Motion Sickness; A choppy Ride
Ah, another beautiful day and another beautiful reason to head out to Shelter
Cove. Yes, there’s the warm grainy sand on your bare feet, the mesmerizing rhythmic
beat of the ocean breaking on the beach and of course the windy ride there. And if you’re
one of those who, while looking at the beautiful roadside view are also secretly looking
for possible places to pull over, motion sickness is a problem. And if your case is really
extreme a windy road sign just might as well be a road-closed sign. So for today let’s go
over that choppy world of motion sickness and we’ll try to navigate a path to smooth
sailing.
The picture of motion sickness is an easy one to spot. A feeling of uneasiness, a
cold sweat and then there’s tossing your cookies for the grand finale. The young and old
are especially vulnerable but really anyone can fall victim.
So what causes motion sickness? What we have here is a disagreement in the
body. Our bodies have a few different ways to detect motion. How does our body tell us
if we’re lying down or standing? We could open our eyes and see what were doing. In
the dark we could also rely on our sensory nerves telling us if there’s pressure on our feet
or across our body. And the last team member is in our middle ear, which detects
position and movement. Usually these three work together giving us a complete
autobiography. Motion sickness is when they disagree. So when you sitting in the back
seat reading a good magazine. Your eyes think your sitting still while your inner ear
thinks the body is doing gymnastics.
Some of us never could stand the spiny rides at a theme park and keep the barf
bag closer than our cheap complimentary blanket while flying. The key to motion
sickness is prevention. After the pale green monster has arrived only stopping the motion
will turn this boat around. And that’s pretty hard while sailing the ocean blue. But there
are some ways to keep your body in agreement. In a plan, try reserving a seat by the
wings, the steadiest section in a plain. (If you explain you might barf someone will
probably trade seats with you also) On a boat the cabin nearest the center of the ships
moves the least so book that. And plan of spending plenty of time on deck, looking at the
horizon. Take ginger tablets to keep the stomach calm. Ginger (or in a pinch ginger ale)
prevents the nausea and queasiness of motion sickness.
If motion sickness happens to you, you can sit back and wonder why me. Or you
can take steps to help your body adjust to today’s modern world; one that can sometimes
cause the body to get confused.