Not in my life ever before have I been a verifiable victim of hiccups. Once upon a time, years ago, one of my high school students had them, day-in and day-out, I remember. Couldn't shake 'em, went to the doctor with 'em, kept getting 'em. But while I've never had any more than the number most humans are alloted in a lifetime, I got them in spades on Saturday night--couldn't shake 'em, kept getting 'em. Even after they'd die for an hour of sweet peace, they'd come storming back.
Middle of the night they attacked once again, enough to wake me up, bouncing the bed; so I went downstairs to the doctor, which is to say, the internet, and googled "hiccups," which brought me to a monster of a sight called "WebMD" and 12 full pages of info on something called GERD, most of which I read and determined, perhaps wrongly, might have been the culprit. Don't know, for sure, but I came away from that site with yet another chronic condition to add to my rapidly growing list. Meantime, those blasted hiccups and the sour stomach they weren't helping were still in heathenish attack mode.
Googled again, and found a web page from some guy who says he doesn't know how and doesn't know why, but a little procedure he knows works--30-seconds, no props: take a huge breath, hold it, then swallow, then repeat, holding your breath as long as you can.
Which I did, forthwith.
Voila. End of hiccups. I'm not kidding. Immediately. Well, maybe thirty seconds later.
When they returned--and they did--me and my steeply inflated lungs vanquished them again, at least two or three more times with the blessed thirty-second cure.
Folk medicine maybe--who knows? But goodness me, it worked. No, it works.
So this morning, I'm thankful for some guy named Kevin Dommer, who laid out the means to an end for which I was desperate, and, at the bottom of his web page, related this horror story: "The Guinness World Record for the longest continuous bout of hiccups is held by Charles Osborne from Anthon, Iowa. The hiccups started in 1922 at a rate of 40 times per minute, slowing to 20 times per minute, and eventually stopping in 1990. 68 years of hiccups!"
Sheesh. Anthon, Iowa, is not too far away. Thank goodness too, I'm not going for the record.
This morning's thanks? The virtual end of hiccups.
Middle of the night they attacked once again, enough to wake me up, bouncing the bed; so I went downstairs to the doctor, which is to say, the internet, and googled "hiccups," which brought me to a monster of a sight called "WebMD" and 12 full pages of info on something called GERD, most of which I read and determined, perhaps wrongly, might have been the culprit. Don't know, for sure, but I came away from that site with yet another chronic condition to add to my rapidly growing list. Meantime, those blasted hiccups and the sour stomach they weren't helping were still in heathenish attack mode.
Googled again, and found a web page from some guy who says he doesn't know how and doesn't know why, but a little procedure he knows works--30-seconds, no props: take a huge breath, hold it, then swallow, then repeat, holding your breath as long as you can.
Which I did, forthwith.
Voila. End of hiccups. I'm not kidding. Immediately. Well, maybe thirty seconds later.
When they returned--and they did--me and my steeply inflated lungs vanquished them again, at least two or three more times with the blessed thirty-second cure.
Folk medicine maybe--who knows? But goodness me, it worked. No, it works.
So this morning, I'm thankful for some guy named Kevin Dommer, who laid out the means to an end for which I was desperate, and, at the bottom of his web page, related this horror story: "The Guinness World Record for the longest continuous bout of hiccups is held by Charles Osborne from Anthon, Iowa. The hiccups started in 1922 at a rate of 40 times per minute, slowing to 20 times per minute, and eventually stopping in 1990. 68 years of hiccups!"
Sheesh. Anthon, Iowa, is not too far away. Thank goodness too, I'm not going for the record.
This morning's thanks? The virtual end of hiccups.
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