Why does your saliva start to taste like blood if you ride your bike up a hill or run fast for a while?
Edit: Thanks for the Awards and the nice Comments.
Also blew up bigger than I thought!
In: Biology
I have low potassium and magnesium and it tastes like penny’s, I get muscle weakness, it feels like my legs are cooked noodles, and they get very heavy.
Talk to your doctor about a blood test. But its probably something else.
Am I the only person this has never happened to?
I have exercise induced asthma and I get this sensation right before I get an asthma attack after cardio exercise. It’s such a strong blood taste I used to think I was going to spit out blood but when I spit it was always just saliva. So learning the science now helps it all make sense.
Some people have provided correct and detailed explanations that I think might be a bit too high-level for ELI5, so I’ll see what I can do.
First, it isn’t your saliva that tastes like blood, it’s the air coming out of your lungs. You should notice that the taste gets stronger if you exhale forcefully.
Second, this is basically caused by your heart/lungs working way harder than they’re used to, which results in some blood getting forced into your lungs. The blood contains a lot of iron, which is responsible for that metallic taste that you instantly recognize as blood.
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