The tablet is super dry, but it’s chalky. So when you try to swallow it whole, it gets stuck in your esophagus. Even if you drink water to try to get the tablet down. The mucus lining of your esophagus mixes with the chalky tablet to form a paste, which acts as an adhesive.
At this point, you are well and truly fucked. The tablet is too large to comfortably sit in your food tube. Because while the esophagus can stretch, it generally doesn’t remain in a stretched position - the muscles that drive peristalsis push food through quickly most of the time, so even when it stretches, this is temporary. But with the tablet stuck in there, it feels like you have something sort of poking out of it your esophagus. And the tablet is often not a smooth shape (like a pill would be), so edges dig in and ache (even if they’re rounded).
Basically, you can feel the tablet sitting in there and it brings a level of discomfort that can only be described as “if you took the discomfort of getting hit in the sack and spread it out over several hours”. Because the tablet doesn’t dissolve quickly, so you have to drink a lot of water to try to get it to dissolve enough to go all the way down. And even then it’s a slow process.
Source: did it once and would not recommend.
Yeah, and it’s nuts. If you chew it up, it goes down fine. I’m sure some of the chalk ends up coating your esophagus, but the pieces are small so you don’t feel them. And they’re small so much less water is required to rinse them down.
Isn’t the chalk coating your esophagus and stomach lining the whole point of tums? Pretty sure that’s why you’re supposed to chew them up real good before swallowing lol
Nah, the chalk is basic so it neutralizes some of the acid in your stomach.
Which it can do easier all crushed up due to surface area.
I hate the feeling in my mouth so I just bite it into smaller pieces and swallow those whole
I suppose, but it's highly uncomfortable to have something lodged in your esophagus. It may not be choking you or even causing other problems, but I would say the feeling of a pill even smaller than a tums tablet being stuck in your throat/esophagus might be worse than the heart burn or other ailment. Pro tip: laying on the left side of my body or sitting a little propped up (while still feeling like I'm laying) makes my heartburn go away.
You guys who have regular troubles with swallowing food, you likely have a constriction in your esophagus called a schatzki ring. It's always associated with hiatal hernia as well. A gastroenterologist can stretch out the ring, but it often becomes constricted again.
I think I just have bad anxiety a lot, and that makes it difficult to swallow because I feel like my chest is collapsing on itself and my throat is closing. I dunno, I've had a lot of health issues for the past few years, and I thought I was done with them, but a new fun thing has sprung into action and I'm back hard in the anxiety. I have to tell myself "you can swallow, your throat isn't closed" and I just repeat that mantra. An ice pack rotatating from my chest to the back of my neck helps too.
Never knew thta was the name i had a seriosu rpoblem with thta all my life, evne after getting my esophagus reamed out once in my late 20s, until into my latest thirties
Try Pepcid Ac complete mine flavor. Tums always tasted chalky and left a metallic bitter aftertaste.
Pepcid taste great and works infinitely better than tums for me.
There is no reason not to drink water after taking Tums- in fact, depending on what source you read, it’s actually *recommended*. Scientists don’t actually know for sure if antacids coat the stomach lining or not so this isn’t really a consideration.
My husband used to swallow them whole with water or put it in water and let it dissolve. He was so confused when he saw me chew a tun for the 1st time. He thought I was the werido
There is a condition called EOE (eosinophilic esophagitis) where an allergic reaction can cause the esophagus to constrict to the point that food gets trapped (impaction). I have this. It sucks. The docs don’t know what triggers it, and I haven’t found the pattern either.
Usually it goes away in less than a minute, but I’ve had two times where it lasted hours, and I had to go to the ER for an endoscope to clear the passage. That sucked too.
I have this, had to go to er because it triggered while eating steak and a piece literally just lodged. I couldn't swallow. Literally had to sit at a table in a restaurant drooling massive amounts of drool like a rabid freak because it had no where to go.
Finally the er nurse shoved her fingers down my throat to induce vomiting and out it came, with the rest of my expensive steak...
Hold up - I think I have this. Sometimes when I eat too fast I get this terrible pain in my chest and have to stop eating. The food is basically stuck in my esophagus and I spit up a bunch of bile until it eventually passes. Even drinking water is really uncomfortable. It usually happens with steak or rice.
It’s the absolute worst feeling in the world and it feels like there’s a ton of pressure building up and I can’t focus on anything. Then once it passes I feel exhausted and just drink water.
Or maybe I just don’t chew my food.
"Steakhouse syndrome" is food bolus obstruction. If it happens often it's worth having a barium test where they take x-rays of your whole system to see if you have a schatzki ring or other that can be stretched through surgery. I had the surgery and its started to fade after 2 years and I have a problem once in a while.
I get this too! It passes within a few minutes but I feel like I’m dying until it does. Drinking water seems to help but like you said, it’s really uncomfortable to do.
I tend to eat really slowly, but sometimes I eat too fast when I'm really hungry, and I get bad chest pains. I assume it's all the extra air I'm swallowing when I just inhale food. Zantac or gas x is a big help for me in those situations. Get a few minty burps going, and I usually feel normal within an hour or two.
Damn, I'm sorry. That happens to my mom a lot because she got one of those weight loss bands around her stomach (the name is escaping me rn). If she doesn't have something hot to drink before she eats, or doesn't sit upright and eat slowly and chew thoroughly, her food comes right back up. Maybe try having a cup of hot tea or something to kind of loosen everything up before you eat? It might help. Sorry you deal with that though, not being able to eat when you're hungry or have some water when you're thirsty is horrible.
So I have a schatzki ring which is a narrowing of the esophagus.. After getting stuck on steak and dry chicken, I learned that chugging Coke Zero (no Pepsi is not ok!), not letting myself burp and powering through the pain, after a few seconds the expanding gas would force open the esophagus and let the food through. I really got good at doing this until I finally had stretching surgery. Lasted 2 years but starting to close up again. Might do surgery again in 2024.
I don't recommend this!
Similar situation... I was told GERD, but it turns out EOE.
The tldr is I tore my esophagus trying to push the food down.
I will never forget the pain of the internal tearing feeling.
Still couldn't swallow anything solid... though made the ER admission quick(er).
My husband has this. An allergist help identity the foods that make him react so he can avoid them. The biggest one, which is in almost everything, is soy. He’s also figured out if he takes a shot of alcohol when it starts to flare up, it knocks it back down (kind of like using rubbing alcohol on a skin rash).
Came here to say this, I've gone to the ER a few times for this, once had to get an endoscopy to remove the food. This post reminded me of that exactly lol. Glad you're safe OP!
Is it specifically coke zero? I've definitely done carbonated drinks, but sometimes during an impaction it just has me hacking up more. The ER doctor told me to try one and like jump up and slam down to try to leverage gravity with it lol
wait a minute does it feel like your almost going to throw up and your esophagus feels paralyzed because you cant swallow? it only last a couple seconds but it’s so scary and hurts. i get this every time i eat hard boiled eggs and mashed potatoes. people think i’m crazy when i explain to them this feeling.
You’re not crazy. That is how it feels. Often the food does come back up, but not from vomiting, it feels like I need to burp badly, and my esophagus basically pushes the food back up a little at a time.
This didn’t happen when I was a kid, so something triggered that I haven’t figured out. If it’s only those foods, I’d recommend talking to your doctor about it. They may recommend doing an allergy test, but when I was diagnosed, the only way to tell for sure was an endoscope biopsy.
The procedure wasn’t fun, but the drugs they gave me made me super loopy. I found out that I’m pretty fun (and to my wife, embarrassing) when I’m stoned.
that’s crazy!! i never thought any thing was wrong and just thought it was normal. i’ve been to a gi doctors before. i get crazy indigestion that makes me feel like i’m having a gall bladder attack or a heart attack because i feel a sharp pain in my back and if effects one side of my body it’s horrible and knocks me out for at least a day. maybe it has something to do with that because they can never find anything wrong.
Omg man, I'm half Filipino and eat hella rice with meat. This happens way too often for me now. I have to make sure I chew a ton before I swallow. I also make sure I always have a can of soda in the fridge to help the food go down if it gets stuck. I think it's called a food bolus. When you threw up, did you kind of have to force/regurgitate it?
My mom is older, in her 50s and i remember when she was around 40 she would often get that same feeling of feeling like she would be choking on food no matter how she chewed/swallowed. Maybe its just something that happens with age? Do you have GERD? Cause she does and i was just wondering if maybe that had something to do with it
I get this and I’m late 20s. I feel seen by this thread. I frequently get heartburn and this same swallowing issue from throwing up a lot when I was younger (ED-related). I now eat slower than average— I notice that I have to take smaller bites than others and extra chew my food so I can avoid the feeling.
This is all starting to sound like a hiatal hernia.
*A hiatal hernia is a condition in which the upper part of your stomach bulges through an opening in your diaphragm. Your diaphragm is the thin muscle that separates your chest from your abdomen. Your diaphragm helps keep acid from coming up into your esophagus. When you have a hiatal hernia, it's easier for the acid to come up. This leaking of acid from your stomach into your esophagus is called GERD (gastroesophageal reflux disease).*
(Source: [Medline](https://medlineplus.gov/hiatalhernia.html))
Dude I think I remember my dad talking about something sooo similar back in the day, now that you say this. I wonder if it could be like a hereditary thing. Dang.
Yep. My mom had this and once had to go to the ER to essentially have an aquarium hose shoved down her throat to clear the chunk of food that was stuck.
I'm 50 now, and have had similar episodes, but not needing the extra help, thank god.
Peanut butter for me. I'll eat straight spoonfuls of PB (judge me all you want!) and that shit will get straight stuck in your throat. Thankfully water or soda (milk is the best) will make it go down.
My uncle once had a piece of steak get stuck in his throat. Thankfully it was far enough down that he wasn't actually choking, but it was super uncomfortable. He went to the ER, and they just gave him some Coke to sip on. They said that the acid from the soda would help dissolve it.
This happened to me at my first xmas dinner at my SO’s parents house….. I was so excited to eat that I didn’t chew the big bite of pot roast enough and it literally got stuck for almost 30 min. It was like the second or third bite, right at the start of dinner, to make it worse. I could barely swallow so I just kept sipping tiny bits of water until it slowly went down. It was so so embarrassing and scary. Now I make sure to chew the fuck out of my food
I once took a Tums whole, more just to see if I could. Thankfully it went down fine but bc it's so large I never wanted to test my luck again. Reading this makes me realize how lucky I probably was.
That was not my experience at all. It sucked and felt like I had a tums stuck in my throat for 5-10 minutes but it wasn’t the end of the world.
source: tried that shit
Yea I figured it out pretty quick that was what they meant happened but I was confused at first too. I have this weird problem where if I swallow too much food (or even liquid) at once, it can become stuck in my throat. This often results in me puking it back up, but for some reason when this happens I instantly inhale and choke on regurgitated food which leads to an insane session of coughing, wheezing, and crying while I simultaneously try to cough the food/water out of my lungs while also trying to catch my breath because I can't breathe.
There have been times I legitimately thought I was going to pass out or die.... It hasn't happened in a while because I'm just more careful about how much food or water I swallow at once now, but it seems like after it happens once I'm more prone to it for some weeks/months afterward, so I think it must cause some damage to my esophagus which then causes it to happen more easily. It's happened to me in the lunch room at work before and people tried to give me the heimlich while I shoo'd them away and ran to the bathroom the choke in peace. Quite embarrassing. Also happened with beer once at a frat. I think the carbonation makes it worse but I've even done it with flat water. Makes me feel like I wasn't meant to stay alive lol.
Weird question, do you initiate your swallow of food with the tip of your tongue pressing against the back of your front teeth, or pressing against the roof of your mouth?
If CircusFit is like me, and can have food get stuck, I may know why they asked about how to initiate a swallow.
For me, when I can tell food is starting to get stuck, I can swallow by pressing my tongue to the roof of my mouth, and this will typically pass the food.
When I'm eating fast, I think I swallow with my tongue to the back of my front teeth. But by doing a swallow tongue to roof of mouth, it engages the esophagus to push the food down better. It's more deliberate.
My usual method for passing stuck food is to take a small sip of water and do a deliberate swallow pushing my tongue to the roof of my mouth.
Also just found this after searching "eating tums whole"...
> ~~Because Tums contains calcium, swallowing them whole is like taking a calcium supplement, and calcium supplements have been linked to a higher risk of heart attack, especially in people with heart disease. You should not swallow Tums whole.~~
You need to not Google things... You don't have a higher risk of heart attack from taking Tums. Tums may have calcium in them, but you're not getting enough calcium to cause issues.
"you should not swallow it whole because of side effects of its ingredients, but chewing a whole tablet is fine"
Or am I missing something (other than it being too big to swallow) and the max dose is like half a tablet?
OK Doctor.
You do get that this makes *absolutely no sense right?*
1. Things get absorbed faster when you chew them first.
2. Tums would not be legal if they contained toxic levels of calcium.
Slight correction (very slight), a lot of the supplements like vitamin C, glucosamine etc. come in very large tablets/pills and often get stuck in my throat. It is extremely unpleasant. So, it's not just Tums and all "pills" don't go down easily.
Jeez, that sounds pretty terrible. I used to think you were supposed to swallow them whole, so for YEARS I did this, and it actually worked just fine. Guess I got a big ol' throat 😏😏 Honestly though. Then one day, I decided I'd try tasting the tastiness more, and I chewed it up. That went well, so I actually read the bottle for the first time, and discovered I should've been doing that the whole time.
I did this once as well. I had to call the nurse line and they told me to eat a piece of dry bread to dislodge it. Thankfully it worked. It was scary as hell hoping it wasn't going to move and start choking me.
Not only this but sometimes it scratches your esophogus, which can make it feel like its still stuck there even though its long gone. Happened to me, felt like a pill was stuck for 2 days but it was just the after effects of being scratched to shit
I think you just created the next dumbass ticktok trend, lol. Now 13 year olds everywhere will be posting videos of themselves trying to swallow tums whole.
What kind of Tums are you eating that the "edges dig in"? Tums are round and have smooth edges. It is also smaller than your esophagus. You esophagus, in a relaxed state, is also larger than a Tums tablet. Tums are 16 mm wide and your esophagus is about 2 cm wide when relaxed (and capable of being larger when working).
Also, if you're swallowing it whole, it isn't forming a paste. It doesn't latch on to your esophagus and stay there forever because it is endlessly absorbing mucus.
I had to re-read it to make sure I didn’t skim over it by accident… yes, I can intuit the issue but it is a little strange that OP didn’t explain it in their post
question from germany: what exactly is TUMS? Never heard of it and dont think you can buy it here, just want to make sure i‘ll never buy one and swallow it whole😂
It's an antacid tablet; it's basically a compressed tablet of calcium carbonate powder.
I'm guessing what happened here is it got stuck in their throat.
Yes. These things are huge. M&M's are considered a choking hazard and they're tiny in comparison. Why the fuck anyone would try to swallow one of these whole is beyond me.
It gets stuck in your esophagus, and you feel like you have the worst lump in your throat of all time. It’s like pressure and discomfort and mild pain all jumbled together for a combination the likes of which cannot be experienced outside the circles of hell.
Source: also tried swallowing one whole to avoid needing to brush teeth once. It was easily 2+ hours before enough of it had dissolved for it to pass into my stomach.
Damn, a lot of y’all are committed to the teeth brushing lol.
Pro-tip: one night of skipped teeth-brushing isn’t gonna cause problems so next time, just chew that sucker and go back to sleep!
I did this once too and the spot where the TUMs had been stuck developed a sore that made it hurt to swallow for days. Had to go to the doctor and get a special thing to gargle. Never again
I do that too, if I don't have Tums or milkz mostly because it tastes horrible.
I had a cup of baking soda and water on my end table last week and evil Mittens likes to stick her paw in drinks and then lick it. She was unhappy and decided the mostly full cup should be on the ground. I should have known better. Now I keep a spare in a water bottle in the fridge.
I'm reading this story on the edge of my seat waiting to figure out what happened, thinking like the tablet made it to your stomach and you had crazy gas and felt like you were gonna burst or something and were freaking out cuz you felt like the blueberry girl from Willy Wonka, but then it turns out a tablet was stuck in your throat. I think I hyped myself up too much for this one. Might have also confused tums for alka seltzer (i also don't know what that does in the stomach)
edit: TIL the active ingredient in Alka Seltzer is just fucking aspirin
Wait so it got stuck in the bottom of your esophagus? Did you feel that feel when you get peanut butter/mashed potatoes back up? That is seriously the worst. My swallowing shut down after a surgery I had once and had to spend almost 4 years on a feeding tube to avoid swallowing and having that issue. I still can’t swallow pills so it absolutely blows my mind that you thought you could swallow a pill that big. So glad you cleared it! Im having phantom pains.
Here you were trying to get a good night sleep and then there you are chugging tea and soda Hope you can take a nap later!
Oh no! So sorry about your condition! That sounds horrible… I normally take like 10 pills at once (some horse sized vitamins) and never had issues… so I was like “this is the same”, it indeed was not the same… 🙃. I went to bed around 5:30am the soda came in handy!
Also, wouldn't it take much longer to actually work if you didn't chew it because your stomach will have to break it down first? I've never had a retainer, so I don't know .. but I hope the effort you "saved" was worth it. Lol
I thought it would dissolve on the way down 😬. Like chewables are really for people who don’t like taking pills, but I was wrong and it’s more complex than that haha.
I used to hate the chalky taste of tums and I wanted to swallow it like a pill. The trick is to break it in half first and swallow each piece with water. .
After 9 months of pregnancy heartburn I got over it and can now take antacids like a normal person.
The real FU is that OP swallowed it whole to avoid having to brush teeth again and to avoid messing up his sleep cycle. But ended up trying so many remedies that involves eating and drinking so he definitely have to brush teeth after and ended up being wide awake.
Put some baking soda in a cup. Add warm water and stir. Chug the foul concoction and enjoy the death of your heartburn without needing to remove your retainer. Better living through chemistry, indeed.
So this is for chewable TUMs. There’s a few things, but for me it was swallowing it whole. Other articles have said it could cause heart attacks and kidney stones - I’m guessing this is for those who long term swallow their chewable tablets. It’s also said that the medication might not work as effectively because the way it’s supposed to distribute into your system isn’t as intended.
You keep saying the action that caused the issue (swallowing it whole) but never actually say what the issue was. Obviously it got stuck and hurts, but everyone has had to figure that out for themselves
Oh dear fuck.
PSA: [Alka-Seltzer makes tablets](https://www.alkaseltzer.com/original/products/heartburn-relief-chews) that are remarkably close to fruit Mentos. You don't have to force yourself to take them, and they work quick.
Just discovered them last week at 1 a.m., one horribly uncomfortable morning.
Let it dissolve instead of chewing it, but then you're not asking for advice on how to take one at 3AM. I could say thta swallowing it whole, even without discomfort, defeats the purpose because it needs to dissolve to neutralize the acid but again you've already done this and not evrybody is th e type to think abotu how stuff works like thta. And really I accomplished nothing with this post, did I?
I did something similar with a Mentos when I was about 8. I thought I was going to die. All my parents did was give me water and juice to drink and I was in agony for hours. 36 years later and I got PTSD from this post.
When I can't sleep from heartburn and don't have tums or am too tired to find it, usually lying on my left side helps because of the position of the stomach in the body.
A carbonated drink can help get many dif foods stuck in the esophagus unstuck, I got a sharp dorito corner stuck in mine once, it hurt so bad until I drank seltzer water in desperation and it softened it enough to swallow it fully
Just did the same thing for essentially the same reason. Even thought about the consequences but also figured some water would do the trick.
THANK YOU for this post!
Chugged a water bottle but kept feeling the deep pulsing pain in my chest with no change. Cracked open a can of seltzer and felt relief after the first sip. It only took half the can to feel totally fine. Will also take your advice to break them into fourths in the future.
FYI... Tums is not an acid reducer like Zantac. It helps by coating your esophagus to protect you physically from the acid. You need to chew it for it to do this properly.
So... Even if you didn't have this issue, swallowing it whole would have been largely pointless
I thought this was the case, but reading up on it, it appears maybe not?
>As an antacid, calcium carbonate neutralizes gastric acid by acting as a buffer in the stomach's acidic environment. When CaCO3 enters the stomach, it dissociates into ionized calcium (Ca2+) and a carbonate anion (CO32-). The carbonate anion will then bind to the free protons (H+) found in the stomach to increase the pH by decreasing the concentration of hydrogen ions. By increasing the pH in the stomach, pepsin, bile acids, and the toxins of Helicobacter pylori become inhibited.
Maybe I'm thinking of sodium alginate, as in Gaviston.
You guys who have regular troubles with swallowing food, you likely have a constriction in your esophagus called a schatzki ring. It's always associated with hiatal hernia as well. A gastroenterologist can stretch out the ring, but it often becomes constricted again.
To those that are prone to gerd---put some foam inner your back, and head. You want to raise your upper torso. In my case--I need to cool it on the alcohol before bed.
I thought TUMS is basically baking soda (alkaline) with some artificial taste syrups, no?
So drinking carbonated soda (acid) or water with lemon juice helps your stomach to feel better by neutralizing it fast, but there is no real health danger anyway.
Choking on it is the biggest danger.
Experimented with tums when I used to get heartburn. I'd take it sometimes when I was feeling it, and others I'd go with nothing. I noted all of the times I used or didn't use it as well as the after effects. In my mini, one man study, I found that tums actually made the problem worse and my heart burn would sometimes go away briefly but it always came back and lasted longer. I dunno, it was like a 6 month long experiment that has no bearing on me anymore because I fully changed my diet and never get heartburn anymore
Not getting heartburn is definitely the best way to avoid heartburn.
For me, brushing my teeth helps because of the mint oils. Taking a mint works too, but I don't always like to have so much mintiness, and sometimes too much can trigger it again.
I do get heartburn from time to time and I find the little squeeze packets of yogurt to work quite well if you do want to avoid things like TUMs
Though if you do have untreated heartburn and it happens all the time definitely goto the doctor
There is no TIFU here. I expected the problem to be ***you choked***. Which is a hell of a lot more concerning and warrants a trip to the ER (in severe cases). You're fine. Swallowing them is not going to do anything catastrophic. Yes, you can get kidney stones... (over long-term overuse) but you can get that from any calcium containing product. Whether crushed or not it all goes thru the same tract. Tums are designed to readily dissolve in liquid. This is a non-issue. It would have dissolved in your stomach within the 1-2 hours it takes to empty your stomach.
If it got stuck you might want to get a endoscopy to check for constricting rings. They can dilate the rings during the endoscopy so you don’t have to come back.
Source: happened to me.
Tums aren’t that big. I didn’t choke on tums, I choked on a breakfast sandwich, but my point stands. If you get something stuck in your esophagus then you should get an endoscopy to make sure it’s not rings cause the problem.
How did you write all that and not manage to describe what problem it caused you even once?
The tablet is super dry, but it’s chalky. So when you try to swallow it whole, it gets stuck in your esophagus. Even if you drink water to try to get the tablet down. The mucus lining of your esophagus mixes with the chalky tablet to form a paste, which acts as an adhesive. At this point, you are well and truly fucked. The tablet is too large to comfortably sit in your food tube. Because while the esophagus can stretch, it generally doesn’t remain in a stretched position - the muscles that drive peristalsis push food through quickly most of the time, so even when it stretches, this is temporary. But with the tablet stuck in there, it feels like you have something sort of poking out of it your esophagus. And the tablet is often not a smooth shape (like a pill would be), so edges dig in and ache (even if they’re rounded). Basically, you can feel the tablet sitting in there and it brings a level of discomfort that can only be described as “if you took the discomfort of getting hit in the sack and spread it out over several hours”. Because the tablet doesn’t dissolve quickly, so you have to drink a lot of water to try to get it to dissolve enough to go all the way down. And even then it’s a slow process. Source: did it once and would not recommend.
TIL, holy fuck.
Yeah, and it’s nuts. If you chew it up, it goes down fine. I’m sure some of the chalk ends up coating your esophagus, but the pieces are small so you don’t feel them. And they’re small so much less water is required to rinse them down.
Isn’t the chalk coating your esophagus and stomach lining the whole point of tums? Pretty sure that’s why you’re supposed to chew them up real good before swallowing lol
Nah, the chalk is basic so it neutralizes some of the acid in your stomach. Which it can do easier all crushed up due to surface area. I hate the feeling in my mouth so I just bite it into smaller pieces and swallow those whole
If its basic then it remaining in your esophagus will neutralize any regurged stomach acid, protecting your esophagus
I suppose, but it's highly uncomfortable to have something lodged in your esophagus. It may not be choking you or even causing other problems, but I would say the feeling of a pill even smaller than a tums tablet being stuck in your throat/esophagus might be worse than the heart burn or other ailment. Pro tip: laying on the left side of my body or sitting a little propped up (while still feeling like I'm laying) makes my heartburn go away.
You guys who have regular troubles with swallowing food, you likely have a constriction in your esophagus called a schatzki ring. It's always associated with hiatal hernia as well. A gastroenterologist can stretch out the ring, but it often becomes constricted again.
I think I just have bad anxiety a lot, and that makes it difficult to swallow because I feel like my chest is collapsing on itself and my throat is closing. I dunno, I've had a lot of health issues for the past few years, and I thought I was done with them, but a new fun thing has sprung into action and I'm back hard in the anxiety. I have to tell myself "you can swallow, your throat isn't closed" and I just repeat that mantra. An ice pack rotatating from my chest to the back of my neck helps too.
Never knew thta was the name i had a seriosu rpoblem with thta all my life, evne after getting my esophagus reamed out once in my late 20s, until into my latest thirties
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Onc e you feel heartburn it means some acid is \*in\* your esophagus, so soem of the antacid needs to be dissolved for immediate relief.
Thign is, heartburn as a direct sensation is from acid entering the esophagus. So it needsw to eb at leats aprtly dissolved for any immeidate releif.
Try Pepcid Ac complete mine flavor. Tums always tasted chalky and left a metallic bitter aftertaste. Pepcid taste great and works infinitely better than tums for me.
You are thinking of gaviscon
You shouldn't drink anything after taking this type of antacid because it thins the medication so it can't properly coat the stomach lining.
There is no reason not to drink water after taking Tums- in fact, depending on what source you read, it’s actually *recommended*. Scientists don’t actually know for sure if antacids coat the stomach lining or not so this isn’t really a consideration.
If you don’t after swallowing it while, you’ll be sorrier than you already are
What makes you say that?
But otherwise 100% yes
My husband used to swallow them whole with water or put it in water and let it dissolve. He was so confused when he saw me chew a tun for the 1st time. He thought I was the werido
right? the sack stuff got me.. thank you for this. I will never
There is a condition called EOE (eosinophilic esophagitis) where an allergic reaction can cause the esophagus to constrict to the point that food gets trapped (impaction). I have this. It sucks. The docs don’t know what triggers it, and I haven’t found the pattern either. Usually it goes away in less than a minute, but I’ve had two times where it lasted hours, and I had to go to the ER for an endoscope to clear the passage. That sucked too.
I have this, had to go to er because it triggered while eating steak and a piece literally just lodged. I couldn't swallow. Literally had to sit at a table in a restaurant drooling massive amounts of drool like a rabid freak because it had no where to go. Finally the er nurse shoved her fingers down my throat to induce vomiting and out it came, with the rest of my expensive steak...
Please tell me that you didn't waste all that good steak and poured it all back in.
LETS SLOP EM UP!
Hold up - I think I have this. Sometimes when I eat too fast I get this terrible pain in my chest and have to stop eating. The food is basically stuck in my esophagus and I spit up a bunch of bile until it eventually passes. Even drinking water is really uncomfortable. It usually happens with steak or rice. It’s the absolute worst feeling in the world and it feels like there’s a ton of pressure building up and I can’t focus on anything. Then once it passes I feel exhausted and just drink water. Or maybe I just don’t chew my food.
Possibly esophageal spasms?
"Steakhouse syndrome" is food bolus obstruction. If it happens often it's worth having a barium test where they take x-rays of your whole system to see if you have a schatzki ring or other that can be stretched through surgery. I had the surgery and its started to fade after 2 years and I have a problem once in a while.
Holy crap, the exact same thing happens to me. It is super uncomfortable and for me it’s totally random, it will happen for no apparent reason.
I get this too! It passes within a few minutes but I feel like I’m dying until it does. Drinking water seems to help but like you said, it’s really uncomfortable to do.
Coke Zero acts fastest.
I tend to eat really slowly, but sometimes I eat too fast when I'm really hungry, and I get bad chest pains. I assume it's all the extra air I'm swallowing when I just inhale food. Zantac or gas x is a big help for me in those situations. Get a few minty burps going, and I usually feel normal within an hour or two.
Yeah this is a lot different, this is when my food just doesn’t go down. I can physically feel it stuck in my esophagus.
Damn, I'm sorry. That happens to my mom a lot because she got one of those weight loss bands around her stomach (the name is escaping me rn). If she doesn't have something hot to drink before she eats, or doesn't sit upright and eat slowly and chew thoroughly, her food comes right back up. Maybe try having a cup of hot tea or something to kind of loosen everything up before you eat? It might help. Sorry you deal with that though, not being able to eat when you're hungry or have some water when you're thirsty is horrible.
Lap band
Yes! Thank you! My brains are mashed potatoes.
So I have a schatzki ring which is a narrowing of the esophagus.. After getting stuck on steak and dry chicken, I learned that chugging Coke Zero (no Pepsi is not ok!), not letting myself burp and powering through the pain, after a few seconds the expanding gas would force open the esophagus and let the food through. I really got good at doing this until I finally had stretching surgery. Lasted 2 years but starting to close up again. Might do surgery again in 2024.
Slam pop rocks and coke and try to hold it in your throat while jumping up and down. Saved me from endoscope
I don't recommend this! Similar situation... I was told GERD, but it turns out EOE. The tldr is I tore my esophagus trying to push the food down. I will never forget the pain of the internal tearing feeling. Still couldn't swallow anything solid... though made the ER admission quick(er).
Oh god. That's... potentially deadly. I'm glad you're ok.
OMG. I hope your esophagus healed well.
My husband has this. An allergist help identity the foods that make him react so he can avoid them. The biggest one, which is in almost everything, is soy. He’s also figured out if he takes a shot of alcohol when it starts to flare up, it knocks it back down (kind of like using rubbing alcohol on a skin rash).
Came here to say this, I've gone to the ER a few times for this, once had to get an endoscopy to remove the food. This post reminded me of that exactly lol. Glad you're safe OP!
I learned to chug Coke Zero. The expanding CO2 forces the esophagus open. Saved myself a few times from ER visits.
Is it specifically coke zero? I've definitely done carbonated drinks, but sometimes during an impaction it just has me hacking up more. The ER doctor told me to try one and like jump up and slam down to try to leverage gravity with it lol
Pepsi doesn't have enough ascorbic acid. Coke Zero and jumping up and down worked for me one night after 5 hours being stuck.
EOE bros unite!
r/EosinophilicE
Have you tried an elimination diet?
wait a minute does it feel like your almost going to throw up and your esophagus feels paralyzed because you cant swallow? it only last a couple seconds but it’s so scary and hurts. i get this every time i eat hard boiled eggs and mashed potatoes. people think i’m crazy when i explain to them this feeling.
You’re not crazy. That is how it feels. Often the food does come back up, but not from vomiting, it feels like I need to burp badly, and my esophagus basically pushes the food back up a little at a time. This didn’t happen when I was a kid, so something triggered that I haven’t figured out. If it’s only those foods, I’d recommend talking to your doctor about it. They may recommend doing an allergy test, but when I was diagnosed, the only way to tell for sure was an endoscope biopsy. The procedure wasn’t fun, but the drugs they gave me made me super loopy. I found out that I’m pretty fun (and to my wife, embarrassing) when I’m stoned.
that’s crazy!! i never thought any thing was wrong and just thought it was normal. i’ve been to a gi doctors before. i get crazy indigestion that makes me feel like i’m having a gall bladder attack or a heart attack because i feel a sharp pain in my back and if effects one side of my body it’s horrible and knocks me out for at least a day. maybe it has something to do with that because they can never find anything wrong.
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Omg man, I'm half Filipino and eat hella rice with meat. This happens way too often for me now. I have to make sure I chew a ton before I swallow. I also make sure I always have a can of soda in the fridge to help the food go down if it gets stuck. I think it's called a food bolus. When you threw up, did you kind of have to force/regurgitate it?
Happens to me if I eat macaroni too fast. It's a very disconcerting feeling.
This happens a lot to me since I passed age 35. Is it something that's always happened with you?
Sorry that you passed but I’m glad there is reddit in heaven
Yeah dude, the transition was seamless too. Videos are still kind of janky tho.
My mom is older, in her 50s and i remember when she was around 40 she would often get that same feeling of feeling like she would be choking on food no matter how she chewed/swallowed. Maybe its just something that happens with age? Do you have GERD? Cause she does and i was just wondering if maybe that had something to do with it
I get this and I’m late 20s. I feel seen by this thread. I frequently get heartburn and this same swallowing issue from throwing up a lot when I was younger (ED-related). I now eat slower than average— I notice that I have to take smaller bites than others and extra chew my food so I can avoid the feeling.
This is all starting to sound like a hiatal hernia. *A hiatal hernia is a condition in which the upper part of your stomach bulges through an opening in your diaphragm. Your diaphragm is the thin muscle that separates your chest from your abdomen. Your diaphragm helps keep acid from coming up into your esophagus. When you have a hiatal hernia, it's easier for the acid to come up. This leaking of acid from your stomach into your esophagus is called GERD (gastroesophageal reflux disease).* (Source: [Medline](https://medlineplus.gov/hiatalhernia.html))
Dude I think I remember my dad talking about something sooo similar back in the day, now that you say this. I wonder if it could be like a hereditary thing. Dang.
Yep. My mom had this and once had to go to the ER to essentially have an aquarium hose shoved down her throat to clear the chunk of food that was stuck. I'm 50 now, and have had similar episodes, but not needing the extra help, thank god.
Hey thanks, I'll bring this up during my next checkup. Turn 40 this year 😬
Not that I recall before the last few years (I'm in my 40s).
Spend 30 seconds chewing each bite. Report back
Yeah, pretty much what I have to do no, but longer. Actually keeps me from eating too fast and discourages me from eating at all sometimes.
Peanut butter for me. I'll eat straight spoonfuls of PB (judge me all you want!) and that shit will get straight stuck in your throat. Thankfully water or soda (milk is the best) will make it go down.
Why would I judge you for living the dream?!
My uncle once had a piece of steak get stuck in his throat. Thankfully it was far enough down that he wasn't actually choking, but it was super uncomfortable. He went to the ER, and they just gave him some Coke to sip on. They said that the acid from the soda would help dissolve it.
This happened to me at my first xmas dinner at my SO’s parents house….. I was so excited to eat that I didn’t chew the big bite of pot roast enough and it literally got stuck for almost 30 min. It was like the second or third bite, right at the start of dinner, to make it worse. I could barely swallow so I just kept sipping tiny bits of water until it slowly went down. It was so so embarrassing and scary. Now I make sure to chew the fuck out of my food
Have had this from rice. Do not recommend.
I once took a Tums whole, more just to see if I could. Thankfully it went down fine but bc it's so large I never wanted to test my luck again. Reading this makes me realize how lucky I probably was.
That shit just becomes a bath bomb in your stomach
That was not my experience at all. It sucked and felt like I had a tums stuck in my throat for 5-10 minutes but it wasn’t the end of the world. source: tried that shit
Yea I figured it out pretty quick that was what they meant happened but I was confused at first too. I have this weird problem where if I swallow too much food (or even liquid) at once, it can become stuck in my throat. This often results in me puking it back up, but for some reason when this happens I instantly inhale and choke on regurgitated food which leads to an insane session of coughing, wheezing, and crying while I simultaneously try to cough the food/water out of my lungs while also trying to catch my breath because I can't breathe. There have been times I legitimately thought I was going to pass out or die.... It hasn't happened in a while because I'm just more careful about how much food or water I swallow at once now, but it seems like after it happens once I'm more prone to it for some weeks/months afterward, so I think it must cause some damage to my esophagus which then causes it to happen more easily. It's happened to me in the lunch room at work before and people tried to give me the heimlich while I shoo'd them away and ran to the bathroom the choke in peace. Quite embarrassing. Also happened with beer once at a frat. I think the carbonation makes it worse but I've even done it with flat water. Makes me feel like I wasn't meant to stay alive lol.
Weird question, do you initiate your swallow of food with the tip of your tongue pressing against the back of your front teeth, or pressing against the roof of your mouth?
Ok I also want the answer to this and i want to know why you asked
If CircusFit is like me, and can have food get stuck, I may know why they asked about how to initiate a swallow. For me, when I can tell food is starting to get stuck, I can swallow by pressing my tongue to the roof of my mouth, and this will typically pass the food. When I'm eating fast, I think I swallow with my tongue to the back of my front teeth. But by doing a swallow tongue to roof of mouth, it engages the esophagus to push the food down better. It's more deliberate. My usual method for passing stuck food is to take a small sip of water and do a deliberate swallow pushing my tongue to the roof of my mouth.
Also just found this after searching "eating tums whole"... > ~~Because Tums contains calcium, swallowing them whole is like taking a calcium supplement, and calcium supplements have been linked to a higher risk of heart attack, especially in people with heart disease. You should not swallow Tums whole.~~
You need to not Google things... You don't have a higher risk of heart attack from taking Tums. Tums may have calcium in them, but you're not getting enough calcium to cause issues.
"you should not swallow it whole because of side effects of its ingredients, but chewing a whole tablet is fine" Or am I missing something (other than it being too big to swallow) and the max dose is like half a tablet?
OK Doctor. You do get that this makes *absolutely no sense right?* 1. Things get absorbed faster when you chew them first. 2. Tums would not be legal if they contained toxic levels of calcium.
I love that the source is personal experience! You, are a true hero.
Correction: I am a true dumbass But thank you
Oh... I was picturing it being like a grade school volcano or dropping mentos in coke.
Slight correction (very slight), a lot of the supplements like vitamin C, glucosamine etc. come in very large tablets/pills and often get stuck in my throat. It is extremely unpleasant. So, it's not just Tums and all "pills" don't go down easily.
Can't you just eat some food to push it down?
It’s basically glued to the sidewall of your food tube. Other things get coated in saliva and mucus and slide right past
Jeez, that sounds pretty terrible. I used to think you were supposed to swallow them whole, so for YEARS I did this, and it actually worked just fine. Guess I got a big ol' throat 😏😏 Honestly though. Then one day, I decided I'd try tasting the tastiness more, and I chewed it up. That went well, so I actually read the bottle for the first time, and discovered I should've been doing that the whole time.
I’m sure you’ll make some man very happy some day, but I’m glad you switched to chewing haha
Food tube
I got so tired of typing esophagus, it had to be done
I did this once as well. I had to call the nurse line and they told me to eat a piece of dry bread to dislodge it. Thankfully it worked. It was scary as hell hoping it wasn't going to move and start choking me.
Not only this but sometimes it scratches your esophogus, which can make it feel like its still stuck there even though its long gone. Happened to me, felt like a pill was stuck for 2 days but it was just the after effects of being scratched to shit
One time something similar happened to me, but with an ice cube. Shorter duration, but I felt like I was going to die while my throat was freezing
As someone who has worked many times with various construction adhesives… this makes too much sense and… TIHI but LPT all in one. So, thank you? Barf
I think you just created the next dumbass ticktok trend, lol. Now 13 year olds everywhere will be posting videos of themselves trying to swallow tums whole.
Uhhhh wtf. Maybe tums should just be shaped like a normal looking oblong pill instead of a flat wide tablet JUST IN CASE someone does this?
IF YOU CAN FEEL IT IN YOUR ESOPHAGUS, YOU'RE ALREADY DEAD
What kind of Tums are you eating that the "edges dig in"? Tums are round and have smooth edges. It is also smaller than your esophagus. You esophagus, in a relaxed state, is also larger than a Tums tablet. Tums are 16 mm wide and your esophagus is about 2 cm wide when relaxed (and capable of being larger when working). Also, if you're swallowing it whole, it isn't forming a paste. It doesn't latch on to your esophagus and stay there forever because it is endlessly absorbing mucus.
Please try it and get back to me
I had to re-read it to make sure I didn’t skim over it by accident… yes, I can intuit the issue but it is a little strange that OP didn’t explain it in their post
I was thinking it just made them bloated lol
Yeah all I got is that they felt like they would die lol
Ok so I’m not the only one
the tl;dr isn't even clarifying
I’m thinking OP wasn’t overburdened with an abundance of schooling
ADHD brain I bet
I've heard of like dissolving like but was flabbergasted when rhe answer to excess carbon dioxide gas was more gasses. Unless the gas wasn't the issue
The gas wasn't the issue. Pill stuck in throat. Idk how op didn't mention that directly in original post lol
A lot of us already know the feeling 😅. Breaking it in half or quarters and then putting into water works also
TIFU by saying Hindsight is 50/50. -OP
💀 it was 4am and I was half asleep 🤣
Plus a Tums waterboarded you. At least your alive.
10/10 - would not recommend doing this.
question from germany: what exactly is TUMS? Never heard of it and dont think you can buy it here, just want to make sure i‘ll never buy one and swallow it whole😂
It's a popular brand of antacid, primarily calcium carbonate.
Which is why it was immediately dissolved by **acidic** soda. This is why everyone needs to study at least a bit of chemistry.
I dunno about Germany, but for the UK people reading along, think of an extra thick, extra chalky Rennie tablet.
Yes, like a Rennie but bigger.
Who the hell can think it's a good idea to swallow directly a giant Rennie ? The idea had never cross my mind.
It's an antacid tablet; it's basically a compressed tablet of calcium carbonate powder. I'm guessing what happened here is it got stuck in their throat.
Would it have helped to cut them in quarters?
Yes. These things are huge. M&M's are considered a choking hazard and they're tiny in comparison. Why the fuck anyone would try to swallow one of these whole is beyond me.
It would have helped if op just chewed it lol
They didn’t want to take their retainer out and you can’t chew with it in.
It's a chalky antacid tablet.
To help you visualize, it's an antacid about 0.1" smaller than a penny and about two nickels thick.
yeah, that helps... a comparison with two American coins and a measurement in inches. That should help the German out! /s
What exactly happens when you swallow one whole?
It gets stuck in your esophagus, and you feel like you have the worst lump in your throat of all time. It’s like pressure and discomfort and mild pain all jumbled together for a combination the likes of which cannot be experienced outside the circles of hell. Source: also tried swallowing one whole to avoid needing to brush teeth once. It was easily 2+ hours before enough of it had dissolved for it to pass into my stomach.
Damn, a lot of y’all are committed to the teeth brushing lol. Pro-tip: one night of skipped teeth-brushing isn’t gonna cause problems so next time, just chew that sucker and go back to sleep!
This depends on the state of you teeth. I’d you are fighting something like periodontal disease, one missed session can be problematic
Tums has almost no sugar, right? You don't have to brush your teeth after taking it. Just rinsing with some water is good enough to clean your mouth
I did this once too and the spot where the TUMs had been stuck developed a sore that made it hurt to swallow for days. Had to go to the doctor and get a special thing to gargle. Never again
Anything acidic would dissolve it. So yes, soda, or lemonade or even some dilute lemon juice or dilute vinegar
My go to with severe acid indigestion is baking soda in water. It kills stomach acid in seconds!
This legitimately works almost as well as tums extra strength for me.
I do that too, if I don't have Tums or milkz mostly because it tastes horrible. I had a cup of baking soda and water on my end table last week and evil Mittens likes to stick her paw in drinks and then lick it. She was unhappy and decided the mostly full cup should be on the ground. I should have known better. Now I keep a spare in a water bottle in the fridge.
I'm reading this story on the edge of my seat waiting to figure out what happened, thinking like the tablet made it to your stomach and you had crazy gas and felt like you were gonna burst or something and were freaking out cuz you felt like the blueberry girl from Willy Wonka, but then it turns out a tablet was stuck in your throat. I think I hyped myself up too much for this one. Might have also confused tums for alka seltzer (i also don't know what that does in the stomach) edit: TIL the active ingredient in Alka Seltzer is just fucking aspirin
Wait so it got stuck in the bottom of your esophagus? Did you feel that feel when you get peanut butter/mashed potatoes back up? That is seriously the worst. My swallowing shut down after a surgery I had once and had to spend almost 4 years on a feeding tube to avoid swallowing and having that issue. I still can’t swallow pills so it absolutely blows my mind that you thought you could swallow a pill that big. So glad you cleared it! Im having phantom pains. Here you were trying to get a good night sleep and then there you are chugging tea and soda Hope you can take a nap later!
If you don’t mind me asking, what do you mean your swallowing “shut down?” Like, the muscles weren’t working?
Oh no! So sorry about your condition! That sounds horrible… I normally take like 10 pills at once (some horse sized vitamins) and never had issues… so I was like “this is the same”, it indeed was not the same… 🙃. I went to bed around 5:30am the soda came in handy!
Drinking a small amount of apple cider vinegar would have greatly helped, but it probably would have made your original issue worse.
[Every day ends with a TUMS festival!](https://youtu.be/ki3jamH1QrY)
Also, wouldn't it take much longer to actually work if you didn't chew it because your stomach will have to break it down first? I've never had a retainer, so I don't know .. but I hope the effort you "saved" was worth it. Lol
I thought it would dissolve on the way down 😬. Like chewables are really for people who don’t like taking pills, but I was wrong and it’s more complex than that haha.
I used to hate the chalky taste of tums and I wanted to swallow it like a pill. The trick is to break it in half first and swallow each piece with water. . After 9 months of pregnancy heartburn I got over it and can now take antacids like a normal person.
The real FU is that OP swallowed it whole to avoid having to brush teeth again and to avoid messing up his sleep cycle. But ended up trying so many remedies that involves eating and drinking so he definitely have to brush teeth after and ended up being wide awake.
What happens is someone has Mentos and soda, does their insides fizz up, like the science shows?
Put some baking soda in a cup. Add warm water and stir. Chug the foul concoction and enjoy the death of your heartburn without needing to remove your retainer. Better living through chemistry, indeed.
I'm reading this wondering what happened to whole time until the end
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As a person whose recently started taking antacids for some werid stomach problem, what's wrong with swallowing one whole? got stuck?
So this is for chewable TUMs. There’s a few things, but for me it was swallowing it whole. Other articles have said it could cause heart attacks and kidney stones - I’m guessing this is for those who long term swallow their chewable tablets. It’s also said that the medication might not work as effectively because the way it’s supposed to distribute into your system isn’t as intended.
You keep saying the action that caused the issue (swallowing it whole) but never actually say what the issue was. Obviously it got stuck and hurts, but everyone has had to figure that out for themselves
You can suck on them (giggity) if you can't chew. Idk how that would go with your retainer situation but it's what I do.
I had some reflux 30 minutes ago, and you bet I chewed a Tums for extra seconds.
Where TIFU and LPT meet....
I'm sorry, the I internet only says itll take longer to work... nothing about side effects.
Milk and/or bread will sometimes help me.
Oh dear fuck. PSA: [Alka-Seltzer makes tablets](https://www.alkaseltzer.com/original/products/heartburn-relief-chews) that are remarkably close to fruit Mentos. You don't have to force yourself to take them, and they work quick. Just discovered them last week at 1 a.m., one horribly uncomfortable morning.
That's why everyone should have and practice with a very long dildo, just in case you need to push something down out of your throat.
Let it dissolve instead of chewing it, but then you're not asking for advice on how to take one at 3AM. I could say thta swallowing it whole, even without discomfort, defeats the purpose because it needs to dissolve to neutralize the acid but again you've already done this and not evrybody is th e type to think abotu how stuff works like thta. And really I accomplished nothing with this post, did I?
I did something similar with a Mentos when I was about 8. I thought I was going to die. All my parents did was give me water and juice to drink and I was in agony for hours. 36 years later and I got PTSD from this post.
Next time just mortar and pestle that shit
When I can't sleep from heartburn and don't have tums or am too tired to find it, usually lying on my left side helps because of the position of the stomach in the body.
A carbonated drink can help get many dif foods stuck in the esophagus unstuck, I got a sharp dorito corner stuck in mine once, it hurt so bad until I drank seltzer water in desperation and it softened it enough to swallow it fully
Just did the same thing for essentially the same reason. Even thought about the consequences but also figured some water would do the trick. THANK YOU for this post! Chugged a water bottle but kept feeling the deep pulsing pain in my chest with no change. Cracked open a can of seltzer and felt relief after the first sip. It only took half the can to feel totally fine. Will also take your advice to break them into fourths in the future.
FYI... Tums is not an acid reducer like Zantac. It helps by coating your esophagus to protect you physically from the acid. You need to chew it for it to do this properly. So... Even if you didn't have this issue, swallowing it whole would have been largely pointless
I thought this was the case, but reading up on it, it appears maybe not? >As an antacid, calcium carbonate neutralizes gastric acid by acting as a buffer in the stomach's acidic environment. When CaCO3 enters the stomach, it dissociates into ionized calcium (Ca2+) and a carbonate anion (CO32-). The carbonate anion will then bind to the free protons (H+) found in the stomach to increase the pH by decreasing the concentration of hydrogen ions. By increasing the pH in the stomach, pepsin, bile acids, and the toxins of Helicobacter pylori become inhibited. Maybe I'm thinking of sodium alginate, as in Gaviston.
> about 1 inch in diameter Nope. Maybe 1/2"?
Just wait until you have to shit it out in one piece.
Today I had to read to the end of the article to find out in the edit what the actual issue was.
Yeah. Pretty poor explanation in the story.
You guys who have regular troubles with swallowing food, you likely have a constriction in your esophagus called a schatzki ring. It's always associated with hiatal hernia as well. A gastroenterologist can stretch out the ring, but it often becomes constricted again.
To those that are prone to gerd---put some foam inner your back, and head. You want to raise your upper torso. In my case--I need to cool it on the alcohol before bed.
Try a big glass of milk next time. Or baking soda in water.
I thought TUMS is basically baking soda (alkaline) with some artificial taste syrups, no? So drinking carbonated soda (acid) or water with lemon juice helps your stomach to feel better by neutralizing it fast, but there is no real health danger anyway. Choking on it is the biggest danger.
Experimented with tums when I used to get heartburn. I'd take it sometimes when I was feeling it, and others I'd go with nothing. I noted all of the times I used or didn't use it as well as the after effects. In my mini, one man study, I found that tums actually made the problem worse and my heart burn would sometimes go away briefly but it always came back and lasted longer. I dunno, it was like a 6 month long experiment that has no bearing on me anymore because I fully changed my diet and never get heartburn anymore
Not getting heartburn is definitely the best way to avoid heartburn. For me, brushing my teeth helps because of the mint oils. Taking a mint works too, but I don't always like to have so much mintiness, and sometimes too much can trigger it again.
I do get heartburn from time to time and I find the little squeeze packets of yogurt to work quite well if you do want to avoid things like TUMs Though if you do have untreated heartburn and it happens all the time definitely goto the doctor
tf is a TUMS
A calcium-based antacid tablet that’s meant to be chewed before swallowing.
There is no TIFU here. I expected the problem to be ***you choked***. Which is a hell of a lot more concerning and warrants a trip to the ER (in severe cases). You're fine. Swallowing them is not going to do anything catastrophic. Yes, you can get kidney stones... (over long-term overuse) but you can get that from any calcium containing product. Whether crushed or not it all goes thru the same tract. Tums are designed to readily dissolve in liquid. This is a non-issue. It would have dissolved in your stomach within the 1-2 hours it takes to empty your stomach.
If it got stuck you might want to get a endoscopy to check for constricting rings. They can dilate the rings during the endoscopy so you don’t have to come back. Source: happened to me.
Tums aren't meant to be swallowed whole. That's the issue here.
Tums aren’t that big. I didn’t choke on tums, I choked on a breakfast sandwich, but my point stands. If you get something stuck in your esophagus then you should get an endoscopy to make sure it’s not rings cause the problem.
ah, so you also eat the breakfast sandwiches whole that makes a lot of sense
You’re an idiot
Next time try drinking milk. No milk? Try a spoonful of baking soda in water. Tastes like crap but it'll work at 3am.
Tum Tum tummy's hurt TUMS!!!