13 Sneezing Facts and the Scary Reason Why You Should Not Stop a Sneeze

9Your eyes automatically close

When you sneeze, your eyes will shut automatically because of the bodily signal to do so when a sneeze is emitted. This can never be helped because it is an involuntary action. 

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10You can’t sneeze in your sleep

The nerves that make you sneeze are usually at rest when sleeping. This is why you cannot sneeze when you are sleeping. 

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11The reason for multiple sneezes

This is something to do with irritants and allergies and many people experience this during seasonal changes due to the possibility of pollen allergies. Sneezing clears out the irritants from the nose and it usually doesn’t happen all at one go. It may take three or four times to clear your nose. 

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12This is why you should never hold up a sneeze

Although there aren’t many reports of people suffering severe implications from a sneeze, the fact that it can be serious if you stop one is TRUE!! Stopping a sneeze can actually rupture blood vessels in eyes and damage the blood vessels in the brain and eardrums. 

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13Here is what can happen

Do not have this misconception that it is polite to stifle a sneeze. For reasons of hygiene and etiquette, you can sneeze in your elbow or a handkerchief but stifling one is dangerous. Among sneezing facts, he most famous incident is of a 34-year-old man who tried stopping his sneeze but ended up rupturing his throat instead. He was taken to hospital as an emergency case being unable to swallow or speak because he had clamped his mouth and nose shut to stifle a sneeze. Doctors even heard popping noises of air bubbles that had travelled all the way back down his neck to the muscle of the rib cage. Doctors attending the man at the University Hospitals of Leicester released full details of the man’s condition to warn others how stopping a sneeze can be extremely dangerous. His condition was similar to Boerhaave's syndrome which tears the esophagus because of intense vomiting.

Said doctor Wanding Yang who authored a study to the effect “Halting sneezing via blocking the nostrils and mouth is a dangerous maneuver, and should be avoided," said Dr Wanding Yang, "It may lead to numerous complications, such as pneumomediastinum (air trapped in the chest between both lungs), perforation of the tympanic membrane (perforated eardrum), and even rupture of a cerebral aneurysm (ballooning blood vessel in the brain)." 

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