ShareThisIrish-pub owner Sean Cummings has heard some crazy ideas over the years about how to avoid a post-St. Patrick's Day hangover:
Coat your stomach with castor oil. Take aspirin before drinking to help flush toxins. Treat nausea with raw egg and beer.
Cummings doubts the remedies work.
His advice: Just expect to feel green after a night of overindulgence.
"Irish people plan all year for St. Patrick's Day," he said. "We are more accepting that we will feel lousy the next day."
Dr. Stephen Prescott, president of the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation, says there's a reason for that raging headache and upset stomach.
Much like St. Patrick is credited with driving the snakes out of Ireland, hangovers are the result of our bodies trying to drive the toxins from alcohol out of our systems.
"There is a direct toxic effect of alcohol in our bodies," Prescott said. "Drink too much, and you end up with compounds in the blood that are very similar to those you find in the flu."
The dry mouth that drinkers often experience the morning after a binge is a symptom of dehydration, a staple of the hangover. Dehydration means you have a low blood volume, leading to dizziness and a racing pulse.
To make matters worse, your body makes even more poison getting alcohol out of your system.
"Our bodies have lots of filters, which try to keep harmful materials out of dangerous places," Prescott said. "Before it can be flushed from the system, alcohol has to be metabolized. So the liver turns parts of alcohol into toxic chemicals, which tend to hurt us on the way out."
Two of the biggest offenders are acetaldehyde and formaldehyde. Yes, says Prescott, your body turns alcohol into embalming fluid.
But once the damage is done, don't try to ward away the pain with a little "hair of the dog that bit you," Prescott said. More alcohol will just stretch out the misery.
Instead, try to give your body what it's missing.
If you're tired, get some rest. If you're dehydrated, drink water or fruit juice. But stay away from Tylenol because that will further stress your liver.
Of course, the best cure is prevention, Prescott said. "Don't drink to excess, and you won't have a hangover to worry about."
(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, www.scrippsnews.com.)
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