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The reasons for overeating today can be very different: starting with the fast pace of life, which is accompanied by wrong eating habits, and skipping meals, as well as the overemphasis on appearance and figure in the current era of social media. In order to look slim, various extremes are taken, starting with miracle diets and ending with starvation. However, such behaviors can very easily lead to bouts of overeating. As a rule, food cravings become more frequent and intensify and bring with them an increasingly bad hangover.¹

The purpose of this report is to examine what overeating and the associated hangover are, how these two affect our bodies and how to avoid them.
Overeating is the consumption of excess energy, taking into account the energy expended by a person, which usually results in weight gain and obesity. Overeating can also lead to a severe mental disorder in the form of various eating disorders such as anorexia, bulimia, etc., but this is not always the case. In simple terms, overeating means inadequate consumption of food, resulting in unpleasant and difficult state and feeling.²

Overeaters usually use food to comfort themselves and relieve stress. Generally, such people suffer from depression and feel helpless.²

Everyone has heard the expression “food hangover”, but does it really exist? It has been studied by scientists that a food hangover, otherwise known as post-meal sleepiness, does exist.³
A hangover, or postprandial sleepiness, is a condition that occurs after a large meal and is usually described as extreme tiredness and feeling unwell that can last for several hours.⁴

As a rule, a hangover caused by overeating is also accompanied by laziness, a feeling of heaviness in the stomach, bloating and sometimes nausea.⁴

There are different theories about what causes hangover. Scientists have been studying this condition for years, but opinions differ and there is no consensus. Below are the two most popular theories of how a hangover occurs.⁴

Many people have experienced hangover-like feelings like tiredness, sluggishness, malaise, and maybe even nausea after a big feast. Many nutrition experts attribute the post-meal slump to the high tryptophan content of the food.⁵

Tryptophan is an essential amino acid found in certain meat and dairy products. Tryptophan is a precursor for serotonin, niacin and indole-3-acetic acid.⁶

When tryptophan-rich foods are consumed with carbohydrate-rich foods (such as mashed potatoes), it easily enters the brain and serotonin levels increase. Serotonin is a neurotransmitter that reduces arousal, which is why a person feels sluggish and tired after eating because serotonin levels are elevated.⁵

Some health experts say that postprandial sleepiness is caused by a change in blood flow. Specifically, some of the blood flow meant for the brain is diverted to the digestive system. Some researchers explain this by saying that eating activates your parasympathetic nervous system.⁷

The parasympathetic nervous system regulates certain functions in the body, such as slowing the heart rate and regulating blood pressure and digestion. The parasympathetic nervous system is triggered when the stomach expands from eating a large meal. As a result, blood flow is directed more to the working digestive organs and less to the brain. This slight abnormality in blood flow can cause drowsiness and fatigue.<sup7
There are many ways to avoid overeating and the accompanying hangover.