Life

6 Super Bowl Hangovers Everyone Will Experience

by Karen Datangel

Forget football — whether you love it, hate it, or don't care about the sport, you can love Super Bowl Sunday for uniting Americans through food, booze, and partying. Just how big is Super Bowl Sunday? According to USA Today, this is the biggest day of the year for pizza sales, and about 1.23 billion chicken wings were consumed on this day in 2013 alone. Additionally, 50 million cases of beer are chugged and roughly 7 million people call in sick the following Monday. Seriously, why can't we just make Super Bowl Monday a holiday already?

It's no wonder that while the revelry is fun, there's hell to pay once it's all over. People eat and drink too much, and the most hardcore football fans — particularly fans of the teams playing in the big game — get too emotionally invested and either celebrate the victory or mourn the loss. On a much more serious note, the extreme amount of alcohol consumed on Super Bowl Sunday leads to more booze-related carelessness on the road. In 2010, 40 percent of the motor vehicle fatalities that occurred nationwide on Super Bowl Sunday were tied to drunk driving, and according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, that's 10 percentage points more than average for DUIs that year. Seriously folks, party hearty, but please be careful and smart about the alcohol and driving.

If you're feeling terrible (or actually feeling really good) the day after the Super Bowl, I can bet your hangover is related to one of these six things. What do you think yours will be?

1. The "I ate so many buffalo wings and other terrible food things I might die" hangover

Greasy food and snacks of both the savory and sweet variety can be so damn good, especially on a Sunday with any football game on TV. But if you pop in more chicken wings, cheesy nachos, or potato chips than you intended to, prepare yourself for some legit digestive discomfort. Honestly, any typical Super Bowl-related food out there looks like a fart attack waiting to happen.

2. The "football happiness" hangover

If you're a Patriots or Seahawks fan and your team wins the whole shindig, then lucky you — the party is just going to go on and on long after the game! This is actually the best kind of hangover to have, because in addition to the alcohol-related buzz, you'll feel absolutely euphoric with your team pride. Plus, if you're going to drink, it's probably most fun to drink out of celebration.

3. The "alcohol and crying-induced sore loser" hangover

On the other hand, if your team loses, the party will probably go on in a different direction as you drink your sorrows away. If you're the sensitive type, you'll even shed a few tears into your pint glass. This can lead to a hangover that not only kicks your ass physically, but drains your soul. Oh, sports... they just break your heart sometimes.

4. The "I drank too much just because" hangover

Just because you hate football or don't care about either of the teams playing doesn't mean you can't drink. To you, it's another Sunday Funday! Or maybe you're just giving in to peer pressure and increasing your alcohol intake for this special day. Either way, it's going to suck on Monday.

5. The "I drank too much because of a drinking game" hangover

You tried to play a Super Bowl drinking game, and you lost. Now you're going to feel like crap, and feel it all the way to the next day.

6. The "I can't get Katy Perry songs or Super Bowl commercial jingles out of my head" hangover

Love Katy Perry or not, there's no doubt that the pop starlet makes some of the catchiest tunes out there, and they're bound to get stuck in your head for a while after she performs at halftime. Or, there will probably be a song (original or not) in a commercial that just gets to you and stays lodged in your noggin for at least one more day. Before you know it, you'll be playing "Firework" and "Roar" on repeat and will probably make one of the songs your new ringtone. The music-related hangover is an in-between. It's not as harmful as food, drink, or sadness-related hangovers, and it's not as happy as a victory hangover, but it can definitely be the most annoying one to deal with.

Images: Giphy (6)