Have you ever ever been drifting off to sleep, solely to be jerked awake by the sound of a bomb going off inside your head? When you have, then you may have probably skilled exploding head syndrome, a mysterious and poorly understood sleep problem.
Exploding head syndrome (EHS) belongs to a household of sleep issues referred to as parasomnias. Different parasomnias embody sleep paralysis and hypnic jerks – the reason for that disagreeable feeling of falling we typically expertise when drifting off to sleep.
EHS has been identified to medical professionals since at the very least 1876, and apparently the French thinker and scientist René Descartes skilled it. Regardless of that, we all know surprisingly little concerning the situation.
A typical episode is characterised by the expertise of an abrupt loud noise or a way of an explosion inside the pinnacle that happens in the course of the transition from wakefulness to sleep. The sounds which can be heard throughout EHS are variable, and embody perceptions of gun photographs, doorways slamming, or nondescript screaming.
Importantly, the sounds which can be heard are all the time quick (a number of seconds or much less), very loud and with none apparent exterior supply within the surroundings.
Alongside the sounds, some folks expertise accompanying temporary visible hallucinations similar to brilliant flashes. Others have additionally reported emotions of intense warmth, or the feeling {of electrical} cost flowing via the higher physique.
It’s onerous to estimate precisely many individuals expertise EHS. One motive for that is merely a scarcity of obtainable information. Solely a handful of research have tried to survey the prevalence of EHS within the basic inhabitants.
One early examine discovered that 11 % of in any other case wholesome adults skilled EHS, whereas one other examine in undergraduate college students discovered 17 % of members had skilled a number of episodes of their lifetime.
In my very own, more moderen examine, once more in undergraduate college students, my colleagues and I discovered that one-third of our pattern had skilled at the very least one episode of EHS of their lifetime, with round 6 % experiencing at the very least one episode a month.
What these research present is that EHS is a comparatively widespread expertise, at the very least in younger adults. It does nevertheless seem like much less widespread than different parasomnias similar to hypnic jerks, which happen in as much as 70 % of individuals.
Triggers
The precise reason for EHS is unknown. Whereas many theories of the basis reason for EHS have been put ahead, the most well-liked implicates the pure mind processes which can be ongoing within the transition from wakefulness to sleep. On a typical evening, as we transition from wakefulness into sleep, exercise inside the reticular formation of the mind is lowered.
The reticular formation is a set of mind constructions positioned primarily within the brainstem and hypothalamus, that acts as an “on-off” swap for the mind. As reticular exercise slows down within the transition to sleep, our sensory cortices that govern imaginative and prescient, sound, and motor motion begin to shut down.
frameborder=”0″ allow=”accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share” referrerpolicy=”strict-origin-when-cross-origin” allowfullscreen>
It has been proposed that the expertise of EHS is because of a disruption on this regular switching-off course of, which supplies rise to delayed and disjointed surge of neuronal activation to sensory networks within the absence of any exterior stimuli. These temporary surges of activation are then perceived because the loud, nondescript sounds that characterise EHS.
Though the precise neural foundation of EHS stays speculative, we’re beginning to be taught extra about different components that make an EHS episode extra more likely to occur. In one of many first research to have a look at related components, my colleagues and I discovered that wellbeing variables similar to life stress have been related to experiencing EHS.
This relationship was mediated by signs of insomnia. In different phrases, life stress didn’t immediately relate to EHS, however was associated not directly via first disrupting regular sleep patterns.
Is EHS harmful?
Regardless of its provocative identify, EHS is innocent. It’s nevertheless necessary to tell apart an episode of EHS from different situations, notably from numerous forms of complications.
EHS episodes are very quick (a number of seconds) and normally there isn’t a related ache. If there may be, it’s gentle and transient. In distinction, many complications are longer-lasting and are related to considerably greater ranges of ache.
This isn’t to say that EHS can’t be a scary expertise. In a current survey of over 3,000 members who had skilled EHS, we discovered that 45 % of respondents reported average to extreme ranges of worry related to their EHS.
1 / 4 of members additionally reported excessive ranges of misery in response to experiencing EHS, with elevated ranges of misery related to extra frequent episodes.
Sadly, there have been no systematic research investigating potential therapies and coping methods for these combating distressing experiences of EHS.
In our survey, members reported that altering their sleeping place to keep away from sleeping on their again, adjusting their sleep patterns and deploying mindfulness strategies have been all efficient methods for stopping EHS. Whether or not any of those strategies show to be efficient in scientific trials stays to be seen.
Encouragingly, merely studying that EHS is a typical and innocent situation can go a good distance. In a affected person case examine, it was reported that reassurance and schooling concerning the expertise stopped the episodes from occurring.
For now at the very least, the perfect recommendation appears to be to try to realise these experiences are pure they usually do not point out that something is flawed. Easy strategies, similar to bettering sleep habits, could go a protracted method to stopping distressing episodes from occurring.
Dan Denis, Lecturer in Psychology, College of York
This text is republished from The Dialog underneath a Inventive Commons license. Learn the unique article.
