Our weird family fainting spells
Because we bloggers, at least some of the time, claim to be about “keeping it real”, I thought I’d tell you all about my rare and unusual medical condition. I’m actually quite sure this is on the list of things you shouldn’t blog about, but why let that stop me. For those with an interest in medical science, this post is for you.
I was reminded of this condition again recently because I have to do a refresher course on my first aid certificate, and I thought to myself ‘I hope I don’t faint in a can of coke this time’, because that is what happened three years ago.
It was a strange moment in my life – one minute I am tipping my head back to drink coke, next thing I know I am on the floor, in a pool of cake. Stranger still though is the fact that a girl who was also on the course came up to me and said ‘I know what that is – did that really hurt when you drank it?’ to which I replied ‘yes’ and then she said ‘It has happened to me before drinking soft drink’. And I am thinking ‘does the rest of the world know about this? Why has no one ever told me soft-drink can send you unconscious?’.
It turns out that this bizarre phenomenon is called swallow syncope (syncope basically meaning fainting), and is known to be associated with drinking cold carbonated beverages (see here, here and here). Those articles make it sound quite serious, in that drinking such cold beverages, particularly when tipping your head back as you do to drink out of can, can cause an atrioventricular block, which sounds like something you don’t want happening to your heart. (See after I had this episode I said to my Mum “you know how sometimes when you drink something cold it really hurts” and she said “no”. Hmmm. Turns out not everybody gets that.)
The most disturbing thing was realising that the fairly extreme but passing pain somewhere in the chest, which I have had occasionally without fainting and just kind of slumped over the kitchen bench wincing while everything went black for a few seconds, is actually such a thing. But it's caused by a complex oesophageal reflex (see the articles above if you care) and all you have to do is not drink really cold, especially carbonated, drinks (and it doesn’t mean anything is wrong with your heart otherwise).
Weirder still is that a few years ago one of my young cousins was causing the family some concern because occasionally when they were trying to get her ready for school she would just pass out. Turns out she has hair-grooming syncope, which is a condition where you can faint while someone is brushing your hair, caused by a neurocardiogenic reflex. Truly. This is a thing. Isn’t that weird?
The human body is a mysterious creation. That is all.