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Ask HN: Am I the only one who gets temple pain during prolonged calls?

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Ask HN: Am I the only one who gets temple pain during prolonged calls?

#1

Post by FirstTimePostin »

I don't believe in the whole phones cause cancer thing, but I also cannot deny what I am experiencing. Here are some more details:

- I experience this during phone calls of duration > 25 minutes or so.

- I keep my phone maybe 10 cm away from my temple.

- I experience the discomfort on the side where I am listening at the very front of my forehead.

- The discomfort remains for some time after calling. I am still feeling it and I have ended the call more than 15 minutes ago.

- The discomfort feels like a sporadically pulsating vein and also similiar to when I get a headache from being dehydrated (could that be it?)

- I happens both with WIFI calling (VOIP?) and over LTE.

- I don't experience this while using WIFI or LTE data for prolonged hours.

- I experienced this throughout my whole life; throughout every generation of phone (I'm I millennial).

- I lived for many years in an apartment facing a phone antenna who was just 20 meters away at most, and I did no experience additional discomfort than usual.

- I don't get any discomfort from WIFI or radio signals. Except, ...

- If I turn on the microwave for a prolonged period of time and stay near the door, I do experience a shrinking/tightening of my whole head. I cannot recall if this happened with all microwaves I owned.

- I don't use Bluetooth ear plugs or other Bluetooth devices so I cannot comment on those.

- When I was a kid, we would be tens of boy scouts packed in a minivan and driven around and everyone (except me) would be playing with their Nokia (this is late '90s / early '00s) and I would experience a similiar headache. I later attributed this to possible CO/CO2 poisoning.

- This happens to me, without fail, even when I am very concentrated on the conversation and without any thought in this direction what so ever, so I don't think I am being hypochondriac.

Has anyone experienced anything similiar? What could be causing it? I know next to nothing about biology, so I cannot say myself. It's such a weird phenomenon. I am not even sure I am not imagining it, but, it usually happens that during the talk, I just get this sudden sharp localized pain, and it takes me by surprise.

Re: Ask HN: Am I the only one who gets temple pain during prolonged calls?

#2

Post by anymouse2 »

Hmm , not sure . I recall a manual for an early Siemens flip phone and was somewhat surprised to read (similar) that ' of the 350 people ( of 600 ) whom tested positive for BRAIN CANCER , that the problem was not consider to be their phone because the BRAIN CANCER developed on the 'other side of their head' and was not associated with (their particular model) of cell phone . I have personally used the speaker phone at a distance since reading that Siemens flip phone manual , believe or not , your choice I guess , regards and good health .

Re: Ask HN: Am I the only one who gets temple pain during prolonged calls?

#3

Post by ddingus »

anymouse2 wrote: post #2

Hmm , not sure . I recall a manual for an early Siemens flip phone and was somewhat surprised to read (similar) that ' of the 350 people ( of 600 ) whom tested positive for BRAIN CANCER , that the problem was not consider to be their phone because the BRAIN CANCER developed on the 'other side of their head' and was not associated with (their particular model) of cell phone . I have personally used the speaker phone a…

I use either speaker or earbud with mic for all my calls.

And for similar reasons.

It is super easy to eliminate that life risk.

Re: Ask HN: Am I the only one who gets temple pain during prolonged calls?

#4

Post by FirstTimePostin »

anymouse2 wrote: post #2

Hmm , not sure . I recall a manual for an early Siemens flip phone and was somewhat surprised to read (similar) that ' of the 350 people ( of 600 ) whom tested positive for BRAIN CANCER , that the problem was not consider to be their phone because the BRAIN CANCER developed on the 'other side of their head' and was not associated with (their particular model) of cell phone . I have personally used the speaker phone a…

As I said, I don't believe in the whole brain cancer thing, because if there was merit to it, there should be more conclusive evidence by now. The symptoms would also not be so abrupt. If this is something it must be the heating of my brain/ear/head tissue irritating me somehow. I almost never used the speaker phone, but I will experiment with that.

All older phone manuals used to have warning about radiation, I believe, but this was just a precaution.

It is also worth mentioning that I get irritated and nauseous very easily. Being too long in the sun causes my ears to ache, for example, also giving me head aches.

Re: Ask HN: Am I the only one who gets temple pain during prolonged calls?

#6

Post by FirstTimePostin »

codingdave wrote: post #5

Sounds less like radiation or anything like that, and more like an odd muscle cramp from some ergonomic concerns with how you take calls.

In that respect I would more readily believe that maybe the loudness of the call is causing my inner ear some pain. But it really does not feel like that.

I am trying to understand why I only get irritated by phone calls and (possibly) microwave ovens, when we are constantly swimming in microwave level radiation. Do phone calls use more energy or something? Can it be related to the transmitted energy? I know most microwaves I used are old so I would not be surprised that they leak a bit from their shielding.

Re: Ask HN: Am I the only one who gets temple pain during prolonged calls?

#7

Post by Jtsummers »

Have you investigated the possibility that it's the noise itself? Perhaps at a high or low frequency that you are less aware of. Especially given your notes about the microwave and car rides. Those are both noisy environments, and both can have a regular mechanical sound at frequencies that may irritate you but you may not be paying much attention to.

Try standing next to your AC unit or similar mechanical system when it's running and see if it also causes a headache.

Re: Ask HN: Am I the only one who gets temple pain during prolonged calls?

#10

Post by seabass-labrax »

readyplayernull wrote: post #9

I remember my cousin had an old desktop computer speaker and it would start buzzing 1-2 seconds before a nearby cellphone started ringing. I never investigated what caused that, but it seems there is some signal power rise.

This is a rather well-known phenomena, to the extent that I was once advised, when going back-stage in a theatre, not to bring my mobile phone lest it set the theatre's sound system buzzing.

It's caused by the periodic nature of the data frames in the original GSM protocol[1]. Judging by the existence of academic research from 2005 into mitigations[2], I'd venture a guess that it has been fixed in the more recent protocol revisions and so is no longer as common (which matches my own experience in any case).

[1]: https://electronics.stackexchange.com/questions/39127/why-do...

[2]: https://www.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:836430/FULLTEXT0...

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