Man's Hiccups Last for 27 Years

Having the hiccups for even an hour is irritating, but can you imagine having them for 27 years?

Believe it or not, hiccupping for more than a quarter-century is not a world record, and Bob Taylor doesn't plan on sacrificing his peace to break it, the New York Daily News reported.

The Tennessee man is willing do anything to stop them. After all, nearly three decades of hiccups is more than most would be willing to endure.

He has decided to speak out and let the public know he wants to get rid of his hiccups for good, once and for all -- even if that means going under the knife.

They can operate, I really don't care what I have to go through to stop, he desperately told NBC affiliate WCYB in Bristol, Va., last week.

Taylor finally took the initiative to go to the Veterans Affairs hospital, where he was told it possible to stop his unrelenting hiccups by operating on a nerve in his stomach.

A person begins to hiccup when the diaphragm muscle involuntarily spasms, so there is a good chance the surgery would be successful.

Unfortunately for Taylor, almost three decades of diaphragm spasms wasn't serious enough to warrant surgery, WCYB reported.

But it is not an answer that Taylor wants to accept; surgery is his last resort.

There's no home remedy that he hasn't tried: standing on his head, drinking water and sugar water and even trying to eat a spoonful of mustard, according to the Daily News.

Unlike Taylor, whose hiccups started nearly three decades ago and persisted ever since, Charles Obsborne's started after he tried to tackle a 350-pound hog and fell down, according to People magazine.

He is documented as having the longest bout of hiccups, lasting for nearly 70 years. Osborne hiccupped from 1922 all the way to 1990, which got him a spot in the Guinness Book of World Records for the longest attack of hiccups.

He explained to People magazine, I felt nothing, but the doctor said later that I busted a blood vessel the size of a pin in my brain.

One of his doctors told People that the hiccups Osborne was experiencing were a result of brain damage.

But who can talk about hiccups without mentioning Jennifer Mee, the Florida resident best known as Hiccup Girl after an online video of her hiccupping went viral in 2007.

She would hiccup about 50 times per minute, but they eventually subsided after five weeks.

She made headlines three years later when she was charged with first-degree murder for having a role in the death of a 22-year-old man.

Prolonged hiccups are usually an indication of a serious illness like liver cancer or bowel disease.

Taylor, the Tennessee man, has been subscribed medications to help his hiccups but he says they made him ill, the Daily Mail reported.

In addition to suffering from the hiccups, he revealed he lies awake at night for practically an hour before his body will allow him to fall into a peaceful slumber.

I lay in bed at least an hour or more before I doze off, he told WCYB in between hiccups. I wake up in the morning, still there.