Eli5: Food vs finger – feeling of vomit in throat

Question

Hi,

Can you please eli5: why do you feel like vomiting when you push your finger down your throat yet when you gulp down food/water, there is no such feeling? What triggers this effect for non food items?

Thanks

In: Biology

Answer 1

If you open your mouth wide and look in a mirror, you’ll see a little bit of flesh hanging down from the back of your throat. That is your uvula. Aside from helping you speak and holding salivary glands, it also serves as a trigger for your gag reflex. If you touch it, you gag. Normally, when chewing and swallowing, you turn your food into mush that your tongue then slides under your uvula without triggering the reflex, but if you try to swallow something that you’d choke on, you’ll hopefully gag and spit it out before you hurt yourself.