Generally, I’ve been pretty lucky with my health. I’ve never had a headache. Or suffered a nosebleed. Or broken a bone. And until quite recently, I’d never experienced a hangover, despite spending most of my twenties and much of my thirties determined to advance the onset of chronic liver damage.

Within the last few years, however, things have changed. For a start, I drink a lot less, but even when I do I still don’t suffer as most seem to – no pounding skull, no nausea, no sensitivity to loud noise – but the night before definitely makes its presence felt on the day that follows. I suffer from a kind of mental lethargy, staring at my computer screen for considerable amounts of time, before realizing with a start that I haven’t actually done anything for ten minutes. And then there’s the digestion issue. Without being too graphic, visits to the toilet become more frequent, more urgent, more painful and, to be frank, more… liquid. It’s not pretty.

So the search for a hangover cure has become paramount. I need something to ease my mind back into the day, something to tighten up the valves downstairs, and several years of intensive trial and error have led me in the direction of two remedies.

Stage one is ice cream, which I believe works for me for two reasons. Firstly, the coolness of product helps to counteract the inevitable post-alcohol sweat. Secondly, both dairy products and eggs are a valuable source of Vitamin B12, a deficiency of which is normal in hangovers – my body is telling me it needs more, and ice-cream delivers.

Stage two is the imbibing of Pepto-Bismol, that remarkable, vibrantly pink remedy for bowel anguish. This stuff is weird, but it does the trick. Years ago, when I worked for outlandishly hirsute rockers The Cure, the band wouldn’t tour without stocking up first. I’d be at my desk, and the call would come in. “Fraser? We’re in Rio, and we’ve run out of Pepto. Can you Fedex us a crate?” And so I would.

Ice cream. Pepto-bismol. Pepto-bismol. Ice cream. After a while, it became obvious. I should combine the two. So I wrote to Proctor & Gamble, manufacturers of the liquid, and asked their opinion:

I am a long-time user of Pepto-Bismol. I like the fact that it is extremely pink, and find it very useful for coping with alcohol-induced bouts of digestive trauma.

But can you cook with Pepto-Bismol? I am thinking of making some Pepto-Bismol ice-cream, and want to know if there are any dangers involved.

Thanks in advance,

Fraser

With the kind of wild efficiency you’d expect from such a vast organisation, a response swiftly arrived.

Hello and thanks for your e mail.

Pepto-Bismol is a strictly controlled medicine and should only used as a remedy to relieve the symptoms of an upset stomach.

Kind regards,

Christine

Consumer Relations

Well, I’m none the wiser. No information. I guess there’s nothing to do but experiment; this is, after all, how advances in medical science are made. And so I gather together the ingredients.

The Ingredients

Eggs (6 yolks). Vanilla pods (2). Milk (250ml). Pepto-Bismol (1 bottle). Cream (250ml). Sugar (50g). Simple. We start by splitting the vanilla pods and scraping out the tiny seeds.

Vanilla

The seeds get added to the cream, sugar and eggs as I rustle up a classic crème anglaise, the foundation of all good ice creams. This custard is taken off the heat as soon as it’s close to boiling (the point at which the liquid can curdle), and rapidly cooled over a bowl of iced water. Eagle-eyed readers will notice the tiny specs of vanilla in the picture below.

Crème Anglaise

Gingerly – I’m not sure why, perhaps I expect some kind of unholy fusion – I pour in the medicine. Nothing happens. No chemical reaction. No-one dies.

Pouring the Pepto

Stirring the ingredients together, however, does reveal a serious problem. The passionate Pepto pink has diminished somewhat, leaving behind a more anaemic imitation.

Pepto Anglais

Thankfully, help is at hand. In the far reaches of the blogjam pantry I’m able to score an ancient bottle of scarlet food dye, and add a capful to the brew.

Dyed Anglais

Finally, I pour the compound into my trusty Panasonic Ice Cream Maker, light the blue touch paper, and retire.

While I’m waiting for the mixture to freeze, I revisit the Pepto-Bismol website, where a glance at the FAQ section reveals a previously unheralded paragraph:

Some people feel refrigerating makes the dose more pleasing to take, and that’s OK. However, you shouldn’t freeze the product.

Whoa! Waddya mean no freezing? I’ve just made ice-cream! I need to clarify the situation immediately, and write back to Proctor & Gamble.

I’ve just noticed that the FAQ on the Pepto-Bismol website says that while refrigerating the product is OK, one shouldn’t freeze it. Can you shed any light on why this might be?

This time, Penny responds.

We do not have any information about freezing Pepto-Bismol….we can only stress that as a controlled medicine it should only be used as directed on the bottle.

Kind regards,

Penny

Consumer Relations

What a quandary! Obviously the girls can’t endorse my ice-cream adventure, but they won’t give me any clues as to why it’s a bad idea either. Penny doesn’t have this information to hand, but P&G must have tested the theory, otherwise the warning on the website wouldn’t be there. What to do?

Eat it, of course! In my book, food without danger is like sex with a condom: it goes in the same entrance, but the experience is altogether less thrilling, less memorable, indeed less satisfying. I fetch the ice cream from the freezer, scoop out a chunk, and admire its pinky goodness.

Pepto Bismol Ice Cream

The taste? Actually, it’s quite nice. The vanilla and sugar temper the metallic bitterness of the medicine, giving the end result a flavour not too dissimilar to black cherry. And as a hangover cure? Initial studies are encouraging, with no negative side-effects experienced as yet. A mild mid-week drinking session provided the first test, and while my cross-breed concoction certainly didn’t eliminate the suffering altogether, the benefits did not go unnoticed.

Obviously, if I’m to suggest to P&G that they approach Ben & Jerry’s to produce a commercial version, there will have to be proper clinical trials, with control groups and placebos and suchlike, but I’m hopeful. It’ll sit nicely on the shelves next to my paracetamol bacon roll.

Small-print: As as a controlled medicine, Pepto-Bismol should only be used as directed on the bottle. If in doubt, consult your pharmacist.

Posted: January 1st, 2008 by Kat Path
Filled Under: Fucking Tastic Stories, Must See Shit
With Tags: alcohol, drinking, drunk, hangover remedy, hangovers, ice cream, intoxication, nausea, pepto bismol
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Listen to your body it all depend how bad you are, what you drank and how much. First if you are felling nausea don’t hold it back with pills since you will probably simply delay the inevitable and waste all the pills and will have to start all over again. Also it will normally just speed up the recovery process by getting the rest of the alcohol out of your body.

Drink Gastrolite or Pedialite, a drink with balanced electrolytes and can be purchased in any pharmacy normally used to help recover from a gastro. Drink slowly as not to overwhelm your stomach. Drink warm water no cold water especially if you are all sweaty since your stomach will contract too fast and you will end up with worst abdominal pains or spasms that can make you throw up.

Take one or two Advil if you have a headache. No Aspirin or Tylenol.

If you have diarrhea or if you throw up, Pepto Bismol will be a good choice to help your digestive system recover.

Once you are feeling a bit better you can go on solid food. My favorite is toast with maple syrup. Well pretty much the same food as if you had a gastro.

Posted: January 1st, 2008 by Kat Path
Filled Under: Fucking Tastic Stories
With Tags: advil, alcohol, diarrhea, drinking, drunk, hangover remedy, hangovers, intoxication, nausea, pepto bismol
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Tips for avoiding the worst consequence of holiday overindulgence.
From Harvard Health Publications

Hangovers seem to be the body’s way of reminding us about the hazards of overindulgence. Physiologically, it’s a group effort: Diarrhea, fatigue, headache, nausea, and shaking are the classic symptoms. Sometimes, systolic (the upper number) blood pressure goes up, the heart beats faster than normal, and sweat glands overproduce — evidence that the “fight or flight” response is revved up. Some people become sensitive to light or sound. Others suffer a spinning sensation (vertigo).

The causes are as varied as the symptoms. Alcohol is metabolized into acetaldehyde, a substance that’s toxic at high levels, although concentrations rarely get that high, so that’s not the complete explanation.

Drinking interferes with brain activity during sleep, so a hangover may be a form of sleep deprivation. Alcohol scrambles the hormones that regulate our biological clocks, which may be why a hangover can feel like jet lag, and vice versa. Alcohol can also trigger migraines, so some people may think they’re hung over when it’s really an alcohol-induced migraine they’re suffering.

Hangovers begin after blood alcohol levels start to fall. In fact, according to some experts, the worst symptoms occur when levels reach zero.

The key ingredient seems to be “drinking to intoxication”; how much you drank to get there is less important. In fact, several studies suggest that light and moderate drinkers are more vulnerable to getting a hangover than heavy drinkers. Yet there’s also seemingly contradictory research showing that people with a family history of alcoholism have worse hangovers. Researchers say some people may end up with drinking problems because they drink in an effort to relieve hangover symptoms.

Dr. Robert Swift, a researcher at the Providence Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Rhode Island, coauthored one of the few review papers on hangovers in 1998. It’s still one of the most frequently cited sources on the topic. The rundown on hangover remedies that follows is based on that review, an interview with Dr. Swift, and several other sources.

Hair of the dog.
Drinking to ease the symptoms of a hangover is sometimes called taking the hair of the dog, or hair of the dog that bit you. The notion is that hangovers are a form of alcohol withdrawal, so a drink or two will ease the withdrawal.

There may be something to it, says Dr. Swift. Both alcohol and short-acting sedatives, such as benzodiazepines like diazepam (Valium), interact with GABA receptors on brain cells, he explained, and it’s well documented that some people have withdrawal symptoms from short-acting sedatives as they wear off. Perhaps the brain reacts similarly as blood alcohol levels begin to drop.

Even so, Dr. Swift advises against using alcohol as a hangover remedy. “The hair of the dog just perpetuates a cycle,” he says. “It doesn’t allow you to recover.”

Drink fluids.
Alcohol promotes urination because it inhibits the release of vasopressin, a hormone that decreases the volume of urine made by the kidneys. If your hangover includes diarrhea, sweating, or vomiting, you may be even more dehydrated. Although nausea can make it difficult to get anything down, even just a few sips of water might help your hangover.

Get some carbohydrates into your system.
Drinking may lower blood sugar levels, so theoretically some of the fatigue and headaches of a hangover may be from a brain working without enough of its main fuel. Moreover, many people forget to eat when they drink, further lowering their blood sugar. Toast and juice is a way to gently nudge levels back to normal.

Avoid darker-colored alcoholic beverages.
Experiments have shown that clear liquors, such as vodka and gin, tend to cause hangovers less frequently than dark ones, such as whiskey, red wine, and tequila. The main form of alcohol in alcoholic beverages is ethanol, but the darker liquors contain chemically related compounds (congeners), including methanol. According to Dr. Swift’s review paper, the same enzymes process ethanol and methanol, but methanol metabolites are especially toxic, so they may cause a worse hangover.

Take a pain reliever, but not Tylenol.
Aspirin, ibuprofen (Motrin, other brands), and other nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) may help with the headache and the overall achy feelings. NSAIDs, though, may irritate a stomach already irritated by alcohol. Don’t take acetaminophen (Tylenol). If alcohol is lingering in your system, it may accentuate acetaminophen’s toxic effects on the liver.

Drink coffee or tea.
Caffeine may not have any special anti-hangover powers, but as a stimulant, it could help with the grogginess. Coffee is a diuretic, though, so it may exacerbate dehydration.

Vitamin B6.
A study published over 30 years ago found that people had fewer hangover symptoms if they took a total of 1,200 milligrams of vitamin B6 before, during, and just after drinking to get drunk. But it was a small study and doesn’t seem to have been replicated.

Artichoke extract.
Supplement makers have promoted artichoke extract for a variety of ills, including hangovers, because it supposedly has beneficial effects on the liver. But a small study published in the Canadian Medical Association Journal in 2004 concluded that it isn’t effective for hangovers.

Posted: December 1st, 2007 by Kat Path
Filled Under: Fucking Tastic Stories
With Tags: alcohol, blood alcohol levels, drinking, drunk, hair of the dog, hangover remedy, hangover symptoms, hangovers, holiday, intoxication
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