Have you ever been drifting off to sleep, only to be jerked awake by the sound of a bomb going off inside your head? If you have, then you have most likely experienced exploding head syndrome, a mysterious and poorly understood sleep disorder. Exploding head syndrome (EHS) belongs to a family of sleep disorders known as parasomnias. Other parasomnias include sleep paralysis and hypnic jerks – the cause of that unpleasant feeling of falling we sometimes experience when drifting off to sleep.
EHS has been known to medical professionals since at least 1876, and apparently the French philosopher and scientist René Descartes experienced it. Despite that, we know surprisingly little about the condition.
