Working from home I’m quite fortunate in that I don’t tend to pick up too many bugs.
Forget decorator items – this is what my kitchen bench looks like at the moment!
However with the hubster coughing and sniffling for three weeks now, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that I have finally sucuumbed and have caught his cold.
Cue much sneezing and snuffling of my own.
Sneezing and Stress Incontinence
Now many of us more mature women – especially if we have experienced pregnancy and birth – avoid sneezing whenever possible. However I’m not talking about stress incontinence (but while we’re at it, knock out a set of pelvic floor squeezes while you’re reading).
But I fear sneezing for another reason entirely.
Beware Sneezing During Pregnancy!
When I was expecting Mr 22, I sneezed so hard I managed to put my jaw out. Yes, seriously!
I don’t have any photos of my jaw being out,
but I was about 5 months pregnant in this pic 🙂
That afternoon I realised I was talking funny – my mouth just didn’t seem to be in the right position. When I ate, I kept biting the inside of my cheek. Even when I looked at my face in the mirror, it just didn’t look quite “right”.
So I saw a doctor who asked me to open my mouth wide. Apparently we should normally be able to fit three fingers in our mouth when we do this – and it was a test I failed dismally (did you just totally try it?!).
My jaw had clicked out of place and the muscles of the TMJ had gone into spasm, so it was locked that way!
It took several days on painkillers, plus a couple of visits to the chiropractor, before I felt 100% again.
I’m not sure why sneezing during pregnancy turned out to be so dangerous for me – I have a theory that all my ligaments and muscles had loosened and relaxed from the pregnancy hormones, in preparation from birth. Even ones that weren’t actually involved in giving birth!
Fortunately it hasn’t happened since. Let’s hope it stays that way!
Did you know that sneezing during pregnancy can be dangerous?!
I know someone who broke a few ribs, coughing.
Wow that sounds painful!
I did the exactly the same thing during my second pregnancy BRUSHING MY TEETH!!! A few panadol and a sleep and it was fine. Not fine was the fact that if I sneezed or laughed too hard my jaw would lock up again throughout the rest of the pregnancy. Happened about 10 times!
Oh wow, your ligaments really WERE relaxed! Ouch … have you had a problem with your jaw since pregnancy?