morning after, the

A hangover. A: "Ugh, I feel so sick." B: "Sounds like the morning after the night before to me. Weren't you out at the bar last night?"

a hangover; the feelings associated with having drunk too much alcohol. Do worries about the morning after keep you from having a good time at parties? She's suffering from the morning after the night before.

The unpleasant results of an earlier activity, especially overindulgence in alcohol. For example, A headache is just one of the symptoms of the morning after. This expression originated in the late 1800s as a synonym for a hangover (and was often put as the morning after the night before). By the mid-1900s, however, it was also being used more loosely for the aftereffects of staying up late.

The generally unpleasant consequences of a previous action or activity. The term originated in the late nineteenth century and at first referred exclusively to the aftereffects of a drinking bout; it often was put as the morning after the night before. By the mid-twentieth century it had been extended to include the consequences of any prior action, although it retained the negative implications of a hangover. It is also used in the colloquial name for an oral contraceptive taken after intercourse has occurred, the morning-after pill.