After an exhausting week of classes, it’s time to unwind. How do most college students relax on a Friday night? For me, it usually includes hanging out with my friends, a few glasses of wine, and a couple of parties. For others, it’s slamming shots, chugging beers and waking up the next morning not entirely sure of how you got home.

Now, I am not saying that all college students are complete drunkards, but the fact is, most college students drink alcohol. Drinking alcohol is a part of the college experience, but that doesn’t mean that you should drink yourself under the table: it’s just not classy.  Here are my tried and true tips for not getting too drunk and maintaining some of your dignity:

Eat something before you drink. You do not need to stuff yourself, but try to eat a little something before you start drinking. Carbohydrates and healthy fats, like mixed nuts or a slice of whole wheat bread with peanut butter, are your best bet. Eating will slow down the rate your body absorbs the alcohol into your blood stream, and will help you better control the amount you consume. Read the rest of this entry »

Most students think that college is the time to party. You may have fewer commitments, more leisure time and no parental guidance; that sounds like an awesome time, right? Well living it up in college doesn’t necessarily mean you have to spend it binge drinking. Sure, that peer pressure mom warned you about is tough to ignore in college. Plus, some parties can be socially awkward, and you may cling to the beer can to become more outgoing. While heavy drinking may seem like a necessary college pastime, it comes with several risks:

Your wallet: you probably thought it was just the books and tuition that broke your bank, but you can plan on spending $25 to $50 a night boozing it up at a club.

Weight gain: If you’re trying to lose the “freshman 15”, binge drinking isn’t going to help. There’s roughly 750 calories in 5 cans of beer and 2500 in 5 margaritas. Read the rest of this entry »

In the United States, an estimated 50,000 cases of alcohol poisoning are reported each year, and approximately once every week, someone dies from this preventable condition.

Excessive or binge drinking is the most common cause of alcohol poisoning, and it is one of the most dangerous activities a college student can do. Binge drinking is defined as drinking five or more drinks in a row. Drinking too much too quickly can affect your heart rate, your breathing pattern and your mental and physical coordination.

Whether it’s you who has consumed too much or your roommate, here is what you need to know about alcohol poisoning. Read the rest of this entry »

In a world where drinking is common and prevalent, parents might be relieved to find that college student drinking week after week has started to bore some students. Rather than pick up another hobby to occupy their past times, students have embraced, developed and created drinking games.

Here is a list of some of the most popular ones:

• Beer Pong: 4 players per game acquire a pitcher of beer or alcohol and a long table with 12 classic drinking game red plastic cups that are set up on at the end of the table on either side in a triangle formation (similar to bowling pins). Each player tries to toss a ping pong ball into the opposing team’s cup and if they get it in, the other team must remove that cup, drink its contents, and the game is over when one team’s cups are completely gone and drank. When a player gets a ball into a cup, they get to shoot again until they miss. Beer pong is the most popular game on campuses. Read the rest of this entry »

You may not have heard the term “drunkorexia” before, but it’s likely that you’ve witnessed some of its symptoms. Binge drinking is on the rise on college campuses, while the pressure for young women to be thin is just as high as ever. Drunkorexia combines symptoms of alcoholism, bulimia and anorexia, all under the guise of a glamorous party-girl lifestyle.

“When I was a freshman, my roommate and I would consume less than 300 calories on days that we were going to go out drinking,” one Harvard student told HerCampus.com. “We would eat egg whites for breakfast and then a vegan boca burger with mustard and no bun for lunch and dinner. We would also only drink water and black coffee. We would eat our meals together and encourage each other not to eat anything else. I cringe now thinking about it.”
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Unsurprisingly, college students still drink. But shockingly, a recent report found that colleges are doing little to stop them.

Toben Nelson, with the University of Minnesota, and his colleagues found that merely two percent of businesses increased alcohol prices in college communities, only 7 percent limited the number of alcohol outlets, only 15 percent mandated server training and only one-third executed compliance checks for underage purchasers.

Nelson studied 351 college administrators’ responses to an online questionnaire. When administrators were asked whether they had followed the U.S.’s National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism’s 2002 recommendations on lessening college drinking, the study found that few colleges were in complete compliance.

Nelson found that there was “very little action on the task force recommendations and very little implementation.” He also said in a news release that “very few had even had conversations in the communities.” Read the rest of this entry »

Vodka infused watermelon

While most of the time college students are slaving away studying in the library, there are the chosen few nights when students are able to let loose, get wasted and wake up with a hangover and use the excuse: “…it’s OK, I’m in college.”

In a place where complete and utter incoherent intoxication is not really frowned upon it comes as no surprise that the art of creatively consuming alcoholic beverages has peaked on university campuses.

Here are some popular drinks that are cheap, quick and easy to prepare for an impromptu party:

• Hunch Punch: ¾ fruit punch and ¼ grain alcohol

• Irish Car Bomb: 3/4 pint Guinness® stout, 1/2 shot Bailey’s® Irish cream, 1/2 shot Jameson® Irish whiskey Read the rest of this entry »

Hangovers happen, and not only on Sunday mornings either. For the days when sleeping off the headache and nausea isn’t an option here are some handy and healthy hangover cures. Just turn on the juicer.

1. Tomato Tune-Up
Toss 5 medium tomatoes, 2 cups of chopped cabbage and a large handful of fresh parsley into a juicer. Garnish with a stick of celery.

2. Fruit Freshener
This drink is particularly good for your liver, which will need a little love after a hard night of drinking. Juice 1 cup of red grapes, 3/4 cup of chopped beet and 2 plums. Pour mixture over ice.

3. Apple Care
Alternately juice 1 and 3/4 cup of broccoli with 2 apples and 5 and a 1/2 cups of raw spinach, so that the juicer doesn’t get clogged with leaves. If the juice is too sweet for your taste, add some water.
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Early this month, Damon Evans, the athletic director of the University of Georgia, was arrested for drunk driving as he was swerving in and out of lanes along Atlanta’s roads.

“As I sit before all of you, I am very ashamed and embarrassed by my actions,” Evans said at a news conference. “I let this university down, I let my family down, I let the Bulldog nation down. I believe my actions have put a black cloud over our program. I never thought I would bring so much shame to this storied university.”

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According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), cigarette smoking is at its lowest among students in high school since the survey began in 1975. The survey samples students in 8th, 10th, and 12th grades, and gathers data about the type and frequency of drug use. The study, which aims to track teenage substance abuse, is conducted by the University of Michigan’s Institute for Social Research.

Other findings include a decline in methamphetamine, amphetamines and cocaine between 2004 and 2009. In 2009, 12th graders reported declines in the use of hallucinogens, particularly LSD. The use of marijuana has plateaued, with reported use by 11.8% of 8th graders, 26.7 percent of 10th graders and 12th graders. Read the rest of this entry »