21 People Who Thought The Unusual Things Their Bodies Did Were Totally Normal...Until Someone Told Them They Weren't
The human body is absolutely fascinating and ever so slightly terrifying. You could just be chilling, living your life, not questioning a single thing your body is doing when suddenly...BOOM, you learn that apparently not everyone's flesh prison does that Thing™️ that yours does?? Which you always assumed was 100% normal??? And apparently is not?? As someone who has experienced this and gotten a look of absolute horror from both my partner and medical professionals alike, it's a weird experience to say the least!
Redditor u/amistakewasmadehere recently asked, "What did you think was normal about your body until someone pointed out that it wasn't?" Here are 21 uncommon things people shared:
1."I can taste words. For example, if someone says three, an image of a cupcake immediately comes to mind, and I sometimes will start salivating. The same word has always had the same food association. It’s called Lexical–gustatory synesthesia."
2."I have a double uvula. That little hanging thing in the back of your throat...mine looks like a ballsack. I thought that's just what they looked like because, like, how often do you look in people's throats? I remember seeing cartoons as a kid where they'd zoom in on a character's mouth when they are screaming or something, and I just thought the artists were lazy, drawing a simple droopy line. But no, that's what most people's look like."
"When I was in my 20s, I went to the doctor for something unrelated, and she checked my throat and just said, 'Huh you have a double uvula. Neat!' I went home and told my roommates, and they all had to look in my mouth. I thought they would think the doctor was the weirdo, but they were all shocked. I'll never forget one saying, 'You've got balls in your throat!'"
3."I have cataplexy — I lose the ability to grip/hold things, chew, sometimes even stand when laughing. Basically, my muscles shit the bed whenever I start laughing too hard. Me, my sister, and my dad have it. My sister has even dropped her children because of it (don’t worry, it's more of a gradual release than a full blown drop, and no one was hurt). I grew up thinking it was entirely normal, and my mind was blown when I found out it was not. I asked the next 10 people I saw — my friends, coworkers, drug dealer — if they got weak while they were laughing, and they looked at me like I had three heads."
4."I spent 20+ years thinking bananas were sour and grapes were carbonated. Apparently, I'm just intolerant of them."
5."Dermatographia. I have really sensitive skin with an overactive histamine response. When I’m gently scratched with a blunt object, I get a hive in the shape of the scratch. I can write my name in hives on my forearm."
6."I thought I was bad at running because my throat would seize up and get painful whenever I ran for more than a minute. I mentioned this to my doctor when I was 30. Turns out I have asthma."
7."I once took part in a study as a paid participant. The doctors used ultrasound probes to examine the blood vessels on my face. They commented on how strange my face's blood vessels were. They struggled and puzzled a little while examining my face. Then they handed me more cash and asked whether I would be willing to donate my body after I died to a medical study."
8."If I’m sorta tuned out or focusing on something and I hear a sound behind me or to one side, I can literally feel my ears attempt to turn toward the sound (like many animals do, such as cats). My ears don’t actually move around, but there’s some automated reflex that tries to do it. I mentioned it to my wife (in an innocent statement that began with, 'You know how you can feel your ears try to move to pinpoint a sudden sound?'), and she looked at me as if I had six eyes. I haven’t found anyone else since then who knows what the hell I’m talking about."
9."That I had eight wisdom teeth grow into the extra space in the back of my jaw (two for each side, top and bottom). They all grew in just fine after 20. On my last trip to the dentist, I found out that I have eight more growing in sideways. The normal amount of wisdom teeth is four, not 16."
10."Thought I had great vision until I tried glasses and found that everything was so much sharper and more vivid! Apparently, my left eye has a vision defect, but my right eye learned to compensate so I never realized!"
11."The first year of menstruating, I had intensely painful periods and severe constipation. The periods would last two weeks, with two weeks in between each one. Everyone told me things would calm down and even out. Then one night, at a friend’s sleepover, I was in so much pain that I was sobbing on the bathroom floor. My parents rushed me to the hospital. Everything I was describing, pain-wise, made it sound like I was in labor. But I was 14 and still very much a virgin."
"After a week of tests and painkillers, they finally figured out the issue. I then had surgery to open up my second uterus and cervix, which had been sealed shut by a membrane. I had been having periods for a year and had built up, like, two liters' worth of blood in my sealed second uterus. So once that was drained out and I was put on major antibiotics, I got to go home and tell all my friends that I had two uteruses.
I was also born with one kidney. Not sure if that’s related, but I sure am a mess down there lmao."
12."That your brain never stopping is not normal. It’s actually a sign of hyperactivity. The first time I took meds and I only thought of one thing at a time? Overwhelming."
13."I knew I always had a stuffy nose, but didn't think much about it. Got on medicine that finally helped, and my nose cleared up a bit, and I could smell a little better in high school. Didn't realize how bad it had affected my sense of smell until college, though. I had a chemistry lab where we had to determine the scent of some liquids, and I couldn't smell anything until I breathed through my mouth. I was suddenly able to figure out each one. That's still how I 'smell' things."
"My doctors are aware I am like this, and my septum has been checked. It's not off enough to cause the problem. I just have a long list of incredibly annoying allergies that cause the issue. For example, I'm allergic to just about every green plant."
14."I was blowing up balloons with someone once and silently judging them for not being able to do it in a single breath. Turns out I’m the freak who just has a wild lung capacity for some reason."
15."Sometimes I can feel and hear my spinal fluid moving in my neck and the base of my head. It sounds like a rain stick."
16."Some of the women in my family grow a third set of teeth in their 30s. My great aunt had a nearly perfect set, only one came in crooked, but my mom's sister had hers come in next to her adult teeth, so she has two rows in some places, like a shark. My mom got a couple extra, but they were pulled, and I haven't gotten any yet, though I got to keep all my wisdom teeth, and they didn't."
17."I have perfect pitch. Somehow, a discussion about it never happened so I went through two and a half years of band learning notes and tuning the way I thought everyone else did. To make a long story short, I found out when my dad was trying to play a tune by ear, kept missing a note, and I finally yelled at him that he should be playing X note, which led to my parents freaking out and quizzing me, and me freaking out because I thought they were playing dumb. It took months and coming across a National Geographic article before it fully sank in that I had an entirely different relationship with sound than anyone in my social circle."
18."Nobody told me this… I ended up learning this on my own in my early 20s. I have a third nipple. I always thought it was a mole on my rib cage, and I actually used to like it and kinda thought it was cute. As soon as I discovered the truth, I immediately started to dislike it. And it’s funny, but it actually does make me feel exposed when I’m wearing a bra or bikini and one of my nipples is showing."
19."I’m very buoyant. I have a hard time sinking to the bottom of a pool at all no matter how hard I try, and float completely with almost no effort for very long lengths of time."
20."I’ve got ‘alternating exo,’ the eye doctor called it. I can choose which eye I can see out of and can switch as I please. Whichever eye is not 'picked' then 'turns off,' and I don’t see out of it since I chose the other eye. Since I've been able to do it all my life, both of my eyes can operate alone, so if I lose one, it won’t be as bad adjusting. Pretty nice actually, but the ‘exo’ makes me hate selfies because whichever eye isn’t picked drifts outward, which is noticeable to me at least."
21.And finally, "Aphantasia or the absence of a mind’s eye. When I found out that people can picture stuff in their head, I was amazed. I was also 45."
Does your body do any unusual things like these? If so, tell us about them in the comments below!
Note: Submissions have been edited for length and/or clarity.
