April 06, 2004

Tough chica Pregnant woman in rural Mexico takes a few shots of tequila and a kitchen knife, performs caesarean on self. Follows up by chewing sheet metal, spitting out nails.
posted by Koko 20 years ago
  • ....well damn
  • Any time that child gets up to some mischief his momma has a mighty big trump card to use to get him to behave.
  • She also has a trump card over any mother who brings up a 36-hour labor story.
  • Shee-it!
  • Kid can't come home crying after scraping a knee. I wonder if she'll keep the knife.
  • "Oh well, I was in hurry to get to the tractor-lifting contest, no way I'd lose my registration fee!" Seriously, now: why didn't she ask the nurse to perform the cut?
  • hey, now husbands everywhere have something to throw at the wife when she's crying after getting the epidural. "toughen up, honey. it's not like you're performing your own C-section or somethin'!" /me runs and hides from the women-folk
  • You have a point, flagpole. Is it possible the nurse did do it, but asked the mother to pretend she did it herself so as not to be struck off the nurses' register for doing a doctor's job, or something like that?
  • looked like the nurse didn't arrive until AFTER the deed was done. ::shudders:: Makes my 45 hour labor then c-section sound like NOTHING.
  • It must have been slightly traumatizing for her child to witness his mother slice open her abdomen and pull out a bloody baby. Do women compare labor stories the way older men compare hunting stories? Oh yeah Beatrice? Well, I once birthed a 15 pounder, through the vagina, in the snow, and chewed off the umbilical cord with my teeth!
  • Do women compare labor stories the way older men compare hunting stories? Oh yeah Beatrice? Well, I once birthed a 15 pounder, through the vagina, in the snow, and chewed off the umbilical cord with my teeth! Damn, I hope they do.
  • When I was a teenager, my mother hosted an evening for an expectant friend. To this day I can remember the voice of one of the women reverberating through the house: "It was like shitting a pumpkin!"
  • it would not have been necessary if adequate medical care had been available. Most likely, the nurse lived too far away to get there in time. Frankly, I think it's amazing what people can resort to when given no other choice. Makes me feel very bourgeois, sitting here with my electricty and heat, hot water and covenient hospital.
  • That's nothing. There was this one time when I had this hangnail, and it just wouldn't come off, so eventually I just got it between my teeth and yanked. There was blood and everything. She ain't got shit on me. I didn't even cry or anything.
  • Holy god-damned motherfuck on a bicycle. Seriously. I just... I just... Fucking hell. Her other children were around at the time, too. That's got to lead to some serious "Mummy, where did I come from?" questions...
  • I strongly suspect that most mothers, given the same (or similiar) situation, would have done the same thing. A mother's instinct is an incredible gift. It goes beyond most of our understanding. Thank God for it, too. An amazing and wonderful story.
  • Darshon: Yes, it is an amazing and wonderful story. And the women has the balls of an elephant (so to speak) But NO, *most* women wouldn't do what she did. Hey, I gave birth four times, only once with any pain killer (that with the fourth--had to be induced.) None of it was that bad--I had fairly short and easy deliveries--but it wasn't fun, either. I wasn't very vocal, but listening to five or six women screaming AFTER being given drugs makes me doubt THEY would be willing to volunteer for a self-caesareans. And I sure as heck wouldn't! Strikes me that it would take the same type of personality as the fella the cut off his arm when the boulder fell on him, then made his way through the wilderness to safety. Most people would just up and die.
  • reason 947 why I am never having children....
  • Agreed Bluehorse. There's a reason childbirth used to carry such a high death rate, and it wasn't because people would administer self-ceasers every time they had a breach birth.
  • oh. my. goddess. i sure as hell wouldn't volunteer to do a self caesarean but if i was in the middle of nowhere, and it was going to take too long for someone to come to my rescue... well, i think i would at least attempt it, rather than just give up and let the baby die inside me. and yah, uhm... this is reason/incident 999,999 why i will never get pregnant. *hugs happily barren self*
  • *whimper* Well, I would like to have at least one child in my lifetime, but definitely in a urban environment with a hospital that is minutes away. And at least three back-up drivers to get me there. That said, that is one brave woman.
  • Appalling and disgraceful that this poor woman be forced to such a desperate expedient. Wish her a good recovery, for there's danger of infection in cutting open anyone's abdomen (or anything) with an unsterilized implement. A most redoubtable woman.
  • I can't see myself having the courage and singlemindedness that this woman had. But we never truly know, I suppose, what we can do in the most extreme circumstances. Plus you know, a woman in labour is a force not to be reckoned with. We can break a man's fingers just by squeezing. :) All's I can say is wow.
  • Mexico is awesome.
  • Call me a mean-spirited sceptic, but you know, we only have Dr Valle's account to go on here, and it's a great story for him. Next time he's in an argument over budgets he can say "Hey - don't talk to me about priorities, amigo: I've got women out there who are performing their own damn Caesareans!". Could you really cut yourself open in the middle of labour - without hacking the baby to pieces or bleeding to death - and then get up and summon help to sew you up again? Are we sure the nurse didn't do the cutting as well...?
  • Plegmund: Sure, it's possibly a hoax. But people can respond in extraordinary ways under all sorts of pressure. People lift things that ought to cripple them to save trapped kids, for example. And hell, if Buck Shelford can manage to play a game of rugby while having his testicles stitched back together, I'm sure this could happen, too.
  • Fair point - I wish I hadn't read your link, though...
  • Pleg (may I call you Pleg for short) I don't doubt there's at least one or two women in the world that would do this, I'm just sure even the average rugby-playing red-blooded American woman wouldn't attempt it. *goes back to chewing off leg in steel trap to get away from watching the grandkids*
  • By all means, BlueHorse ('Blue'?) - speaking of names, I think the child really ought to be named Caesar (Julio Cesare, maybe?).
  • That's why we invented Tequila. All our First Aid Kits carry one bottle, you know?
  • Guide to emergency self-treatment with a kitchen knife and Tequila or Mezcal: One shot: Basic dental surgery. Two shots: Bullet extraction. Three shots: Cesarean. Four shots: Amputation. Five shots: Brain surgery.
  • Banana, Zemat!