Will my head explode if I hold in my sneezes?

Question

Does it take years off your life and/or does it kill brain cells

Answer 1

I have searched through the literature using both Ovid and MD Consult (two great resources for sorting through medical literature) and have come up with nothing relating the force of a held-in sneeze to pressure damage in the head. The only organ I would be worried about is the tympanic membrane (ear drum) which could be reached by way of the eustachian tubes. (It is through these tubes that the bacteria causing inner ear infections travel.)

In the literature, there is reference to the bursting of tympanic membranes by rapid changes in pressure, but these pressures have only been reached by explosions occurring near the head and by changing depth quickly in SCUBA diving.

Of course, just because it might never have happened before doesn't mean that you couldn't be the first person to pop your ear open by holding back a sneeze!

Answer 2

No, of course not. Those are just stupid.

However, if you sneeze and didn't instinctively close your eyes, your eyeballs could pop out. Not shooting across the room, of course, but at least popping them out of the socket.

I think a sneeze can travel at about 500mph, so it's best to just let it go rather than hold it in. Look that up though, because I can't remember if that was the number I was told or it was something else.

Answer 3

The chances of your getting a brain aneurysm from a sneeze, stifled or otherwise, are pretty slim.

But it could happen.

The peril isn't strictly from containing a sneeze, although this does present some danger. Judging from the case file, you're equally or more at risk from giving your sneezes full vent. Some cautionary tales:

A 64-year-old man repeatedly experienced severe headaches after sneezing heavily, followed by slurred speech and weakness on his right side. On examination he was found to have two cerebral arterial aneurysms--that is to say, two weakened, enlarged blood vessels in his brain--both as yet unruptured, luckily for him.
"After a violent sneeze, a previously healthy 35-year-old man had severe left-side neck pain lasting ten minutes," we read. He developed partial paralysis and sensory loss on his left side, plus other symptoms. After tests the doctors decided he had "unilateral upper cervical posterior spinal artery syndrome," a seven-word noun phrase that's about as close as you can get to German and still be speaking English. To put it in simpler terms, an aneurysm in the neck following the sneeze probably led to a loss of blood flow to part of the spinal cord, causing nerve problems.
It's not just sneezing that'll do you in, either. Check out this one:

A 48-year-old woman was hospitalized with blurred vision and partial right-side paralysis. For a time she had been unable to speak. Upon operating, surgeons found and repaired a three-centimeter-wide aneurysm on her carotid artery. What had she done to trigger the episode? She'd blown her nose, forcefully and repeatedly.
You're thinking: cheezit, if I so much as cough my brain is going to explode like a water balloon. Relax--only a handful of sneeze-related aneurysms have been reported in the medical literature. Moreover, it appears that sneezing per se won't cause an aneurysm in someone who previously didn't have one. But the sharp head and neck movements accompanying a violent sneeze may cause the inner and outer walls of a blood vessel to tear loose from one another, an event known as a "dissecting aneurysm." Or a sneeze may stir up trouble with a preexisting aneurysm--either it ruptures (although I know of no cases in which this resulted directly from a sneeze) or debris within the aneurysm can block the flow of blood to the brain or other vital organ.

Is suppressing a sneeze bad? Could be, due to something called the Valsalva maneuver, better known as a way of relieving pain in the ears caused by a rapid change in elevation. While pinching your nostrils shut, you blow into your nose hard. This opens the Eustachian tubes connecting your inner ear with your throat and equalizes the pressure on either side of your eardrums. But because the Valsalva maneuver increases pressure in the chest, it also briefly blocks the blood flow entering the heart, causing a sharp fluctuation in blood pressure. Conceivably this could cause an aneurysm to rupture. You're performing the Valsalva maneuver when you contain a sneeze, but the same pressure spike can occur during an especially violent sneeze, nose blowing, etc. So while your efforts to be ladylike could be harmful, Miss Atomic Sneezer may not be doing herself any favors either. We won't know till one of you tries it and winds up in the ER.

Answer 4

your head may not explode but your ears can explode if you hold your sneezes

Answer 5

Yes all of the above, in fact if you sneeze more than 100 times in a year you will die of sneeze exhaustion.


What can I say--silly answer for a silly question.

Answer 6

it wont make your head explode but i have heard that can kill brain cells dont knowif true or not . my friends grandpa broke his neck by sneezing to hard so it is something to careful about.

Answer 7

Your head will not explode, but you will cause damage to your ears with the excess pressure.

Answer 8

i don't think ur head will explode, but i know you can hurt your eardrums holding it in like that.

Answer 9

Your head won't burst, but your eardrums might.

Answer 10

Yes, and you will get your brains everywhere. It will be disgusting and your loved ones will have to clean it up! Don't do that to them, just cover your mouth.