Do we eat spiders in our sleep?

Question

First of all, no yes or no - I want this resolved, so credible sources, please.
A friend of mine says we average 4 nighttime spiders per year. Creepy, but nutritious. Any truth? Does anybody film and review themselves sleeping daily? 'Cause that sort of thing would be awesome for my curiosity.

Answer 1

NO, IT IS A URBAN LEGEND.

This very widespread urban legend has no basis in fact. It exists in various forms; another common version is that you swallow an average of 20 in your lifetime. (At 4 per year, that would make a very short lifetime of 5 years...) A correspondent in Pennsylvania had heard a version that involved swallowing a pound of spiders (while sleeping) in one's lifetime. (That would be over 20,000 average spiders, for a lifetime of 5,000 years at the 4 per year rate).

For a sleeping person to swallow even one live spider would involve so many highly unlikely circumstances that for practical purposes we can rule out the possibility. No such case is on formal record anywhere in scientific or medical literature. Since this page first appeared, I have heard from one person who found a small harmless spider hiding in her ear (which is possible), another who claimed to have had one in her nose (but had no evidence that it wasn't already in her hanky), and one who claimed that when she was a young child a spider leg was found by her lips. But not one person has claimed that a spider entered his or her mouth.

Answer 2

No, The fact is that Spiders are actually afraid of our breathing and would not crawl anywhere near your mouth so the only way for a to go into your mouth would be for it to lose it's grip so to speak and fall from the ceiling making a lucky shot. Other wise due to our movement while we sleep and our breathing keeps the spiders mostly on the out side of our bodies, however there have been accounts of people finding spiders in their ear. most recently a young boy was taken to the doctor with an earache and claiming he heard, what he described as, "Rice Krispies" sound in his ear. When his ears were flushed out two small spiders were washed out as well, one living and one dead. The sound the young boy heard was the spiders walking on his ear drum.

Here is an interview with an arachnid Expert to read very short but gets the point across:
http://www.brownreclusespider.org/eating-spiders-while-asleep-myth.htm

and if you want to read more about the boy with the spiders in his ear:
http://www.kgw.com/news-local/stories/kgw_050607_news_spider_earache.3faa8ff4.html

Answer 3

Me personally...I live right near a river so I have a lot of bugs (spiders included)...and in my humble opinion, I think your breathing would most likely put off any spider from entering your mouth. You also move around in your sleep, which would be enough to ensure that a spider wouldn't generally remain in close proximity to you....so the answer is....NO!

Answer 4

This Site Might Help You.

RE:
Do we eat spiders in our sleep?
First of all, no yes or no - I want this resolved, so credible sources, please.
A friend of mine says we average 4 nighttime spiders per year. Creepy, but nutritious. Any truth? Does anybody film and review themselves sleeping daily? 'Cause that sort of thing would be awesome for my...

Answer 5

I just read an artical about this and scientist say that because air is coming out of our mouths spiders do not want to crawl into them. Plus they say that since we move alot in our sleep that it would be difficult to get into our mouths anyway. But there is that slight chance but dont count on it.

Answer 6

When I eat a bug when I'm awake, I know it (when a gnat flies in there while you're talking), so I can't imagine I'd swallow a spider while asleep without waking up.

Answer 7

no we do not eat spiders in our sleep in fact that's a myth that as confirmed years ago

Answer 8

The Mad Scientist does not believe so. We move around too much while sleeping, our breathing is too disturbing and the likelihood of a spider triggering the swallowing reaction is unlikely.

Answer 9

No, we do not eat spiders in our sleep. Now, whether they crawl in your ear or something might be a different story, but very doubtful.....

Answer 10

so unlikely, if you have ever found a leg in your mouth when you woke up then you probably ate a spider but i have never heard of such a tale and i have never had something like that in my mouth so don't count on it. besides, spiders dont like movement and we move a lot in our sleep.