Reading In A Car Tricks Your Brain Into Thinking You've Been Poisoned

When she was growing up, my mom always suffered from motion sickness. Whenever her family went on vacation, it was common for her to vomit for the whole car ride to and from their destination. On one trip, my grandpa told her the vomiting wrecked the vacation for everyone. She replied, "Well, it was no roaring hell for me, either."

As she got older, my mom figured out how to manage the problem and can mostly avoid getting carsick now. Part of it involved bringing snacks along for the ride, but knowing what not to do was just as important.

The big one she figured out was to never read in the car. Since I never had this problem, I was often on map duty when we were driving somewhere unfamiliar. Yet, while she figured out the hard way what pitfalls led her to vomit, it was always unclear just why this was happening.

While it's still a mystery as to why some people get carsick and some people don't, we can at least know what's going on inside folks that are stuck with this nuisance.

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When we move, our body actually goes through a complex process to figure it out.

If we're running, we understand that our eyes are measuring the distance we're covering and our muscles tell the brain that they're being used.

At the same time, the balance sensors in our inner ears are sending their own message.

These are tubes filled with fluid. The fluid shifts depending on where we're going and how fast we're moving. So if gravity suddenly reversed and we were walking on the ceiling, these balance sensors would pick that up.

The eyes, the muscles, and the balance sensors all send their information to a part of the brain called the thalamus. This then sorts all these signals out so our brain can understand what we're doing.

Most of the time, all these signals agree with each other.

If you're moving on your own or driving a car, you're not going to have a problem. Your eyes can see the road going by and that signal matches how fast your balance sensors think you're going.

While your muscles aren't exactly strained when you're driving, their role in the motion is still fairly clear.

However, problems can start when you're in the back seat.

Passengers riding here sometimes only see the back seat in front of them, especially if they're children, which doesn't appear to be moving. Their muscles also aren't doing much, yet their balance sensors are still alerting their body to the car's speed and every turn it takes.

When the thalamus gets all these conflicting signals, the brain gets confused.

From this confusion, carsickness is born.

It gets even worse when you read because your eyes are focusing on the words and not the scenery going by out the window. Since you can read just fine, your eyes and muscles think you're still while your inner ears know you're not because they're picking up the car's movements.

But why does your brain decide to make you vomit?

Whenever your brain gets mixed messages from your body's sensors, it assumes you've been poisoned because that was the only reason early humans had for this confusion.

So your brain tells your body to vomit with the hopes of getting the non-existent poison out of you.

So what can you do about motion sickness?

If possible, you're going to want to either drive yourself or ride shotgun. This gives you a clearer view of the world going by, so your brain is more willing to accept that you're in motion because your eyes are suggesting that you are.

Otherwise, you're going to want to look out the window as much as possible to get the same effect. Hopefully the scenery is nice.

You can also settle your stomach with some light snacks.

Preferably, you're going to want something high in protein like nuts. However, anything that doesn't contain a lot of fat will work just as well. Fat and grease only make you more nauseous when motion sickness is afoot.

Don't forget to SHARE this and help your friends understand their motion sickness better.