Have you ever laughed so hard in your life that you felt like you were going to die? Laughing is undeniably a great thing, with the many health benefits it provides, such as, a stronger immune system, increased blood flow, higher intake of oxygen, and even sometimes to control sugar levels. However, there have been instances when a person was to die by laughing too hard (or too much). Yes, laughter, like most other things, should be taken in moderation.
A new study conducted by researchers of the University of Birmingham and Oxford University, examined past occurrences in which laughter may have contributed as a detriment to one’s health. A few of these hidden dangers were uncovered and published in the British Medical Journal.
In addition to the great effects we benefit from laughter, comes the dangers of laughter to people that may be prone to having a brain aneurysm (Which is apparently up to 6% of people). A single laugh may trigger a series of events that may cause the aneurysm to rupture, causing death.
There are other things that may happen too, like fainting, arrhythmia, and cardiac arrest. If you have asthma, laughing can trigger it. And laughing too hard may even cause a collapsed lung. However, it isn’t quite as serious as if you were to die from a ruptured blood vessel. If you have a serious heart disease, you’d be careful to not laugh too hard as anything that gets your heart rate Up can potentially cause something to dislodge and block arterial blood flow. Ouch.
However, many times laughter also signifies bad things rather than actually being the cause of death. For example, a disease called Kuru (a brain disease similar to that of Mad Cow Disease) manifests itself on people by literally having little things called prions attack and eat the brain – in which a symptom in the later stages is hysterical laughter.
A more common occurrence is that a person experiencing a stroke may have an unexpected fit of laughter as a first sign. These laughing fits might be signs of brain tumors, TB, and other things that will certainly kill you.
There are so many things out there that are out to kill us in which laughter contributes to. It might even turn our own bodies against us. However, everyone’s time comes eventually, and why wouldn’t you want to go out with a hilarious BANG? God, that sounds awful. Nah, I’d rather die an old, humorless man.
