Different types of alcohol can cause different hangover symptoms. This is because some types of alcoholic drinks have higher concentrations of congeners, which are the byproducts of fermentation in some alcohols.
The highest number of congeners is found in red wine and dark alcoholic beverages such as bourbon, brandy, whiskey, and tequila.
Meanwhile, clearer liquors such as rum, vodka, and gin contain fewer congeners. Vodka contains almost no congeners at all. So, hangovers because these drinks are rare or not so severe.
In one study, 33 percent of people who drank bourbon reported a severe hangover compared to 3 percent of people who drank the same amount of vodka.
In addition, combining drinking alcohol with different congeners can cause very severe hangover symptoms.
3. Drink lots of water
Alcohol is a diuretic, which makes you pee more when you drink alcohol than by drinking the same amount of water. For this reason, alcohol can cause dehydration.
Although dehydration is not the main cause of a hangover, lack of fluids can cause symptoms such as thirst, headaches, fatigue, and dry mouth.
Dehydration is easily avoided by drinking enough water. A good rule of thumb is to drink a glass of water (or any other non-alcoholic beverage) between alcoholic drinks, and take at least one large glass of water before bed.
4. Get enough sleep
Alcohol can disturb your sleep. This can damage the quality and duration of sleep, as well as disrupt your sleep schedule. As a result, you may wake up weak and feel more agitated. This is what then makes other hangover symptoms such as headaches and nausea get worse.
Getting enough sleep after drinking alcoholic beverages can help your body recover from a hangover. The trick is to keep the room temperature cool and turn off all electronic devices (including cellphones) at least one hour before bed.
5. Eat a healthy breakfast
Reporting from the BBC, eating a healthy breakfast in the morning can help restore lost nutrients because overnight your body has worked hard to digest alcohol. Choose foods rich in folate and iron to increase energy, for example, from chicken eggs or fortified cereals folate and iron.
6. Take supplements
Inflammation is an important reaction for the body to repair damaged tissue. Many hangover symptoms are thought to result from mild inflammation.
Several anti-inflammatory drugs have been shown to be very effective against hangovers. Many plant foods and medicinal herbs can also reduce inflammation and help you to prevent a hangover. Supplements that have been shown to be effective include red ginseng, ginger, and prickly pear (cactus fruit Opuntia ficus-indica , from Mexico).
In a study conducted on 55 young and healthy people, taking prickly pear extract 5 hours before drinking alcohol reduced the risk of a severe hangover by 62 percent. While it doesn't completely prevent a hangover, it can relieve hangover symptoms and events.
Apart from supplements, you can also drink ginger tea. In addition to preventing hangovers, ginger can help reduce symptoms such as nausea and vomiting.
7. Choose beer, avoid liquor
Carbonated drinks can speed up the absorption of alcohol in the body. The faster the body absorbs alcohol, the less alcohol is released into the blood and brain, causing a hangover. Well, beer is usually more carbonated than liquor like wine or whiskey. Therefore, if you want to drink or party the night away, choose a beer that is safer than booze.
Carbonation occurs naturally in beer because fermentation produces carbon dioxide along with alcohol. Whereas liquor like wine, whiskey, rum, and vodka are processed by distillation (distillation) so that the carbon dioxide content is not much or not even carbonated at all.
