Since the 80s, Hugh Rooney has been having hiccup fits that can last weeks at a time — he's even been hospitalized for them.
The 78-year-old retired tube mill inspector has tried every home-remedy and cure under the sun but, once an episode starts, nothing will stop it until it eventually fades away on its own after a couple of weeks.
The hiccups are both audible and inaudible and come non-stop every few seconds every waking hour throughout each episode, which typically last two to three weeks.
Spoonfuls of malt vinegar or sugar, drinking water through a paper towel, blocking his ears while drinking water, antacids, Tylenol, Gravol, holding his breath for as long as he can, gurgling water, and putting his head in basin full of ice — absolutely nothing works to stop his hiccups.
“As soon as I tell people about it they say they have something I should try. If I thought it could cure me, believe you me, I’d try it,” he said.
Thankfully Rooney's hiccup episodes only come about once a decade.
He's currently about one week into an episode right now.
Rooney's been to several doctors — including his own son — but no one can tell him why he gets them or how to stop them.
His first episode was around 1987, said Rooney.
At the time he was on a cabbage-heavy weight loss diet and he's not sure if that might be related.
“One day I just started hiccupping. I figured, it’ll go away anytime — it’s just hiccups — but it just kept going and going and going until I started to feel a bit raw inside,” said Rooney.
Rooney said the rawness will develop just below his ribs and above his belly.
So much hiccupping affects his breathing and makes him very tired but because of the hiccups it can be difficult to sleep.
He'll be lying in bed and just when he thinks they've stopped, a few seconds later they'll start up again.
Rooney's never heard of someone with a case of hiccups as bad as him.
“You feel like you can’t do anything, you can’t live a normal life. You're too engrossed in the hiccups to do anything else and it gets frustrating,” said Rooney.
When Rooney had his second bout of hiccups, in the late 90s, it lasted almost three weeks.
The last three days of that episode were spent in the hospital.
People will often laugh when he says he has bad hiccups, which he understands, but when he's in the middle of an episode there's nothing funny about it to him.
"Even the doctor said... 'sorry for laughing, I know its not funny'," said Rooney.
When an episode comes on Rooney can mostly just sit down on the couch and watch talk shows and old movies to get his mind off of them.
Rooney's current bout of hiccups is just as bad as years past.
The night before they came on he was eating cabbage and he's wonders if that's again related.
The other day his wife Betty tried to see if she could scare the hiccups out of him.
They were sitting around the living room and she suddenly jumped out of her armchair and spooked her husband with a scream.
It didn't work.
On Friday afternoon Rooney went to the hospital and they gave him gapapentin.
If he still has them in ten days, Rooney said he'll go back and see if they can try something else.
"I hope it works," he said.
