It's the day after Christmas. The presents have been opened. The food has been eaten. And most of you—some literally—have what I call the Christmas hangover.
It's a feeling where you got completely hyped up to open presents. You sang carols. You heard a thousand thousand Christmas songs in various states of remix on the radio. In fact, you might scream if you hear one more rendition of "I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas." (I might actually do that—don't test me.) For probably more than a month, you've been hyped for Christmas. Christmas came and went, and now the real world is back with a vengeance.
The symptoms of the Christmas hangover include a headache, dizziness, nausea, nostalgia, a pensive wistfulness, sensitivity to non-Christmas music (especially electronic music), and an empty wallet. Occasionally, there are intense flashbacks to the previous day.
Usually, these symptoms do not last longer than twenty-four hours. However, if a complete Christmas detox has had adverse effects and symptoms persist longer than three days, doctors suggest several major remedies: re-watching your favorite Christmas movie (but only once), listening to some more Christmas music, and maybe going to work so your wallet doesn't stay empty for too long. Unfortunately, these come with side effects.
Re-watching Christmas movies can occasionally worsen the regular symptoms of the Christmas hangover.
Listening to Christmas music and slowly weaning yourself off of it may ease the pain of the real world, but you may or may not get laughed at by anyone who finds out (depending on how much of a jerk your friends are).
Going to work has the side effect of actually making you money. There's not really a downside here so long as you don't overdose like this guy I knew named Ebenezer. Don't be like Ebenezer—then you won't like Christmas the next time it comes around!
Hope everyone had a merry Christmas! Don't have a Christmas hangover.
