As the title says. When you go on vertical drop roller coasters or big bumps in the road, is there any way to minimise the sinking feeling? I’m pretty sure tensing stomach muscles don’t do anything to help…
I know it sounds simple, but it works for me.
Lean forward.
I found if I lean back, the sensation is strong, but if I lean forward (like I’m going to attack a steep ski slope), the sensation almost goes away. Anyway, works for me.
J.
I shall try that in a car, but what about roller coasters where the safety holder thing is over your head and chest so you can’t lean forward?
Yep, most of the best roller coasters have the full-body harness dealies, so you can’t really move at all. There are exceptions though - one of my favorite roller coasters ever is the Millennium Force at Cedar Point, Ohio, and it just has the standard seat belt and lap bar. When you go down the 300 foot near-vertical drop, it feels like you’re going to fall out. It’s awesome.
Personally, I wouldn’t want to reduce the upside-down stomach feeling - that’s my favorite part! 
Patient: “Doctor, it feels really uncomfortable whenever I do this.”
Doctor: “Well then, don’t do that.”
In all seriousness, exposing yourself to that type of thing a lot will help you learn to enjoy the feeling. I am a perpetual flight student and I find rapid falls to be moderately orgasmic now whereas I was petrified of them as a kid. Hop right back in that line.
Mini-hijack: Does one get the same sinking feeling when one jumps off the plane for a sky dive? And if so, does it last all the way until the chute opens?
I’ve always wanted to know. Thanks, and sorry for the hijack.
No. You get out of a plane at about 100mph which is pretty close to terminal velocity (about 110-120mph). Your speed doesn’t change that much although the direction does (from horizontal to vertical). The only time I’ve ever felt that stomach-dropping sensation was when I jumped out of something that wasn’t moving much, including hot-air balloons and helicopters.
It’s unnerving the first time you do it (as a skydiver) since we’re used to a lot of wind noise and plenty of control (due to the relative wind). When it’s dead quiet and the first couple of seconds are at low enough speed that you just kinda flail around there’s a bit of a “Woah!” sensation.
As far as I know the “falling feeling” is your guts sloshing around a little bit (our torso is not a rigid body) so tightening your muscles will help a bit but you can’t prevent it altogether. Like Shagnasty said, embrace the sensation - I love that first drop on a big roller coaster.
I remember reading somewhere that astronauts experience that feeling all the time, when they are in (subjective) zero G, but that they just have to learn to live with it. Is that actually true?
It sounds like it would make sense, no gravity to keep their innards down. Gosh, how horrible that must be lol.
Yes, it’s true for astronauts that are in orbit and it’s called free-fall. By very definition, object in orbit are constantly “falling”, it’s just that they have enough forward velocity that the Earth curves away as they fall. Essentially they’re just falling around the Earth.
It doesn’t apply to low/microgravity, although I can’t speak to whether the sensation is similar or not.
But yeah, when you see one of those videos of an astronaut on the space shuttle playing with blobs of floating water, they have that same feeling (but likely they’re just completely used to it).
Easy: Exhale big and strong.
I went from hating everything from the log flume to mini-coasters. Oh boy…that feelking in my stomache!
Since I used the ‘exhale strong’ technique, I’ve been on everything I can get to. My latest was about a dozen runs around the Incredible Hulk coaster at Uniersal Studios. A vendor rented the Superhero island area for us, and I did that coaster at least a dozen times.
Take healthy breaths in, then just push it out like you are blowing out a huge candle.
Spinning note: Spinning never bothered me to any degree I could push myself, but that stomache feeling kept me off so many rides for decades. Exhale, good and strong!!! Changed my Amusement Park life!
I’m not sure what is your distinction between micrgravity and free fall (in practical terms, that is). A person inside a freely falling box does not subjectively experience gravity; such a person would not be able to tell the difference between falling, or being ‘weightless’ in deep space.
Also, Military Static Line jumps… they are done at pretty slow speed no matter what the vehicle. Helicopter jumps are especially slow, and the chute actually takes a couple seconds longer to deploy. But I get that rollercoaster-stomach feeling on every jump until the chute opens. Then it’s the “balls in a mousetrap” feeling the rest of the way down.
IMHO that feeling is not from the lack of gravity as much as from the change in gravity. When I went sky diving, that feeling went away after about five seconds. Being an astronaut is probably more like being underwater.
I don’t think so; whilst your body as a whole is floaty and buoyant underwater, inside your body, your organs are still affected by gravity; they are pulled down within your thorax and abdomen. In free fall or zero gravity, they’re not.
Again with skydiving, once you have reached terminal velocity, you’re not feeling the same sensation as you would be if you were in zero g or falling in a vacuum.
Although I think you probably have a point in that it’s the transition from not falling to falling that makes the most difference.