All You Need To Know About Alcohol-Induced Headaches

Delayed alcohol-induced headaches, aka hangover headaches, often show up the next day. And that hangover can evolve into a migraine attack that can last for days. In your bloodstream, ethanol can cause headaches through vasodilation. Vasodilation can stimulate certain brain nerves and result in pain. Alcohol also affects chemicals and hormones in your brain, such as histamine and serotonin, which contribute to the development of a headache. Be sure to talk with your healthcare provider about your “cocktail headache” plan.

Why Do You Get a Headache After Drinking Alcohol?

Catherine is a dedicated freelance health and science writer committed to excellence and professionalism. She specializes in health topics including diet and nutrition, immune-related diseases, surgery, and cancer. Your liver is often an unsung hero, fulfilling over 500 jobs without complaint — follow these five tips to avoid liver disease and keep yours running at maximum efficiency. If you’re feeling queasy, avoid rich, greasy foods and stick to dry, bland foods like toast and crackers. The following factors play an essential part in determining the safe amount of alcohol for you.

• Note that to qualify as a cocktail (or delayed alcohol-induced) headache, the pain must start within three hours of drinking.
• As we discussed earlier, not everyone is prone to alcohol-related headaches.
• Although one might feel relaxed and happy after a few drinks, the after-effects are visible soon after that.
• As dehydration can cause headaches, staying hydrated when consuming alcohol is key.
• Essentially, the duration depends on a number of factors, including how much alcohol was consumed, how long the drinking session was, and how much water was consumed.
• This kind of headache, also known as a hangover, usually occurs 5-12 hours after consuming beer or any other alcoholic beverage.

Choose light-colored drinks

Just like food triggers, alcohol headache triggers are individual, varying from person to person. Tracking your own patterns may allow you to enjoy the party after all. All beers contain alcohol, although the amount of alcohol present varies from beer to beer. The alcohol content in beer is determined by the brewer and ranges from as little as 0. Dehydration can cause headaches due to the lack of fluids in the body. Alcohol can also disrupt the natural balance of some of the body’s chemicals, such as serotonin and dopamine, which can lead to headaches and other unpleasant feelings.

Does alcohol trigger a headache?

In fact, in one large survey on cluster headaches, beer was the most common culprit of all alcoholic drinks. As we have discovered from looking at the why does my head hurt after drinking beer types of alcohol-induced headaches, you may experience one from as little as three hours after drinking alcohol. The main ingredient in alcohol that is responsible for a sore head is ethanol. There are a variety of reasons why this potent chemical can cause a headache such as its ability to dilate the blood vessels. Alcohol is a diuretic, causing the body to lose vital salts and minerals which help it to function.

It may worsen with physical activity and can last up to 72 hours. A person should eat bland carbohydrates, such as toast, to minimize nausea, improve energy levels, and help return blood sugar to normal. Taking preventative measures is the best way to stop a hangover headache before it ever starts. Ethanol’s diuretic effects can also quickly dehydrate you, and a headache is just one of many symptoms of dehydration. Not everyone feels the same effects of their drinking the morning after.

When this happens and your https://ecosoberhouse.com/ body can’t break it down fast enough, you can get a headache. Additionally, tyramine can make your blood pressure go up, and one main symptom of high blood pressure is a pounding headache. Migraine Again follows strict sourcing guidelines to ensure the accuracy of its content, outlined in our editorial policy. We use only trustworthy sources, including peer-reviewed studies, board-certified medical experts, patients with lived experience, and information from top institutions.

Hangover Headache Treatment

• As a result, a female’s blood alcohol concentration tends to be higher, making it more likely for females to experience headaches and hangovers.
• That said, broadly speaking, clear spirits like vodka are considered the least likely to cause a hangover and thus result in an alcohol-induced headache compared with darker drinks.
• Dehydration, a change in the balance of body water and essential nutrients, results.
• A 2014 study from the Center for Weight and Health at UC Berkeley found that fitness drinks like Gatorade were better for quick hydration after intense exercise.
• There are a variety of compounds in alcohol that can cause post-alcohol related headaches.

There are multiple ways in which you can prevent and heal an alcohol-induced headache using natural remedies. Whilst all types of alcohol stand to cause some sort of headache, there may be types that you find you tolerate better than others. This can differ for each person and whilst one may find that spirits cause a headache, another may find that lager doesn’t agree with them. It has been seen in many studies all over the world that one-third of those who suffer from regular migraines have noted that alcohol is one of the main things to trigger them off. An alcohol-induced headache may fall into many categories and whilst they are painful and unpleasant, there are things that can be done to relieve the symptoms. One 2019 article published in BMJ Case Report describes the case of a 32-year man with a two-month history of progressively worsening lower back pain.

In fact, your genes alone account for nearly half of the variables that contribute to how your body reacts to alcohol. This is because distilled, dark-colored drinks like whiskey, bourbon, and brandy contain large amounts of congeners. Never take acetaminophen (Tylenol) when you drink or when you’re hungover. Acetaminophen makes it harder for your body Alcoholics Anonymous to process alcohol and can damage your liver. It’s easy to find tons of purported hangover headache “cures” that you can make at home and even buy in stores.