The Physics of a Hangover - Biology, Preventitive tips, Cure, Remedies Fact & Fiction

Since the days of the bible and before, the affects of alcohol to bring merry festivities of losing ones inhibitions and just having a great time have been the traditional way to forget the work week and all your problems temporarily. The inevitable hangovers have been the post party discussion of many millions all over the globe. It wasn't until the last 100 years that we've been able to really dig deep into the psyche and biology of what makes us feel the daunting effects of alcohol and grasp the physics of what is really happening in this chain reaction of hell.

Understanding what your body is going through and why is more important than just trying to find cures. Knowing what is happening and why helps us to make better decisions to avoid mixing drinks for example, and to drink water so we don't dehydrate and feel the pain of the hangover that could have been avoided.

"An ounce of preparation is worth a pound of cure"

To drink, have fun and not over do it or break any natural laws of over indulging in the drink of the gods you need to know and understand exactly what it is your doing right or wrong. With great power to get drunk comes great responsibility to prepare and protect your body to not get sick, so you can go to work the next day.

Don't just think.. "Well last time I had a hang over and this time I didn't- why?" " I don't know". You should know why and how to prevent it. In this article we will discuss:

• Hangovers the physics of how they happen at every biological step
• Types of alcohol and how they affect you when mixed or consumed in different combinations
• Preparations you can take to give yourself the best chance for NOT getting a hung over
• What NOT to do lest your begging for the pain
• Remedies: Fact & Fiction and how the ones that work do their job (scientifically proven)
• High tech over the counter pills that prevent hangovers
• High tech CD's that instantly using binaural beats technology alleviate (distract the mind from) the painful nausea and headaches evident in a hang over, and is powerful enough to trigger your brain (after 7 minutes) to release endorphins the endogenous opiate in your body, which makes it all feel like a warm bath!

For centuries cures were created from trial and error, false cures were hypothesized and real cures were figured out, well at least some remedies that one could use to feel better until their body caught up with its mopping up of the toxic aftermath

When you drink you should pay close attention to what you drink and make sure your not mixing different types of alcoholic beverages. By different types I mean beer, hard liquor, and wine. Alcohol has a toxin called congeners, its a by product of the fermentation process and its what gives you that wonderful reality check the next day after drinking. That time when your so miserable that you no longer for the moment anyway, take simple pleasures like opening your eyes when the curtains are drawn, for granted. Different types of alcohol have different amounts of this bi-product and each kind has its respective toxins as well. When you mix the different types of alcohol the toxins don't play nice together, in fact they out right start a chemical civil war in your body.

Some drinks contain a higher concentration of congeners which causes you to have a massive hangover with heightened nausea and achyness. Mixing drinks specifically ones with high concentrations of congeners is really bad. Mixing drinks generally darker drinks have congeners, while clear drinks like vodka don't (which is why clear drinks like tequila patron, vodka, gin and so forth are your best bet if you want to get drunk but don't want to suffer the next morning from certain hangover symptoms. You can still get dehydrated but this is easily avoided.

The best drink with the most impact, least possibility for a horrid achy hangover is Long Island Iced tea. The LIIT is made of all clear alcohols the only reason its dark at all is they tap coca cola into it to give it the color, but coke doesn't affect it since it doesn't have any alcohol in it.

Red wine and dark liquors (bourbon, brandy, whiskey and tequila) contain the highest concentration of this toxin. White wine and clear liquors such as rum, vodka and gin have fewer congeners and so hangover symptoms aren't as bad when you drink them, however you can still dehydrate so be careful. With wine the cheaper it is the more congeners, hence more toxic and likely to give you a hang over; the more expensive wines are distilled better and are less likely to give you a hangover. Sweet wines are the most likely to give you a hang over.

Different types of alcohol like beer, wine, whiskey and so on, contain different types of congeners so be extremely careful not to mix these drinks too much, and if at all possible avoid mixing them at all. Your best bet is to stick to clear alcohols or to stick with just one type (i.e. only beer, only wine, or only hard liquor but only one type a night) because although the mixture gives you several variations of "drunk" it also has a severe hangover that follows. Many mixed drinks with cleaver names like atom bomb, take advantage of the contergen content to give you a certain experience but you pay a price for this experience if you drink too much of these.

It works a lot like how getting high on paint thinner or whip cream cans CO2 gas, which essentially suffocates the brain of oxygen and the high is your brain dying or suffering (I know it sounds sick but its true and knowing this doesn't stop people from doing ridiculous things) but doing this with alcohol is much safer than the latter.

Some people like the "high" the mixed alcohols brings them so much they drink them in large quantities knowing this will hurt the next day, they make a sacrifice that they regret each time but yet continue to do it when their well again! These people need a better solution to how to beat the hangover as the second half of this hub is dedicated to the cure and this part is dedicated to the cause. I believe if you understand what's happening better you can take better steps to avoid the pain and mistakes most people make and don't realize what happened.

Some people get drunk at random, paying no mind or seeing no rhyme or reason to their actions and never know if they will be hung over the next day or not.. if they drink a lot of long island iced teas they can get drunk (very drunk) and not get the toxic effects of congeners so if they are sure to drink a lot of water they can probably avoid a hang over all together, then nights they drink a couple beers a glass of wine, and 4 shots of 4 different hard liquors, they feel like death warmed over the next morning and don't realize what they did different!

Another not so well known fact is that the carbonation in beer accelerates the absorption of alcohol so following beer with whiskey for example, will give the body even less time than usual to process the toxins which are also more potent when mixed (two different kinds of congeners! Its like saying yes can I get a headache and two shots of stomach cramps, then they hit you with both at the same time.

It helps to become aware of the concept of how alcohol reacts in your body, so subconsciously you start to realize what's happening and you will actually think before you drink, in a sort of intuitive way in the future.

The mind is amazing at doing this, although your subconscious mind already knows what's going on, the brain instinctively does all of this like a fine tuned antivirus program (we get drunk/high because our body is temporarily disabled by the foreign substance but when we fight the toxins we return to sober again).

Knowing the chain reactions, big words and all helps your mind label the events and thus helps you become more conscious of what your doing to yourself when you drink.

Chain Reaction of Alcohol in the body:

The liver breaks down the alcohol you drink by an enzyme called "alcohol dehydrogenase" which creates the bi-product acetaldehyde. Acetaldehyde is much more toxic than the alcohol itself. But it doesn't stop there.. Once created the acetaldehyde like a foreign substance in the body is attacked by another enzyme called "acetaldehyde dehydrogenase" and glutathione, which has a lot of a substance called "cysteine".

Cysteine is attracted to acetaldehyde and when the two get together they bond and create another chemical this time that is non-toxic and is similar to the chemical make up of vinegar. This process helps to inhibit the acetaldehyde chemical from causing too much damage IF YOU ONLY HAVE A FEW DRINKS. If you drink more than that you make it harder for your body to fight it thus the acetaldehyde toxin reeks havoc on your body.

The problem comes in when you start to drink heavily because the liver starts to run short of the chemical glutathione, causing the acetaldehyde to build up in the body. The longer periods of time the acetaldehyde is in the body the more toxic it is to your system. Its like you have this defense chemical that neutralizes the toxin but if you drink too much your body can't fight it fast enough and it overwhelms your system and causes some bad things to happen. The acetaldehyde is not broken down due to the overwhelming amounts in the system (the enzyme can't handle the entire work load).

Weight does factor into this equation so it change the dynamics between two people trying to drink each other under the table (the bigger person has the advantage of tolerance). Another thing to pay attention to is the different chemistry between men and women, rather the different amounts men and women shouldn't try to drink the same amounts (say in a contest to see who has the biggest balls) because its literally and physically not fair.

Women have less acetaldehyde dehydrogenase and glutathione, which makes their hangovers worse, even if they drink the exact same amount as someone with their same body weight and shape (who's male) because it takes longer for a woman's body to break down the alcohol! Bet you didn't know that, I guess we are different in some ways we thought we were the same!

When you feel the horrid symptoms like fatigue, stomach irritation, and the normal feelings of sickness ALL OVER, this is due to something called "glutamine rebound"

After drinking heavily it's hard to fall asleep, although you'd think that you'd pass right out from the intoxication. You may fall asleep depending on a lot of factors but their is a reaction happening in your body that makes sleeping soundly hard. Alcohol has a depressive effect on the body because while you're drinking the alcohol in your drink inhibits the glutamine agent, one of your body's natural stimulants. When you stop drinking your body starts to create more glutamine than it needs to try to make up for lost time.

The added glutamine levels stimulate the brain while you relax and try to pass out. This keeps you from reaching the deeper levels of sleep (their are several levels of sleep called sleep cycles that you go through every night if you're getting good rest. When you don't sleep good you skip "cycles" and thus don't feel vibrant in the morning. You heal and regenerate vital chemicals in the body like potassium while you sleep, generally in deep delta sleep cycles, but when you drink it is hard to reach these dreamless states of rest resulting in the body not being properly recharged and the damage from the alcohol to your system is not so easily repaired. This can lead to some of the symptoms you feel when you wake up "hung over" like fatigue.

Alcohol is absorbed directly through the stomach. This causes the lining of the stomach to become irritated. Alcohol stimulates Hydrochloric acid secretions which cause the nerves to send messages to the brain that the stomach is hurting the body!

This is why you start throwing up, its your brain trying to get rid of the toxin, and has nothing to do with the food you ate, or anything else in the stomach. The alcohol is the irritant and the brain uses different ways to force you to throw up and expel it out of the body, including heightened senses like smell or taste that make you feel sick, but this is the body trying to flush out the toxic waste.

This actually helps you in the long run because it removes the number of toxins the body has to deal with helping you not have too bad a hangover. Other not so pleasant symptoms that can insure are diarrhea and lack of appetite (which makes eating bread to absorb the alcohol in your stomach hard to keep down)

For another great hub on hangover relief check out this page (but please finish reading this one first *smiles* Word Play

Food and Drink Remedies - Fact or Fiction?

Hangover relief is an interesting topic that has so many variations people don't know what works and what is just something they heard. One of the reasons I precluded this hub with all that science above is because this will help you if you decide to look up your own remedy theory. Below are some of the most popular remedies that work, on the other side ones that do work, including a short explanation why it does or doesn't work.

If you have something I didn't mention here please leave a comment below the appropriate box and I'll research it and add it to the box my research shows it to fit into (do or don't, real or wives tale etc..) (Fellow Huber's this is an interesting use of a comment box by the way. You can also leave general comments on this hub at the bottom. Please limit the comment boxes below the do and don't work boxes to hangover remedies and not general comments to keep this page symmetrical.

Check out this great hub for more: Hangover home remedies

Black Coffee

Coffee has a lot of caffeine which is a stimulant. Coffee helps fight fatigue and stimulates focus, which can help you "feel" better. This has only a mild effect on your hangover symptoms and you should never drink coffee upon waking up with a hangover until AFTER you drink at least one to two glasses of water. Coffee is a diuretic like alcohol and so coffee dehydrates you. If you're hung over you're already dehydrated so coffee can make symptoms worse.

If you drink plenty of water then drink ONE cup of coffee it can help you. But besides the two glasses of water you should drink before drinking the coffee, you should drink another glass of water after you finish your coffee just to be safe. Water is your best friend when your dehydrated and the more you drink the faster you'll start to feel better!

Coffee can also help a pounding headache because its main ingredient caffeine is a vasoconstrictor. It reduces the size of blood vessels which counteracts the effect of the alcohol, which makes them swell up. This causes the headache in the first place.

Over all coffee is not a very good cure for a hangover because it can agitate the headache causing other symptoms to worsen.

• Fried or Fatty Foods

Although eating fried or fatty foods the morning after will probably only irritate a drinker's stomach more, eating them before drinking can actually help alleviate potential symptoms before their problem. eating anything fatty before you drink helps prevent a hangover, fatty food especially stick to the stomach lining better and slow the alcohol ingestion into the blood stream, this may make getting drunk take longer but it also gives the body more time to handle the toxic effects of the alcohol which helps to avoid a hang over too.. a Mediterranean folk tactic is to take a spoonful of olive oil before drinking alcohol as a hangover preventative measure because it works!

• Power drinks:

Drinking Gatorade, or any electrolyte fortified sports drink, smoothie, or fruit drink (fresh real fruit is best) replenishes the robbed electrolytes that went out when you kept having to go to the bathroom!

• Eggs

Eating eggs the morning after gives you energy like any other food, which is the greatest benefit, but eggs also contain large amounts of cysteine the substance that breaks down the toxin (remember?) acetaldehyde in the liver's easily depleted glutathione. Therefore, eggs can potentially help mop up the left-over toxins.

• Bananas

Bananas provide lost electrolytes, but it also replenishes the potassium lost to alcohol's diuretic effect. Other potassium-rich foods such as kiwi fruit or sports drinks work just as well.

• Water

Drinking water is the most important thing you can do for your hang over, especially if you drink it while you drink. This combats dehydration, but also helps dilute the left over chemicals left over from the alcohol and liver. Its a good idea to drink a glass of water with salt and sugar mixed in it as this replaces the lost sodium andglycogen. Sports drinks can achieve the same effect but drinking plain water and sports drinks is recommended.

It is also recommended that while you drink you drink a full glass of water for every glass or 3 shots of alcohol you drink. This is a good preventive measure that works wonders. This slows down drinking, and gives your body more time to deal with the alcohol. The body only processes 3/4 of an ounce of alcohol per hour any more than that becomes toxic and generally will cause hangover symptoms the next day, or induce vomiting while drinking.

• Fruit Juice

Fructose or fruit sugar in fruit juice helps to naturally increase the body's energy. Studies have proven that it also speeds up how fast the body gets rid of toxins. Fruit juice is also a good idea the morning after because it is high in Vitamins and supplements that were depleted the night before because of alcohol's diuretic effect. Taking vitamin B and C are best but I recommend you take a multivitamin like Centrum to replenish your supply holistically.

• OTC (Over the counter) Hangover Pills

The over the counter hangover relief tablets work by way of a filtering effect of charcoal. Chaser and Sob'r-K Hangover Stopper, which claim carbon as their main ingredient are only two of several versions of this. These over-the-counter remedies are taken prior to drinking. Manufacturers claim that the activated charcoal in the pills "attracts" congeners The carbon/charcoal found on burnt toast is not the same as activated charcoal, nor is it the equivalent of taking an OTC hangover remedy.

The OTC hangover remedies also have vitamins and protein and such in an attempt to give your body more of a chance of maintaining enough of its lost supply, but this doesn't always work.

Chaser, Sob'r-K Hangover Stopper, RU-21, Berocca and Rebound all work but contain drastically different sets of ingredients. Some are the same like active carbon. Their effectiveness varies based on ingredients. They are considered dietary supplements, meaning:

• They contain vitamins and minerals.
• no prescription necessary
• They are usually taken as pills.

Sob'r-K Hangover Stopper is the cheapest yet best based on a study, compared to the others, uses the highest-grade carbon and the concoction is patented therefore, Hangover Review deemed it the smartest choice.

It's been said that since the pills are required to be taken through out the night with a tall glass of water, that the water more than the pills themselves is the real reason you don't get a hangover, however the congeners are absorbed by the activated charcoal so they do have another function other than replenishing vitamins.

• Time

No matter what you do time is the real cure.. the other remedies help to speed up the body's progress and make you feel comfortable in the process but the body has to mop up the toxins the alcohol left and stimulated from the liver so you have to wait it out sometimes but the body always takes care of it in due time.

A recent development in hangover relief is through the use of Binaural beats technology. Binaural beats carefully sculpted to specific frequencies helps the brain release euphoria chemicals like serotonin (helps you sleep) endorphins (helps body pain and aches and headache) and when used in conjunction with an atmosphere scape and a layer of panning effects, such as a white noise effect that masks an ocean surf works wonders.

The panning effect of the white noise or brown noise is a distraction of the mind and also acts as a mental massage. The panning effect pulls you into a nice trance and the ocean and rain scapes allure your senses and make you forget your sick. Together with the aforementioned binaural beats "frequencies" your body gets a shot of natural chemicals (mentioned above) that help you relax, When your feeling horrible all you want to do is go to sleep and sleep it off (as you sleep the body repairs itself faster because the resources of your brain are freed up and your body is less taxed by hydraulic movement. The blood flows smoother due to the heart not being over stimulated by your movements.

I built the first hang over relief CD on the market (as far as I know, I looked for another company that made one so I could see how it worked, but found nothing at all, then when mine came out I noticed a flux of them coming out using my exact format).. But although it worked very well (I used it on many occasions!) It didn't seem to sell (although I suspect I put too much of a clip on the page and they just ripped the clip and looped it which although not the full effect would pose enough to give alittle relief, i wanted them to feel that so they knew it worked but I guess it backfired?

I'm going to update this page with that CD uploaded to a Youtube video shell when I figure out how to do that. So if you get a hang over you can come here and listen to it, make sure you have quality headphones it's important. The CD is called "Pain and Migraine relief Volume 2: Hangover and withdraw relief"

I built it based on the information above and several hundred articles on the net about how the brain stimulates the signals that cause the pain. Part of the pain is based on an enzyme that generates a pain chemical. Aspirin works by inhibiting the enzyme (where ever in the body it is it neutralizes it from producing the chemical sent to the brain to trigger the pain you feel. No matter where on your body you hurt it is all only really hurting in your brain, and its just a signal designed to let you know to fix the problem. I hope this was informative and enlightening, remember an ounce of preparation is worth a pound of cure!