What caused this out of the blue immediate vomiting reaction? Food or something else?

In My Humble Opinion (IMHO)
#1

Last night I had a somewhat scary episode. I had eaten a few bites of a pasta and chicken spaghetti dish when I almost immediately felt nauseous and starting throwing up. It was frightening and disorienting because I almost never throw up except to rare occasions when I get a bad flu or stomach bug, or in my 20’s once or twice when I drank way too much. I am not picky eater and have never, so far as I know, thrown up just from disagreeable food.

This came on out of the blue about a minute after starting to eat and it wasn’t the all in, stomach emptying flu bug/food poisoning type reaction. I had 4 smallish vomiting episodes over the next 20 minutes basically dumping out what was in my throat and upper stomach and then it kind of went away. I’m still kind of weirded out, but I have no oncoming bug or flu symptoms this morning and ate a normal breakfast. I have never had this happen before, ever.

Two things about the meal that were a little different. The pasta, chicken spaghetti I cooked were leftovers that has sat in a pan most of the previous afternoon and night before being put in the fridge and I had an accident where the coarse salt grinder malfunctioned as I was putting some salt into the dish as it was reheated cooked and dumped about 3 -4 times the normal about of salt in the dish. It was more salt than usual but not inedibly so.

I can’t see food poisoning as the food was in my body less than a minute or two before the vomiting began. Will too much salt cause this kind of reaction?

Still kind of freaked out.

#2

I’ve had two episodes of something similar happening to me, and both times involved me using the coarse sea salt grinder. The third time I finally figured out why it was happening, and I quick drank a tall glass of water and the need to vomit went away. I quit using the coarse salt grinder after that.

#3

Anyone else eat the same dish?

#4

Yeah it dumped a bunch of sizeable little cubes in. I stirred them around to dissolve but they may still have been big pieces by the time I started eating a minute or two later. I wonder if big hunk of salt starts dissolving in your esophagus against the surrounding tissue if it would cause the reaction?

#5

I’m sure there’s no reason to become alarmed, and I hope the OP enjoys the rest of his meal…
By the way, is there anyone on board who knows how to fly a plane?

#6

No just me. I had eaten the same dish the night before with no issues. I added a can of tomatoes to expand the leftover volume and reheated. In thinking about it with the salt in the original cooking and then the salt accident in re-heating I had way too much salt in that dish. On the other hand I have eaten super salty Marmite. it was disgusting but did not make me throw up.

#7

In antiquity drinking salt water was a method to induce vomiting, FWIW.

#8

One summer, we were made to take salt tablets, as kids. Immediate reaction was powerful urge to vomit. So. . . .

#9

I take salt tablets during the summer, and salt my food liberally all the time, because I tend towards hyponatremia, as do some members of my dad’s side of the family. He’s actually been hospitalized a couple times due to this. I always take them with a full glass of water, and have never had any tummy issues as a result.

I’m guessing that there was something in that food that the OP’s stomach immediately recognized as something that was not supposed to be there.

#10

That’s WAY too long to leave food out. Should be NO MORE than two hours.

#11

Depends on the food. Egg salad you don’t want sitting out, a high acid food like spaghetti sauce can sit for a number of hours in big pot as it cools with no issues.

#12

Yeah, the big chunks of salt. I almost guarantee that this was a case of the astro getting too much salt into his system too fast. Or, as he mentioned, maybe it was the dissolving of the salt chunks in his throat that caused it. Either way, this was a coarse ground salt issue.

#13

Now I’m scared of coarse salt. Just a well it didn’t taste different it was mainly the esthetic of the crunchy act of grinding of the salt I liked.

#14

Don’t eat alone. It makes a diagnosis difficult.