Wednesday, April 8, 2009

A bed time story



I must warn you right away that the title can be misleading. My intention is not to give some tips on how to deal with your sleeping problems, if you have any. Such articles are plenty in magazines and on the internet, very often copied from each other. After all, our world is right now so busy copy/pasting like crazy!
So, back to “sleeping disorders”. The issue I have in mind is related to a few people who came visiting me when my family was back in my home country. These “people” weren’t total strangers. They were friends of my uncle. There were five of them. Plus my uncle. Six big men. Six too many...

Human beings can hide a lot of stuff inside themselves. Some of it is actually better left inside always. One good example is what they do when they do not know what they are doing, when they are sleeping. Snoring. Friends, I am not talking about that irritating sound made by a man while he is sleeping. I am talking of a massive onslaught on your eardrums caused by five after-dinner drunk obese men at 12 in the night. Words are woefully inadequate to describe that experience. You can probably talk about it later, if you survive.
That night was the longest night of my life. It was like trying to sleep on top of a spluttering genset; infact 6 gensets on a spluttering world championship. I think at some point in time, my ears were bleeding or I might have been hallucinating. It is just the Almighty's grace that I was not turned into a serial killer of snoring people.

I did some reading once I survived. I had to. You never know, they could come again, right? You must also keep in mind that such a night can be a life changing experience. At least I was happy to remind myself that I was not a woman and one of their wives. So I did this reading to protect myself just incase such a calamity finds its way to my house a second time.

According to health expert and author Mr. James A Penn, “snoring is caused by something that blocks the air passages causing the tissues to vibrate. The back of the mouth is collapsible and the tongue, upper throat, and soft palate, and uvula come together here. During snoring, these 4 parts strike against each other to produce the vibration that we know as snoring”. This information was not helpful. I wanted to know how people can “roar” in their sleep.

That is when I found this information: “The mechanics of snoring are produced in the throat. As air travels down through it, you end up getting vibrations that create the sounds of snoring. What a lot of people don't seem to realize is that their jaw's position will actually lead to the expansion and contraction of the throat. The more room you have for air, the less likely you're going to experience vibration. When people snore, they have their jaw open or at least loose. That causes the constriction. All you have to do close your jaw and snoring will stop”.

That is it! All I need to do is makesure that their jaws are closed. Cut out their air supply. I may have something at home to get this job done. For those of you out there who ever had to go through what I went through and are thinking what I am thinking, here you go….I am willing to share this life-saving gadget with you. Check out the picture above! As I always say; Information saved is a life saved!

The Great Plan

  “Everything happens for a reason” What? That has to be mankind’s vain effort to make sense of everything that happens around them. To ...