Sam Sinfield

Following on from previous posts (alcohol and memory loss and back to old habits), I have been researching the phenomenon of alcohol-induced black-outs. A couple of weeks ago, I proposed the theorem that the degree of memory loss is directly related to the type of alcoholic drink consumed and used myself, of course as the test subject.

After a good night out with all (most) of my colleagues from work, and having a decent meal before drinking, I spent all night drinking vodka and red bull and putting my theory to the test. I drank shit loads of vodka and red bull and can remember most of the night, to a point. It then becomes a bit sketchy after about midnight. I didn’t have complete memory loss, probably about 60% memory loss. My memory came back 100% after about 4am.

I therefore revise my theory about the type of drink directly affecting your degree of memory loss and amend it to the type of drink affects how drunk you get, and this isn’t necessarily linearly related to the percentage of alcohol in that drink. How drunk you are, and also how tired you are, are directly related to the degree of memory loss.

If you don’t want to suffer from alcohol-induced black-outs, my advice would be:

1. prepare for a big night out several days before by getting loads of sleep and adjusting your sleep routine as much as you can so you’re used to staying up late.
2. Have a medium sized meal before you go out, not too much though. A high carb meal is a good choice, such as pasta or rice.
3. Drink slowly during the night, I know you’ve heard it a million times before, but you have to pace yourself and try to drink the odd soft drink. Remember, a forgotten night is a wasted night!
4. If you think you’re approaching the black-out limit, test yourself by trying to remember what happened 15 minutes ago. If you don’t care, you’ve probably drunk too much!!
5. If you’ve hit the black-out limit, it’s not necessarily time to go home. Bring yourself back to under the limit by drinking a couple of cans of red bull, slowly, with no vodka in, it might be difficult, but it still tastes good, especially with lots of ice.

Remember, the best nights out are ones where you are slightly drunk but still have full control over your actions and your memory. If you can’t remember the whole night, not only is it a waste of money getting to that point, it is a waste of time. That’s time out of your life. Time that you can’t get back. It really isn’t worth it!