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Folk Remedies for Your Hangover

Hangovers are not very enjoyable - the dry mouth, nausea, and dizziness are more than enough of a discouragement if the headache does not do you in first. Unfortunately, by the time that you are suffering from the symptoms, it is often too late to do much of anything. You can try a variety of remedies, but there is a pretty good chance that they will do little, if anything to help.

Even the Mayo Clinic, some of the best medical professionals in the country, will tell you that that the best way to get rid of a hangover is not to get one in the first place. If ignore their warnings, getting enough rest, water, and over the counter medications are about as good as you are going to get. Even so, there are plenty of folk remedies hanging around that drinkers throughout the world and throughout the ages will swear work.

The "hair of the dog" - which basically means drinking more alcohol, has been a longtime favorite remedy for hangovers - even since the time of Shakespeare. There are a variety of recipes out there for you to try, all involving some alcohol and a variety of other ingredients that you have to choke down. The Bloody Mary became popular during the Roaring Twenties, and this tomato juice cocktail is still one of the most popular morning-after hangover cures around. Another drink, known as the Black Velvet, includes champagne and flat Guinness, and is also quite popular for relieving hangovers. Tomato juice and beer was a common cure for Hemingway's drinking indulgences.

If the idea of drinking more alcohol does not appeal to you as you are developing a new relationship with your toilet, then there are plenty of food remedies that you can give a try. For Hispanics, a Mexican soup known as menudo, whose primary ingredient is boiled tripe, is a popular dish to cure hangovers. Go back in time, and the Romans ate deep-fried canaries, while the Greeks preferred sheep's lungs. Other ancients found relief by eating boiled cabbage before a night of drinking. Does alcohol make you feel like a knight in shining armor? Then you can always try the medieval recipe of eel and bitter almonds. In many cases, however, the sufferer from the hangover finds these cures worse than the symptoms themselves.

In more recent times, there are a variety of other remedies that you can try. Some have a minimal base in science, with direct emphasis on treating the symptoms and their causes. For instance, since dehydration, low blood sugar, and a loss of essential vitamins and nutrients often cause the worse symptoms, many hangover "cures" seek to rectify these conditions, but do nothing to actually eliminate the alcohol from your system.

However, if you are willing to give them a try, most of them will not hurt. Tomato juice, aspirin, a hot shower, coffee, orange juice, honey, plenty of water, vitamin supplements, buttermilk, Coca Cola, and toast are all popular ingredients. Other people choose a more proactive approach and eat or drink specific foods before going out for the evening.