We’ve decided to try taking on the mother of all
wine-related questions on the Ideal Wine Company blog. What causes wine to give
you a headache?
Everyone’s had a wine headache
We’ve all been there. Because
we’re a provider of luxury bottles from wine making regions around the world,
many of us at the Ideal Wine Company have certainly been there. What can we say, we love our product!
You wake up after a having a few
glasses of your favourite vino the night before only to find you have a
headache. A roaring headache. Nobody knows exactly why drinking certain wines
can give you a headache but everyone has wondered at some point or another why
they wake up with a banging head after a few glasses of their favourite
Burgundy.
Sulphites do not give you a wine headache
People generally fall into two
camps. They either believe that wine gives you a headache because it contains
sulphites or because you drank too much of it.
Let’s clear up a common
misconception right now. Wine does not give you a headache because it contains
sulphites. People associate sulphites with wine headaches because some people
react badly when they drink wine with sulphites in it. However they react badly
because they’re allergic to sulphites, not because they’re particularly known
to cause headaches.
Can wine give you a headache if you drink too much of it?
Now let’s tackle the other
theory. Wine can give you a headache because you drank too much of it. Is there
any truth to this claim?
Some. Basically wine, like all
alcohols, dehydrates your body. That’s why you feel ravenously thirsty whenever
you’re hung over. One of the side effects of dehydration is headaches. Ergo
sometimes you may be prone to develop a headache after a few glasses of wine if
you’ve not had any water to rehydrate your body afterwards.
Drink wine in moderation
Truthfully no-one is exactly sure
why wine can give you a headache sometimes. However it seems pretty safe to say
that the best way to prevent such a headache is to drink wine in moderation. ‘Everything
in moderation’ is the key to living a healthy life.
