Ugh, your head hurts,
you're nauseated, you're achy,
and you are certainly never drinking again.
The only thought running through your foggy mind is,
"Why are hangovers the absolute worst?"
Let's go back to last night.
As you down that cocktail, alcohol migrates
through your GI tract to your liver,
where enzymes break it down.
But as you continue to drink, your liver can't keep up.
So the alcohol overflows into your bloodstream
and travels to other organs like your brain.
There, it suppresses a hormone called vasopressin.
Normally, vasopressin prevents you from urinating too much.
So without it, you have to pee all the time,
dehydrating you in the process,
and that helps explain your brutal headache
the next morning.
But there are other chemicals at work,
such as proinflammatory cytokines.
These are small proteins that stimulate inflammation,
which causes symptoms like nausea, jitters, and headaches.
And people who are hungover
have tons of them in their blood.
In fact, when researchers injected proinflammatory cytokines
into people who were stone-cold sober,
they actually felt hungover without all the fun beforehand.
What a rip-off.
Now, scientists aren't exactly sure why binging
triggers this kind of inflammatory response,
but there is some evidence that it's more severe
when you drink darker alcohols.
In one study, participants who drank bourbon
instead of vodka reported that their hangover symptoms
were 36% worse the next morning.
Then, there's that awful morning anxiety called "hangxiety."
And no, it's not the guilt that you feel
from all the bad decisions you made the night before.
It's actually biological.
Hangxiety starts to develop when you finally put down
that last empty cocktail glass.
You see, up until that point, your brain
has been ramping up the activity of receptors
called G-A-B-A, giving you that calming buzz.
And at the same time, it's been blocking glutamate,
a stimulant linked to anxiety.
But when you stop drinking,
that whole system flips right around.
Your brain empties those calming G-A-B-A receptors
and floods with stimulating glutamate,
which can make you feel abnormally anxious
by the time morning comes around.
It can also disrupt your sleep so you wake up still tired.
But enough with all that bad news.
You want to know how you can make
that nasty hangover a thing of the past.
Sorry to say, but that delicious, greasy breakfast
isn't doing you any favors.
Your body is running low on water, not fat.
So your best bet is to hydrate
and take an anti-inflammatory.
Chances are the hangover will vanish within 24 hours
or at least in time for next weekend.
Uh, hello, my good friend?
Yes, I'd love to go to the big party,
and I will be drinking a lot of alcohol as well.