And I Must Scream/Real Life: Difference between revisions
minor changes to the previous two entries and another one on a survivor of lower brainstem rupture
(Eben Byers' radium poisoning leading to extensive jaw necrosis, and some more details on Lacey Fletcher) |
(minor changes to the previous two entries and another one on a survivor of lower brainstem rupture) |
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*** Disregarding the possibility that her parents somehow restrained her on purpose, this all sounds a lot like an extreme form of a [[Hikikomori]]. (Well, combined with caregivers who are either [[Jerkass]]es bordering on [[Complete Monster]] territory, or [[Too Dumb To Live|morbidly stupid]].)
** Whatever exactly happened (we may never know), this case is really an abomination. And it seems it's [[Fridge Horror|not even the first time]] such a thing happens. A couple of similar cases are known from the last decades, the dark figure is unknown (in case of Lacey nothing outside her house looked in any way suspicious), and it's probably [[You Fail Animal Care Forever|a lot more common to happen with animals]]...
** As this case is ongoing, the details [[It Got Worse|become darker and darker]]. Contrary to what Lacey's parents initially stated, they were apparently away over New Year while she was dying alone at home, and unable to find enough food in her reach, she ''ate parts of the faeces-soaked couch foam'' as her last meal. Meanwhile, for all the years she spend wasting away at home, most of her neighbors didn't even know that she ''existed'' in the first place, and the few ones who knew of her thought that she had moved away. The whole crime scene was grotesque, with fresh cloths, food, various sanitary items and video DVDs all present in the living room but [[Room 101|''juuust''
** [[Tear Jerker|And the worst thing of all]]? Lacey had lost so much of her soft tissues to ulcers that self-tempered in the couch cushioning that, if she had been found some time earlier and ''still alive'', it would have been impossible to get her off that couch alive, as tearing open those huge wounds would have caused ''immediate exsanguination''. It's unknown since when she was actually fused to it (in the earlier years her parents might have been patient enough to get her up regularly enough to prevent this), but from her post-mortem injuries it was concluded that the "fusion" started a few months ago at best, and several years ago at worst. After that, she was essentially doomed, irreversibly fused to her own waste, getting eaten alive by a myriad of microbes and insects, no matter what would happen.
* [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eben_Byers Eben Byers] suffered such a fate after consuming the alleged [[Light Is Not Good|"medicine"]] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radithor Radithor] for chronic pain after a fall injury to his arm. After three years of regular consumption he stopped using it in October 1930, when he no longer felt positive effects and started developing headaches. Within the following 17 months, his health deteriorated dramatically: He lost weight, his teeth fell out, and his bones started disintegrating ''as he was still alive'', starting with his ''jaw bones''. As if this wasn't enough, he developed multiple cancers. Sometime in 1931, the Federal Trade Commission already suspected something being wrong with said "medicine", and sent a lawyer to Byers' home so that he could testify his experience. The lawyer found him in a devastating condition; Byers had [[Nightmare Face|most of his upper ''and'' lower jaw removed]] due to advanced necrosis and bone cancer, and he had multiple holes in his skull bones. He finally died of his multiple cancers on March 31, 1932, and his case became a testament to the dangers of radioactive quackery.
** There is an actual photo of Byers without his jaws circulating as creepypasta on the internet, known as the [[Exactly What It Says on the Tin|Man with no jaws]].
** Not to mention, Byers' fate isn't even unique. Probably ''thousands'' of workers who painted the radioactive paint onto the radium dials in the 1920s, known as the "radium girls" (since most of them were female), suffered similar consequences, known as the "radium jaw". And even before the discovery of radioactivity, a condition known as the [[Fluffy the Terrible|"phossy jaw"]], caused by white phosphorus, was fairly common among workers in the matchstick industry.
* [https://www.nature.com/articles/3101975 This] article describes a case report of a young man surviving atlanto-occipital dislocation with complete transection of the medulla oblongata (the lowest part of the brainstem). Thanks to immediate resuscitation and subsequent mechanical ventilation, he made it alive to the ICU, where neurogenic shock, bleeding and secondary infections were treated. It was then determined that he was completely tetraplegic with loss of function of all nerves starting from CN IX, could not breathe by himself, but was ''aware'' without gross cognitive deficits. A special tube was implanted for feeding (he could not swallow), and after surviving about a dozen of life-threatening situations, the patient went on to live for ''at least 16 more months'', while remaining extremely debilitated and developing secondary depression.
{{reflist}}
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