r/mildyinteresting • u/regardkick • 28d ago

humankind hiccups 😅 Acid reflux can come out of your eyes.

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Kind of. Short story long.

I have Silent Reflux, it's like regular acid reflux but it fucks you up especially bad because it's basically the aerosol spray version of stomach acid and doesn't always show the same physiological damage like esophageal erosion or ulcers. So it can be missed on endoscopies and other tests (especially if you're fat because then that's obviously the problem.)

Depending on the force behind the reflux, the vapor could reach as high as the nasopharyngeal area (throat and nose area behind the dangly ball in your mouth), into the Eustachian tubes (ears), or through processes that are too complicated for me to understand, through and around the sinus cavity where it can come out of the nostrils or, pressure builds and forces it up through the nasolacrimal gland (cry hole). Where it mixes with the eye-air causing what feels like acid tears. Side Note: If that's not fucked up enough, the vapors can even be inhaled. Like, into the lungs. There's nowhere it can't go (that's only a minor exaggeration).

I'm lucky because I also have gastroparesis (t1/2=174), a moderately tight (53mmHg) lower esophagael sphincter (I know, lol), spontaneous reflux to the aortic arch, a hiatal hernia at the GE junction, dysphagia and globus sensation. I also had a partial liver resection and 9lb, 20cm choeldectoral cyst removed in 2020 and brain surgery to place a stent to remove a block in my right transverse venous sinus, which was causing Intercrainial Hypertension (10mmHg pressure difference) earlier this year.

Needless to say my GI tract (um, body?) is fucked. Back to the acid-eyes, though: with my specific situation, there's a problem with the muscles that let food enter my stomach, and the muscles of my stomach don't fire correctly so it just...doesn't do stomach things. This is dumb for two reasons. First, it's very hard for food to enter my stomach, which means I involuntarily regurgitate nearly every meal. But! For the food that does enter my stomach, it sits there for 2-3 times longer than the normal stomach. This basically makes a pressure cooker bomb in my belly. Eventually something has to give, the sphincter blows (again, lol), deploying the acid vapor like a weapon into my upper GI and head.

One week ago yesterday I ate a can of Chef Boyardee Raviolis, and I can only describe the last seven days as truly bizarre. After one visit to the urgent care who sent me to the ER who referred me back to my primary care who sent me to an allergist who confirmed that acid tears were a possibility. I am now on a regimen of "monitor to see what happens" and medication to handle the skin autoimmune/skin/hives freakout.

But on a positive note, my PCP and allergist are wonderful. And my eyeball/vision isn't in any immediate danger.

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u/regardkick 28d ago

It's WILD how interconnected these things are!!

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u/KaiPRoberts 28d ago

If you have stomach surgery, you learn really quickly that the receptors that make you happy are like 90% in your gut.

90% of our serotonin receptors are in our gut. Go figure. If your stomach isn't happy, you aren't happy.

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u/CrackedCeladon 28d ago

This is something I learned first hand with celiac disease. Every time I get glutened, my worst acute symptoms are neurological. That includes a drop in mental health so severe that I need to be monitored, and I'm typically a very chill/chipper person, even in tough situations. The gut-brain connection is real.

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u/Negative-Impress5151 28d ago

as a fellow celiac, same. my first symptom is usually high anxiety and depression and then the other symptoms follow

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u/KaiPRoberts 28d ago

From a Chrony to a brother with another mother, my condolences. I say I have stomach pain and people don't realize that stops me from having any rational thoughts.

This is why weed is a godsend and I can't understand how some states have alcohol legalized and not weed. Alcohol doesn't treat anything, it masks it behind numbness.

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u/RoutineAd7185 27d ago

until you get CHS and now your stomach is further messed up 😭😭

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u/Ap0kal1ps3 21d ago

CHS is extremely rare and doesn't last long if the user stops smoking cannabis. I had it temporarily, and that was only because I was abusing cannabis to an extreme degree that isn't possible without concentrates. I stopped using cannabis for a month and things normalized. Now I just use the flower and have no issue stopping when I want to.

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u/regardkick 19d ago

My GI tells me at every visit that I need to stop smoking because of CHS. The first time, I played along and asked if they could show me peer-reviewed articles that connect CHS to my symptoms. He laughed. I said, I've only been a regular user for about 6 months, before that it had been almost 20 years since I smoked last.

And he said something like, well, there's lots of data that blah blah. And then kind of chuckled and said "we'll see what we can find for you."

I was there with my dad because it was after an endoscopy, and my dad said, "sir, I don't think she's joking. She has a PhD" (my dad is very proud of me). It was only after my dad spoke up that the doctor Suggested that I ask the PA for specifics at my follow-up appointment.

Dear Redditor, 16 months later and they still haven't shown me anything more than their own website that says you should stop. They've also never offered anything else for nausea or to stimulate appetite. And they say, "if it's as bad as you say, you would be losing more weight." They wrote this in my medical chart. So I still smoke.

I do have a background in health research so I've started to look more into it as it relates to my specific condition. But most of the research I'm finding is on patients older than 50, with a long history. That's not me, and I doubt it's a lot of the patients that they are blindly pushing CHS fear onto.

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u/Ap0kal1ps3 19d ago

I've been using cannabis for 20 years. When I suffered from CHS, I was using about two grams of concentrates a day. That's like smoking an ounce of cannabis, which is clearly too much. So I cut back, and the CHS went away.

It's a VERY rare illness that isn't very harmful. Just stop smoking for 1-2 weeks, and it goes away. It should take more than 2 weeks to lose a significant amount of weight, even if you do have trouble keeping soup down. If my doctor openly showed this kind of ignorance, I'd find a new doctor. The key point about CHS is that you have no issues with nausea or vomiting when you're high. When you're not, you vomit while trying to eat, and you feel nauseous.

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u/RoutineAd7185 21d ago

i was definitely abusing cannabis, but my episode was so severe i definitely won’t be touching it again for a long while

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u/KaiPRoberts 27d ago

Look into a good diet.

DHA is a big one since a lot of people don't eat fatty fish in the West.

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u/imomystery 27d ago

100% this. Omega supplements and B100 complex vitamin are lifesaving. Thiamine deficiency is another common concern.

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u/weeblordjay_ 23d ago

especially for folk with chronic pains or exhaustion/fatigue. deadass the only thing that's been helping reverse my POTS symptoms and allowed me to work on my physical vitality otherwise

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u/Sufficient-Club-1230 27d ago

I am allergic to sesame seeds, and if I accidentally eat them, I'll get stomach pain and a scratchy throat, but the worst symptom is this inescabale feeling of impending doom. It feels like the world is going to crumble around me for ~2hrs until the allergic reaction passes. Crazy stuff

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u/oddestowl 27d ago

I’m very lactose intolerant and all this explains why I feel utterly awful if I accidentally consume dairy. I’ve never understood why it upped my anxiety and made me feel so horrific mentally as well as physically.

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u/Kotobug123 26d ago

I’ve recently become anaphylactic to shellfish and as a nurse who knows the clinical symptoms of impending doom for many things it was crazy to finally experience it myself. Spent the whole time telling myself I’m just anxious but underneath that lie I knew something was very wrong like I couldn’t gaslight myself hard enough to escape that.

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u/Bobby_Jindall 22d ago

My mom and I grew up in Louisiana and ate our own weight in crabs, shrimp, and crawfish. My mom’s about 47 and she just developed an anaphylactic allergy to shellfish as of last year. She showed up to a family crawfish boil like she did every year. Partook in some of the crawfish and her throat began to close up. My mom developed a deathly allergy to our favorite food for decades. Also I use to be allergic to cinnamon when I was a child (non-anaphylactic) but I grew out of it. Odd how allergies can pop in and also vanish randomly through out your life. My son has 4 allergies. Anaphylactic to peanuts, and minor allergies to Wheat, Egg, and Dairy to where he breaks out in hives and gets super lethargic. I really hope he grows out of AT LEAST ONE OF THEM. Grocery trips to the store have become expensive and so time consuming sifting through all the labels lol. I swear if it doesn’t contain one allergen then it contains another. And if it doesn’t contain any of his allergens than that shit is marked tf up in price. Allergies are such a weird thing.

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u/allofthemwitches 26d ago

Would you mind sharing how you discovered your allergy to sesame seeds? Allergies are interesting to me

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u/Sufficient-Club-1230 26d ago

Yeahit's a funny story, my parents would feed me Nutella at a young age, and I would break out into hives. They had no idea what it was so would just put lotion on me and send me off. One day the told the doctor about it and had me checked for a whole host of common allergens; turns out I was very allergic to tree nuts, sesame seeds, and shellfish.

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u/Ap0kal1ps3 21d ago

The impending doom is caused by the throat symptoms. I have a similar thing with salmon. The constriction makes you feel like you might die, even if you never thought about that.

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u/MM-SG-pro 24d ago

Same here. My first symptoms are 4 to 8 hours of manic anxiety and becoming allergic to everything. Then 3 days of zombie like depression.

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u/richan25 21d ago

Mine is nerve pain all over my body

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u/Informal_Tell78 28d ago

Holy shit... this might explain why when I drink Dr Pepper, I often end up feeling very irritable... Dr Pepper can give me acid reflux. This makes so much sense.

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u/KaiPRoberts 28d ago

Exactly! It's a big misconception that everything originates in the brain. Your body has to be in balance for you to feel good. You can't just sit in a chair all day and expect to have good mental health... because mental health is, quite literally, bodily health.

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u/RedBlockFour 25d ago

Dr pepper has caffeine in it. More than a cup of coffee. Found ivwas getting annoyed after dr p and mountain dew and saw they both had tons of stim in them.

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u/LittleDebbieBigDebra 27d ago

Omg I do the same thing

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u/actualladyaurora 28d ago

It's very easy to think about things in terms of "brain chemicals" or "gut bacteria", but it is very much an oversimplification of what's actually happening.

You are a bag of water, fat, and protein. What happens in your body does not stay in their neat human-made taxonomical categories.

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u/KaiPRoberts 28d ago

Huh?

I am not simplifying anything. Serotonin receptors and the "feel goods" are not primary a brain thing; that's the part people get hung up on. 90% of your serotonin receptors and the proteins they are made of, are in the lining of our gut. Sure you feel it in your brain because that's where our consciousness is but it's far from where the feeling originates.

I am not talking about bacteria or our internal fauna at all here.

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u/actualladyaurora 28d ago

I was agreeing with you.

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u/KaiPRoberts 28d ago

Oh... uh... carry on! That's my fault! Sorry about that, redditor.

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u/honeyandwhiskey 28d ago

I read somewhere that this is why recreational drugs that can make you happy can also make you puke.

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u/KaiPRoberts 28d ago

Yes! Like Psilocybin for instance! It acts on serotonin receptors.

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u/Electrical-Pea-3662 27d ago

Can confirm. feeling like I'm about vomit happens to me almost every single time when eating mushrooms. Psilocybin converts into psilocin in the stomach, which then activates serotonin receptors right there. That's where the nausea comes from.

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u/VainChinchilla 27d ago

As someone with Chrons: Can confirm.

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u/Efficient_Progress_6 28d ago

That explains my weight...

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u/KaiPRoberts 28d ago

There's a reason you get munchies in your gut after smoking weed XD

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u/SBowen91 27d ago

Wait… what? Any specific stomach surgery ooor? I had WLS done and my mental health has been absolutely trashed the last year.

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u/KaiPRoberts 27d ago

I had a bowel resection when I was 15-16-ish and I was messed up for a few years.

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u/SBowen91 27d ago

I mean my brain was trash before but now I’ve learned how much worse it can be lol. I’m sorry you had to deal with that.

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u/Worshipme988 27d ago

Minor and major surgery in itself can cause the same symptoms.

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u/Spare-Cobbler7442 23d ago

No wonder I am chubby lol

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u/Bistilla 27d ago

I learned this with my cannabinoid hyperemesis syndrome. So many important receptors are in the gut

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u/an_sible 27d ago

I had serious stomach issues after getting some kind of GI infection while traveling a couple months ago. For a couple of weeks, I got to deal with the delightful combination of nausea, constant acid reflux, and panic attacks triggered by a deep sense of impending doom. All went away with some rest and some proton-pump inhibitors.

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u/Meisterschmeisser 27d ago

Serotonin has a completely different function in your gut.

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u/T0macock 27d ago

I had a random attack of gastritis and months after I recovered I was fucking miserable. My therapist was like "don't do any reading on it, but take a probiotic and we'll meet again in a month".

Literally a week after taking them I'm back to 100%. As soon as I started feeling better I looked up the gut/brain connection and was like ohhhh shit, buddeh.

I'm a super skeptical dude. I never would have believed her if she told me why or blamed the placebo effect. Was kinda cool to be lab ratted like that, honestly.

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u/KaiPRoberts 27d ago

Exactly! I had a few comments like "serotonin from your gut doesn't cross the blood brain barrier" or "Serotonin in your gut has a different function". Those comments are correct but also make the wrong assumption on pathway of action.

The Gut-Brain Axis is very real and anyone with stomach issues can attest to it without medical proof. Thank you for your story!

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u/bluh67 27d ago

Depression and bowelmovement problems go hand in hand.

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u/ChaoticKiwiNZ 26d ago

This is probably a big reason why many people have comfort foods. As someone who's lived with Crohn's Disease for 10 years now it's insane to realize just how important your bowel health is to you mental health.

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u/No_Adhesiveness_6604 24d ago

It’s Mostly used for signaling instead of affecting your mode, depending on the amount also
It’s like adrenaline has Alpha and beta receptors proprietaries in small amount it’s vasodilator effect while in large amount it affects flight or fight and causes vasoconstriction and the whole cascade

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u/KaiPRoberts 24d ago

Go read about the gut-brain axis. It’s a lot more about mood than you think. 

Anyone with stomach issues knows this first hand.

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u/No_Adhesiveness_6604 24d ago

I did, the brain affects the GI system using the vagus nerve which in turn does increase stomach acid and release of prostaglandin and decrease the stomach lining causing ulcers, abdominal pain and dysfunction, the GI System has its own nervous system working alone without the help of the brain with chronic ulcers Vagotomy is suggested

I’m not saying serotonin is not affecting your mode
Dopamine, serotonin and other endorphins do have different affect on your brain with tolerances, if you’re high all the time your brain will build up a tolerance which inversely mean you need more so such an affect can happen

Nevertheless, I hope you have an enjoyable life ^__^

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u/EarlyInside45 24d ago

I started taking a certain probiotic and went into a pretty bad depression. Crazy how fast it happened.

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u/bagofass420 23d ago

This isn't true, 90-95% of serotonin is produced in the gut but there are waaay more serotonin receptors in the brain than the gut. Serotonin is produced in the gut because tryptophan, the precursor to serotonin comes from the food you consume.

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u/MagazineMoney 21d ago

I needed to hear this as a depressed guy that hasn’t been eating great. Thank you.

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u/un_gaucho_loco 28d ago

Opposite is true as well.

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u/PrincessRegan 27d ago

That explains why some people (me included, lol) get hangry.

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u/Busy-Ad-833 27d ago

Serotonin made in the gut doesn’t pass the blood brain barrier

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u/ExcelsiorUnltd 23d ago

Wait til you find out the food hole and the breath hole are the same!!! Woah 🤯

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u/regardkick 23d ago

Just big ol' meat tubes.

(Can't lie, I hate that mental image so much!!)

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u/Cumdump90001 21d ago

My poop hole and my sex hole are the same, too!

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u/arbyyyyh 24d ago

It really is, but also at the same time like, of course it is.

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u/recycledcup 27d ago

I had ear surgery and now I taste sour almost always. It’s getting better, kinda.