Here's a reason not to wear wireless earbuds if you eat things in your sleep: a Massachusetts man just swallowed one overnight and didn't realize it until later the next morning.

"Here's one for the record books," said Bradford Gauthier. "I woke up this morning, felt fine, but when I tried to drink a glass of water it wouldn't go down, I had to lean over to let it spill out into the sink. Gross. Something felt off with a lot of pressure in my chest, but I figured my throat was just dry or something from all the snow shoveling late last night... Right after that I looked around for my AirPod headphones that I was listening to the night before as I went to bed and could only find one after scouring the bedroom. Owen [son] jokingly tells Heather [wife] that maybe I swallowed it in my sleep...

Fast forward to a trip to the ER and an X-Ray, and sure enough I had an AirPod lodged in the lower part of my esophagus. I just had an emergency Endoscopy to get it removed. Be careful listening to wireless headphones when you fall asleep, you never know where they'll end up!... Big thanks to the Mrs. for dropping everything and bringing me to get the procedure done."

Here was the X-Ray. You can just make out the metallic piece of the AirPod near the top of the circled bit, and I've overlaid another photo next to it to show how the dang thing was positioned:

Gauthier had to have an emergency endoscopy to have it removed.

The solution? Don't wear wireless earbuds to bed unless you've got those suckers tied together or wedged in tight.

Also, don't mindlessly swallow plastic objects the size of a quarter while you're snoozing. Who does that??

Meanwhile, scientists are still determining how to keep us from eating spiders while sleeping.