Sparked by today’s classic column…
For as long as I can remember I’ve had occasional sneezing ‘fits.’ I’ll be sitting, working quietly or just reading or watching tv, and I’ll sneeze. Then again. Over and over. Usually 5 or 6 times, but it’s been as many as nine (Yes, I count, what else can you do while sneezing?) And then it’s over until the next time. This happens maybe twice a month, but not on any regular schedule.
The thing is, this doesn’t seem to be related to anything else. Like I said, I’m generally sitting still indoors when it happens, so it’s not like I’ve suddenly stirred up dust. I have no allergies, not to food or drugs. I don’t react to pollen. It never develops into a cold and I have no other symptoms. For example, my nose doesn’t run before or during or afterwards, I don’t have a sore throat or any body pains at all. No fever. Nothing. I just sneeze like a maniac five or whatever times and then the last sneeze sort of aborts – you know, you inhale and inhale and inhale and then the urge to sneeze just vanishes. Sneezus Interruptus.
I don’t expect there’s a real answer to this mini-mystery but I was wondering if anyone else experiences this?
Has happened to me ~10 times in life. I usually have 5-10 seconds between sneezes and all have been >20 in a row. I remember unloading the dishwasher for several of the fits but certainly doesn’t happen every time that I do that. I have stopped them the last couple of time by either plunging my face into a bowl of water and holding my breath or just putting my face under the faucet and doing the same.
Afterwards I have the most incredible euphoric floating on air feeling- “drugged” does not even begin to describe it, but I don’t know if it is from rattling my brain, lack of O2, or something else.
Yes I can say I have it occasionally. I can sense it coming. There feels like something tickling my inner nasal cavity. It feels very good to repeat a few sneezes and clear the air. Sometimes it passes with no sneezes. When things come and go like this it suggests they are not serious.
My wife’s father used to have sneezing fits during the fifteen years I knew him. Curiosity got me to start counting. It was ALWAYS eleven sneezes in about 90 seconds.
He never knew we were counting, of course. We found it mildly amusing.
My personal record is 13. My grandma apparently did 17 in a row once. I can’t figure out a cause, either. Occasionally, it actually really hurts and I walk around with a sore rib cage for a day.
Yep, between 30 and 50 in a row with less than a 5-second interval between them. Very annoying. Happens in the late evening sometimes if I’m really worn out, other than that I haven’t been able to identify a stimulus.
Happens to me practically every time I sneeze these days. It generally feels like there’s something inside my nose tickling my sinuses when it happens, and sometimes I’ll sneeze and then sneeze again without sufficient time to breathe in between the sneezes. Last time that happened four times in a row and I thought I was going to asphyxiate before I was able to pull in some air, and the sneezing fit continued for another ten or so sneezes.
My sneezes are fairly explosive anyway, so doing them that many times in a row is just agonizing. My chest muscles are always really sore afterward.
