“YOUR BREATH IS BUGGING ME” #MindOfMarlar
#MindOfMarlar is written by Darren Marlar, host of Weird Darkness
A 58-year-old man from Haikou, in China’s Hainan Province (and no, I refuse to rewrite this story to make it into a Haiku, because nobody likes Haikus – plus, I’m too lazy). Anyway, this guy – let’s call him Mr. Haiku – recently experienced what can only be described as the ultimate entomophobe’s nightmare – that being a fear of insects. Come to think of it, this could also be a story of halitophobia, the fear of bad breath. Most likely both. And if you didn’t have these fears beforehand, you’d certainly have them after this happened to you.
Mr. Haiku was peacefully snoring away one night when he suddenly awoke to a very peculiar sensation: he felt something was crawling up his nose. Now, for most of us, this would trigger immediate panic, jumping out of bed, blowing our brains into a tissue, grabbing a neti pot filled with gasoline, or sniffing up some Benedryl gel to stop the itching. (Hey, you do nasal health your way, I’ll do it mine.)
But this man? He didn’t panic. He just figured it was probably an itchy nose hair. Side note – if you can mistake a creature climbing up your nose for an itchy hair, you are probably way overdue to invest in a nose hair trimmer.
He didn’t have long to think about it though – as it turned worse almost immediately when he felt that “itch” slip down his throat. He coughed and sputtered, hoping to eject whatever had made the questionable life choice of entering his respiratory system, but nothing happened. At this point, it’s kinda mandatory to panic – right? At least gargle with hydrogen peroxide? (I hear you judging me – stop it.)
Not this guy. Mr. Haiku is obviously a really stoic individual – or possibly he suffers from narcolepsy, because he was able to shrug this off too and go back to bed.
The next morning he felt fine and pretty much forgot about the incident. He went about his normal day, but somehow he noticed something was a bit… off. For some reason people he normally got along with around the water cooler were avoiding him. And not in the usual, “I don’t want to hear about your stupid ear wax collection again, Carl” kind of way. I doubt his name is actually Carl – but hey, I named him Mr. Haiku, so why not name him Carl Haiku. I don’t know about the ear wax thing either – but I figure, hey, if he’s not worried about things crawling up his nose and down his throat, he probably doesn’t spend a lot of time thinking about ear canal cleanliness either.
But it wasn’t just people acting strangely around him – even his dog, Mr. Woofles, kept his distance. (Oddly enough, we do know the dog’s name in this story, but not the actual man’s name… that’s some great investigative reporting there, China!)
It appears Carl Haiku’s breath had gone from mildly “morning breath” bad to “Oh my gosh, did someone crawl inside your lungs and die?” bad. (Oh… if only they knew the truth.)
After three days of leaving a trail of wilting houseplants and unconscious coworkers in his wake, and coughing up enough yellow sputum to start his own horror film, he finally decided it was time to consult a doctor. Solid thinking there, Carl! Solid thinking!
The first specialist, an Ear Nose and Throat doctor at Hainan Hospital, took a peek up his nose and down his throat, finding nothing… except perhaps the vague regret he suddenly had of choosing medicine over accounting, where he wouldn’t be forced to smell this guy’s breath. But Carl was convinced there was something lurking within, something sinister. So, he was passed on to Dr. Lin Ling, a respiratory and critical care physician, who decided it was time for a chest CT scan.
The scan revealed a shadow in the posterior basal segment of the right lower lobe, which in layman’s terms means “Hey, there’s something weird down there!” Dr. Lin recommended a bronchoscopy, a minimally invasive procedure involving a tube with a camera. Now, when I hear “tube and camera going into my body” I immediately think of a colonoscopy – which would be a tough decision if it was between that and just living with bad breath. It’d be a toss-up. But fortunately this tube and camera were going down the other end – kind of like an endoscopic safari, but this time into the dark and mysterious jungles of the human lung. And you know the jungle… there are scary creatures lurking in there! Almost as scary as what you might find in a colonoscopy.
During the procedure, Dr. Lin peered into the bronchus and saw… wings. “Well, that’s unusual,” he thought, though he probably used more medical jargon. He pulled out his Doctor Dictionary and Endoscopic Encyclopedia and flipped through the pages looking for what organ of the human body might possibly have wings… and, unsurprisingly, found none.
After a lot of suctioning, out came a phlegmy blob that could rival any child’s slime collection. The culprit was revealed: a cockroach. Yep, a real-life, crawling, crunchy cockroach, just hanging out, living its best life rent-free in the roach motel that doubled as this man’s trachea.
Once the little tenant was evicted and the area thoroughly cleaned (we’re talking industrial-strength mouthwash levels here – and possibly a tiny flamethrower), the man’s breath returned to normal, and he made a full recovery. Physically, that is. I can’t imagine anybody walking out of this not needing some serious professional mental health counseling. Mr. Haiku was discharged the next day, undoubtedly with a newfound appreciation for bug spray and air purifiers… and probably breath mints.
Dr. Lin said cases like this are rare, but he advised that anyone who feels something crawling up their nose in the middle of the night should probably not ignore it and go back to sleep.
Solid thinking, there, Doc; solid thinking.
(Source: Oddity Central: https://weirddarkness.tiny.us/bddussc5 | Video created by https://www.fiverr.com/vane875)
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