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On a hot, stifling day, there's nothing better than an ice cream cone. As it drips down your hand, you might find yourself licking faster in a futile attempt to salvage the falling ice cream. Then, like a ton of cold bricks, it hits you -- brain freeze! What's going on when this happens? Why does it feel like your eyes are going to pop out of your head? We poked around the Internet and discovered the causes of ice cream headaches. First we stopped by the Health section of MSNBC, where we found an article published from the British Medical Journal. According to Dr. Joseph Hulihan of Temple University, about a third of people suffer from "ice cream headaches." The condition is caused by extremely cold foods or beverages
that touch the roof of the mouth and set in motion a chain of events. When the nerves that travel to the brain are stimulated, the blood vessels in the front of the head expand and contract like they do during a migraine headache. Even though this sensation typically lasts only 10 to 20 seconds, the pain is mind-numbing. We next visited a "News for Kids" web page from The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. The page corroborated our earlier finding, adding that "brain freeze" has nothing to do with your brain, it's just the reaction of the blood vessels in your noggin. In addition, we learned a couple of ways to avoid the pain: - Slow down. Eat cold foods slowly.
- Warm
the cold food in the front part of your mouth before swallowing.
- If it's too late and you can feel the pain creeping into your head, hold your tongue against the roof of your mouth to warm the palate. This may help ease the pain a bit.
One thing is for sure: Americans love their ice cream and don't seem to mind the pain that comes with the pleasure.
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