How 1 Song Got a Woman Hospitalized

A young woman had to get medical help because songs would get stuck in her head for months on end. So where do earworms come from? What songs make more notorious earworms? And how to get rid of a song that gets stuck in your head? Let’s get into it!

[How Earworms get Stuck in your Head]

[Other Sources]

[zippee]

it's worse when you have a song stuck in your head but you can't even remember how it goes so it's just randomness and a few notes repeating constantly

[akiraxapocalypse]

This may sound strange, but a way I’ve learned to often help deal with “ear worms” is to imagine the *end* of the song playing, and then immediately try to think of something else afterward. It doesn’t work 100% of the time, but it has helped me on many occasions!

[DaemonRayge]

"Cant get you out of my head" as an earworm. How fitting.

[audreyyale]

I once had "I want it that way" by the Backstreet boys stuck in my head for a month on end. I thought I was going insane. It didn't leave until my sister played the whole song instead of just the one part.

[secondary_yt]

It’s all fun and games till you have the entire track of “everywhere at the end of time” stuck in your head

[joemck]

"Musical itch" sounds very accurate. It's like my brain is stuck in one little piece of the song and, for me, listening to the whole song is usually the most effective way to "scratch the itch" and get my brain through the rest of the song.
Conversely, if I listen to a catchy song and stop it partway into the chorus (or otherwise the catchy part), that's the most effective way to get it stuck.

[tinygoatanimatesstuff]

As someone with OCD, ear worms can be BRUTAL. Sometimes it’ll take hours to fall asleep cause five different songs are looping in my head. Sometimes screaming a song in my head that never becomes a ear worm is the only way to drown them out. Fortunately most of the times it’s songs that I like, but even those are anxiety inducing.

[Creepy_Cuckooclock]

This happened to me, and eventually turned into voices as well. I am surprised I was not hospitalized in that time. It happened for around 1 year. I could only sleep with a radio, and only hearing other noises and music would make it go away while hearing those things. Any classical piece or any type of music could become an ear worm. I still can not listen to some songs without fearing that they will trigger an episode again. And then, whenever I heard another song, that would become trapped in my head and constantly repeating. My brain somehow forgot the songs on the radio, as I was falling asleep.

I did not know at first if I was actually hearing things or not. I have had it happen in the last 5 years as well. It happened around a year and a half ago for 2 months. Before that, it only happened for around 1 week.

[kandreasworld]

My personal favorite is when I get two completely different songs stuck in my head at the same time. They play simultaneously. I can alternate lines from each song as I sing along. It's kind of fun.

[hdkwhdkshdkjf]

"If you have a song stuck in your head, you might have a earworm."

My brain:
*What you know about rollin down in the deep*

[sweetpotato]

I never thought having a ear worm could be a bad thing... sometimes I get a catchy song in my head, and I will sing it in my mind a couple of times while working or doing something, but I never thought it could be a very bad negative thing... but I guess anything can be bad if it becomes too overbearing for a person

[FeliciaRojasDMA]

Lately my husband and I have been passing “Mixed Nuts” from Spy x Family back and forth between us.

I think what usually helps me with my ear worms is learning the song in-depth and practicing/rehearsing it till it’s performance ready 😅

[thescholarsjourney]

So.... songs constantly in your head every waking moment ISN'T normal?

[EEEGZ-YT]

the fact that “cant get you out of my head” is a common ear worm is ironic

[kimm]

Am I the only one that always has music playing in their head all day, every day? Because mine practically never stops! There's always some sort of song playing, unless I'm actually listening to music, which is the only time it goes away. I've had full songs, parts of songs, instrumentals, and even songs I hadn't heard in years randomly pop into my head at all hours of the day. It's so constant to me that it just blends into the background, like my own little soundtrack. Is anyone else like this or is it just me?

[Shako_Lamb]

I've been diagnosed with OCD and while my earworms have never been outright debilitating, they have been to the point of extremely obnoxious before, especially around the time when I was going through puberty. Two that I remember were when I was around 13 and heard Gotye's "Somebody That I Used to Know" for the first time playing in a store, then was awake in bed until nearly 6am that night with that xylophone loop playing VIVIDLY in my head over and over again, and sometime not long after that, I think I was 14, I had the chorus of Bonnie Tyler's "Total Eclipse of the Heart" stuck in my head nonstop for nearly an entire month.

[Movie_Games]

For some reason I looked up Adam's Song a few days ago and I can't get just random lyrics out of my head. I don't even like Blink 182. It's torture.

[asgardianews]

"There's some wh*res in this house, " was stuck in my heas for 2 days after hearing WAP once.

[CrezzyCreeper]

Imagine an earworm Rick Rolling you for a whole month.

[cryptidbunny]

My mom suffered head trauma in a car wreck and suffered a few neurological effects, including some memory loss and inability to recall words in conversation. She's mostly recovered now, but one of the long-lasting effects was getting lyrical songs stuck in her head REALLY easily and struggling to get rid of them. She basically just can't listen to any music with lyrics in English anymore. Instrumentals and non-English lyrics don't bother her, at least.