What do you do to fix a hangover? I'm about to go get some MacDonalds, I think, since a nice big double cheeseburger always seems to put my blood back in order.

That and I drink a lot of water. But the water doesn't do anything if I haven't had that huge cheeseburger.

When I've had anything to drink, I'll take some aspirin right before I go to bed with a tall glass of water. For some reason it didn't do it's magic last night like it usually does...

I think because I had wine and then a few wine cooler type thingys.

What do you do when your head is caving in?

-- Anonymous, July 23, 1999

Answers

I do the asprin before bed thing. Hasn't failed me yet. *knocks on wood*

-- Anonymous, July 23, 1999

Actually, in addition to hangover food (good because it soakes up the crap in your stomach) it's a good idea to get some sugar, and lots of liquid. So a mega-huge soda with that burger is probably a good call.

But you should really drink water before you go to bed - 1 glass for each hooch (damn, that stuff is nasty).

And don't ever let anyone feed you a drink called a Zombie. i know it's tasty, but it's called that for a REASON ;)

-- Anonymous, July 23, 1999

1) drink an ocean of water 2) than drink another ocean of water 3) repeat steps 1 and 2. Eating greasy food or taking aspirin the night before won't cure what a hangover is: dehydration or possible alcohol poisioning.

-- Anonymous, July 23, 1999

4 aspirin and a HUGE (i'm talking HUGE - like 32 oz glass size) glass of Milk. I can't do the water thing when I'm drunk. It will, without fail, make me throw-up. But the aspirin/milk thing, RIGHT BEFORE I go to bed has worked for the past 7 years.

Oh yeah, 12 hours of sleep helps too. (= Whoda thunkit?

-- Anonymous, July 23, 1999

I usually find if you drink more it all goes away the only problem with that is you have to keep it up and then your liver goes

-- Anonymous, July 23, 1999

Hangover 'prevention':

4 aspirin, large glass of water.

Hangover recovery:

1 can of Coca Cola (not Pepsi - it's too sweet). Gatorade, and something greasy. A couple slices of pizza, or a couple hamburgers works. Maybe another coke, or just water or gatorade.

Then, not to cross the line of bad taste or anything, about half an hour after eating, a good poop (what a silly word).

100% immediate recovery:

one beer, wait two minutes, second beer.

-rich http://www.inferiority.com

-- Anonymous, July 23, 1999

water and ibuprofen before bed. oh, and i spend most of the night peeing every half hour (small bladder) so that i stay nicely toasted while still getting the alcohol out of my system.

well, at least that's why i THINK i rarely get hangovers. =)

-- Anonymous, July 23, 1999

The best hangover cure i've found is lots of water, aspirin and milk thistle extract. The milk thistle helps your liver handle the alcohol and protects it from damage.

-- Anonymous, July 23, 1999

I can't believe no one has suggested mine yet! Midol! It freezes your insides, making you feel WAY less sick. Sure, it's girly cramp medicine, but hey... it works. :)

-- Anonymous, July 23, 1999

The best hangover cure I know is being 22. I never got hangovers when I was younger.

Barring that, as long as it's not a throwing-up kind of hangover, I recommend hot and sour soup. Clears your head and generally makes you feel better. Then have dim sum and you'll be good as new, as long as you keep drinking water.

If it's a stomach-related hangover, Alka-Seltzer is good because it settles your stomach plus it has aspirin for your headache. Of course, if it's a really bad stomach-related hangover, you will immediately throw up the Alka-Seltzer, which will also make you feel better in the long run.

I hate hangovers. They make me feel like I'm wasting my life. I would be happy to never have another one.

-- Anonymous, July 23, 1999

I seem to have my worst hangovers when I'm back home visiting old friends. That said, I spent Saturday morning a couple of weeks ago, doing something I have been doing for far too many years. I pull into the tiny, local supermarket (about as far as I can get at that point) and I immediately grab a six pack of V-8 off the shelf. I then sit in my car and chug as many of them as I need to (yes, warm). Hasn't failed me yet, although I find the older I get, water before I fall asleep and the morning after also helps.

The thought of eating anything before dinner time when hung-over makes me queasy.

-- Anonymous, July 23, 1999

I wish I had a good hangover cure. I've never been able to find one. Some nights I can just have one beer and feel like crap the next day. (And my hangovers usually last ALL day!) Maybe it's because I'm prone to migraines, and any little thing can give me a headache. I do try to stave off a hangover by alternating water with whatever I'm drinking (although who REALLY does this? Not me, not often anyway!). HUGE glass of water before bed (which really helps you sleep well, getting up and peeing every hour on the hour), with 4 ibuprofen, some vitamins C & B.... Sometimes I can keep it at bay that way, but not always.

-- Anonymous, July 24, 1999

Oh, yeah, and once I have a hangover, nothing but time will make it go away. Time or a maybe a gun. Nothing like a rippin' pukin' head- poundin' hangover to make you wish you were dead.

-- Anonymous, July 24, 1999

The best hangover cure I've found is to drink two HUGE bottles of Gatorade and a banana or two. I used to do that when I worked early mornings in a bakery. Hangover would disappear within an hour.

-- Anonymous, July 24, 1999

I can tell you what NOT to take for a hangover -- undiluted Cranberry Juice. It is a Very Big Mistake to drink something acidic when you wake up with a hangover... especially something red and acidic. Even though alcohol seems like a stimulant, it's really a depressant.. when I wake up with a hangover I usually spend the day feeling glum and sorry for myself. I find the best 'cure' is to drink water and write off the whole day by staying in bed.

-- Anonymous, July 24, 1999

Just water will make you throw up. It has to by isotonic (a bit salty, really), so that your body actually uses the water.

Gotta go with whoever said Gatorade + bananas.

Or, if you know there's gonna be a big crowd with hangovers, make yourself my cure:

Orange juice Apple juice Magnesium pills Water A little salt

And eat something fatty but not gross.

-- Anonymous, July 24, 1999

Nothing does it better than a bloody mary or a mimosa...a little hair o' the dog that bit ya.

Otherwise, lots of water, and I find that plain tomato juice will help a queezy stomach-type hangover. And don't miss that "window of opportunity", where you are lying in bed and feel a little hungry, but your head hurts too bad to get up and eat something. If you wait too long, then the hunger pangs turn to nausea and the hangover takes a turn for the worse instead of getting better.

-- Anonymous, July 24, 1999

OK , probably not best for the whole kidney/liver part of the body but if you can get hold of anything in a headache tablet with codeine , it relievs pain fast ......down here mersyndol is the shit , and it is the highest octane rating of all the "over the counter" medicines.This only works for the headache , but the gut-ache requires grease in the form of bacon and eggs on toast.....also good for cholesterol........also a big glass of 'hangover helper' aka Cooler Cordial , aka Lime Cordial. This stuff can made mixed so sickly sweet it beats the brain into submission and soon you will be bouncing off walls again.

-- Anonymous, July 25, 1999

Okay, since I was silly and put my responsible answer in the "favorite drink" section, I'll share my "kids don't try this at home" answer.

In college, a buddy of mine and I would always go through the ritual of bong hits, breakfast at Waffle House- complete with coffee, and then the poo thing that someone else mentioned. None of it is good for you and you can still pretty much write the rest of the day off, but you feel better just lying on the couch watching TV.

-- Anonymous, July 26, 1999

Ice cold V-8 works every time for me. Then drink lots of water for the rest of the day.

-- Anonymous, July 26, 1999

in highschool : putting on some sunglasses and picking up up either pizza and coke or taco bell fries supreme for breakfast (for those in the US, fries supreme are just like nachos supreme -- all the beans/meat/cheese/sourcream/chives but on top of french fries mmmmmmmmm) in college : run out of alcohol at around 1am and staying up until 4am drinking water and talking. add 6 hours sleep and a cheap movie and you're set today : big bottle of water beside the bed, wake up every hour and drink drink drink. take a HUGE pee in the morning - and of course sleep until 1pm. a few months ago, i went to albuquerque to visit a friend, and drank almost an entire bottle of wine by myself - the next day, i did the whole throw up and don't move a muscle thing until about 7 in the evening. i didn't feel better until i had a shower and some dinner. needless to say, i won't be pulling that one any time soon.

-- Anonymous, July 26, 1999

Ok, Here's my ultimate cure: before bed, 2 ex-strength tylenol, 2 multi-vitamins, and at least a pint of H2O (or as much as you can hold at that point). If vomiting is involved, repeat the ritual, minus the tylenol. Next morning, lots of coffee. Dont ask why, but it always works for me, even though it doesnt really make sense (caffine=dehydration). Then, wait. Later, after a nice, big breakfast, usually consisting of greasy eggs and french toast to sop up all the booze, lots of H2O and/or Gatorade. Exercise seems to help me, too, but usually only when my body feels like hell, not my head.

-- Anonymous, July 26, 1999

I cured a NASTY hangover today. It was one of those really stupid hangovers, too -- I'd had plenty of beer last night, but wasn't feeling that buzz, so I said, "OK, just one more!" Even though I knew I had to get up at a decent hour today and I did have something to do where my brain would have to function. Yep, that did it, and that one beer pushed me from sober to drunk in no time flat, then I felt like leprechauns were building a St. Patrick's Day float in my head this morning. (Yes, I know it's July, but that's what it felt like.)

I had a feeling it would be one of those mornings when I went to bed last night. So I drank a huge glass of water, downed 4 ibuprofen, PLUS one of my prescription migraine pills, and B and C vitamins. (Didn't help, or at least I don't want to know if I would've felt worse without it!) Then when I got up I drank a huge glass of milk, took all my vitamins, 3 Extra-strength Excedrin, another prescription migraine pill (fioricet, FYI), AND I used Imitrex, another migraine drug, in nasal spray form! It killed my headache -- which almost NEVER happens with my hangovers! -- but I still felt queasy, so I ate a couple of (really yummy - not) wintergreen Tums. That did it! It's a miracle! I'm cured! HALLELULIAH! (did I spell that right? oh who cares!) I was so cured that 15 minutes later I was starving and downed a nice heavy-on-the-carbos lunch before I dashed out to my meeting, looking and feeling fresh as a daisy.

I don't necessarily recommend this "cure" for the average person -- especially since Excedrin and Fioricet both have acetamenophen (sp?) (tylenol) in them, and you really shouldn't mix that too frequently with alcohol, as it can cause serious liver damage. But -- I've never rid myself of an ass-kicking hangover before, not even when I was young and even stupider than I am now, so I just had to post this for any interested parties!

-- Anonymous, July 28, 1999

Quickest cure I've ever had was an ounce and a half of brandy in black coffee. Of course, I don't condone drinking in the morning, but worked pretty quickly. I only recommend this for those mornings when you know you aren't going to be seeing anyone right away or else you'll be the target of an intervention.

Gatorade and then a hard ride on the bike has worked really well, though it's painful for the first few minutes. Just grit your teeth and try not to puke.

Other than that, Beth is right -- being 22 worked best of all.

-- Anonymous, August 01, 1999

There are different hangover symptoms, therefore you need a different cure for each symptom. The worst by far is when you HAVE to get up, and your first clue that you are in deep trouble is when the alarm goes off and your entire body is screaming for water. So you run to the faucet and start drinking water as fast as you can in an effort to put out the fire burning inside you (Your mouth tastes like a little man crawled in it during the night and took a dump, but this is really second to the all-consuming thirstiness). Unfortunately, about this time you get the second clue that you are in trouble, as you lean over and toss up all the water you just drank. This happens especially frequently if red wine or scotch is your drink of choice. And don't even think about getting drunk on something sweet like cheap schnapps.

Rule #1 No Sweet Drinks. In fact my friend Brad and I came up with Dr. Suessish rhyme for when that caring considerate friend says "Hey, how about a round of Pink Fluffy Slippers?!"

I will not drink them on a bus I will not drink them if you cuss I will not drink them in a glass I will not drink them Kiss my ass

Rule #2 Clear liquors hurt less than dark liquors. Gin may be the only exception to this, I don't know why, maybe cause you feel like you ate a Christmas tree.

Rule #3 No tylenol Like some other people have stated, it wrecks your liver. One day you will forget your promise to God or Allah or Mother Nature and you will drink again. When that day comes, you'll want your liver.

As for cures:

Stomach If you have never tried Zantac (the heartburn medicine), you are missing out on a great tool. This is a drug my friend Tom the chemist swears was invented for drunks. Take one immediately upon waking up with one normal sized glass of water, then wait 20 minutes before taking anything else. Then you'll be able to drink sulphuric acid or eat pig iron if you are so inclined.

Head Once you've got your stomach under control, I think aspirin works best for throbbing headaches, taken with some kind of food. I like melon, because it takes care of your thirst at the same time. Very efficient. Then follow it with some kind of hearty something like a burger.

I also find that Sudafed works wonders. Helps you breathe and makes your head feel 10 lbs. lighter. I don't know what it does to your liver, so if one of you docs have any info, let me know.

Lethargy Once you get the head and stomach calmed down, you'll feel like you have zero energy. The Sudafed will help this some, caffeine helps, sleep helps (Not always possible). I also recommend vitamins for this, particularly B vitamins. If you're smart, you'll save those real wild drunks for when you know you don't have to get up. Otherwise call in sick. Because what you really need to be doing is laying on the couch watching old movies drinking ice water.

And getting ready to head out that night.

-- Anonymous, August 05, 1999

A big fry-up. Where I come from it's called an Ulster fry. Fried egg, fried sausage, fried bacon, fried tomato, fried mushrooms, fried bread, fried soda bread. Possibly baked beans along with it. It doesn't sound like it should work - a great big heart attack on a plate - but it does. Oh, I also sometimes go in the other direction and drink lots of green tea because it makes me feel healthy.

-- Anonymous, August 31, 1999