When I was wee, hosting birthday parties was taken seriously. Preparations involved, among other things, blowing up 40-50 balloons, a task performed by my brother and me. While doing our job, invariably we would develop a bad, achy pain in our jaws and/or cheeks (PBICP).
Has anyone else experienced this?? Any insights into why this causes pain?
Well…sometimes I get the menstrual cramps real hard–Raising Arizona
such a constant inflation of the cheeks is surely to stretch the tissue, and cause longterm effects. i suggest water sports.
luke… i am your sperm donor.
But that’s not the kind of pain it is. It’s not stretchy pain, and it’s not exactly in the cheeks. Maybe it’s closer to call it post-balloon inflation jaw joint soreness(PBIJJS)–This is getting longer.
the jaw is a fragil bone, as the collarbone is. the position you put it in while blowing a baloon is very un-natural. i can remember my father telling me stories of people who would go to parties to blow up baloons (before they had legally-distributal helium tanks) complaining of jaw/neck pain. it’s a very un-natural, and should be VERY UNCOMFORTABLE1 position to put your jaw in that much.
Maybe you’re onto something qbert with jaw position. Let me tell you my pet theory about this and see what you think.
One of the salivary glands (the parotid)is in the vicinity of the jaw joint. It has a duct which leads into the mouth. I think that the elevated air pressure in the mouth when inflating balloons leads to air tracking back into the parotid via the parotid duct. The air in the parotid stretches it and this causes pain.
Try the site How working with balloons impacts health
We used to call it “blower’s cramp.”
Your brain-in-a-jar,
Myron
Imbibo, ergo sum.