Wake Forest is an outstanding educational institution, but there are some lessons that students must learn outside of the classroom.

For Wake Forest students, one of these valuable lessons is dealing with the inevitable morning-after hangover. While your first hangover at Wake Forest may not be your first ever, knowing how to successfully manage your post-party blues will improve your weekends immensely.

1. Start your day

The morning after a night out at a fraternity party, Last Resort (LR) or an awesome pregame can be a hazy mess. Chances are that you’ll want to stay in bed forever, but unfortunately, you probably have things to do that day.

The first step to conquering a hangover is to get out of bed. Once you’re up, you can shower, get dressed and potentially rehash the hazy sequence of events from last night.

Don’t get back in bed until you’ve accomplished at least a few more steps.

2. Hydrate your body

While you might feel fully hydrated at 1:00 am, you won’t feel the same way at 10:00 am.

Staying hydrated is key to staving off hangovers, and luckily, Wake Forest has a lot of great beverage options.

The two PODs, Starbucks, dining halls and Benson all have a variety of drinks and smoothies that will quench your thirst and relieve your headache.

Stay away from caffeine, however; even though it sounds tempting, you’re far better off with Gatorade.

The other option is to go one for one during the party.

Having a glass or cup of water with every alcoholic drink you consume may seem can be tedious, but it’ll ensure that your headache the morning after is, at worst, manageable.

3. Get some food in your system

Possibly the best thing about Sundays at Wake Forest is the Pit breakfast. You can eat virtually any breakfast food you want until your hears content and your belly isn’t aching, and then you can go back and eat some more.

With the newly renovated breakfast bar in the Pit, you won’t need to go off campus for comfort food.

Unfortunately, Sunday is the one day a week that Chick-fil-A isn’t open, but Wake Forest has many great dining options to soothe a hangover.

4. Take some medicine

If food and drink aren’t helping your hangover, you can always take an Advil, Aleve or another OTC pain reliever.

Be careful, however, and always take it with food or a (non-alcoholic) drink.

5. Try to be productive

Once your hangover is starting to subside, you can start to think about being productive for the day.

This could mean finishing an assignment, going to the gym to get your blood moving, or running some errands.

Accomplishing even some basic tasks will make you feel much better about your day post-hangover.

6. Go back to sleep

When all else fails, napping off a late night out is the best way to get your body back on track.

You definitely need the sleep, and you can do all that homework later, when you can think without a headache.

Sometimes you can push through your hangover symptoms, but when you know that the quality of your work is suffering because of them, it’s best to call it quits and try again when you’re feeling better.

7. Just don’t drink

There’s only one foolproof way to avoid a hangover completely the day after a night out, and while it is not enticing for most students at Wake Forest, being the designated sober friend is sometimes a necessary role to play, for the sake of you and your friends. You’ll be revered by your friends for your responsible behavior and they will definitely owe you one next weekend.

While your hangover might seem like the end of the world when you stumble into the Pit, let yourself be comforted by knowing that you are definitely not alone on campus, and that nobody will judge you for breaking your “never drinking again” vows next Thursday.