We all like to rant and rave about our workplace annoyances—but what about workers in medical professions?
These poor souls face terrifying, heartbreaking—and mostly just plain disgusting—experiences, and they have to attend to them STAT. These Reddit stories, however, come with a warning: only the brave, and those with stomachs of steel, should read on.
1. She Was Lying In Wait
woman in red shirt wearing blue gogglesPhoto by MedicAlert UK on UnsplashI got a fast bleep one night to a side room on the ward. A fast bleep means “drop everything you’re doing and attend to this emergency please.” When I entered the room, I found no patient in the bed. Not anywhere in the room. I was just about to leave the room and go back out to the nurses station, where there had been a bit of a hubbub when I’d dashed past the first time, when something caught my eye.
I looked up at the ceiling—and couldn’t stop myself from screaming. It was a face with wide, slightly wild “psych eyes” peering down at me. She was a lady waiting for a bed in the psych hospital who’d clearly thought the ceiling was the best place to hide from the people trying to poison her. Honestly, I can’t think of another occasion that I’ve been quite so terrified.
Worst thing was that I had to walk—well, dash—back out underneath her to get help from the nurses and security to get her down.
2. This Is Why We Have Two
While I was in training at an army hospital, the doctors would provide free medical attention to civilians that couldn’t afford it on their own. One story was about a woman in her seventies who came in complaining about a problem with her anus. And that’s not even the bizarre part. When the doctors went to roll her onto her side, one of the guys grabbed her arm, and it just flopped freely like it was just hanging on by skin.
They freaked out and asked her if she was okay and if her arm hurt. She said that it was no big deal, and that it was just her bad arm. As it turns out, when she was 16 years old, she fell down and completely dislocated her shoulder. They didn’t have access to medical attention, so she just lived with it like that for over 50 years.
She just conceded that she would never use that arm. He said that it could have been reset very easily without surgery, if they would have taken care of it when it happened. This story makes me so sad every time I think of it.
3. Right Angle? Wrong Angle
man riding on gray road bicycle during daytimePhoto by Beau Runsten on UnsplashOne of my students was a nurse. She was a really pretty girl, about 30 years old, and quite conservative. So when I asked her about horrible things she’d seen on the job, I thought she would share a pretty tame story—especially considering there were three other students in the class, two of them 22. I couldn’t have been more wrong. She started by telling me that a guy came into the hospital and he was “swollen” down there.
Was his scrotum inflamed, I asked? “No, no, not swollen,” she said. “My mistake. More like…” and here she made a hand gesture which I will never forget. First, the hand raised, perfectly straight, as if to initiate a karate chop. Next, the hand folded in the middle. 90-degree angle. At this moment I began making horrified expressions and the other students, all women, began laughing hysterically.
The best part? His mistress did it to him, not his wife. He ended up telling his wife that he had been riding a bicycle after work and had fallen off and done this horrible thing to himself. His wife, crying and agonized, pleaded with the doctors to save her poor man’s little man. However, he told the real story to the stone-faced doctors and nurses, who proceeded to inform the wife of the truth.
4. Location, Location, Location
I work at a hospital, and one day I got a script for a dewormer with a ridiculously high dose. Higher than I had ever seen before. I thought for sure it was a mistake, so I called the doctor just to be sure. He said that it was no mistake, and then told me what was up. I must say, this is the most disturbing thing I can remember in recent history.
It turned out the patient was someone with Cysticercosis, which is a tapeworm infection. While this isn’t that unusual, what was unusual was the location. The tapeworm infection was in her brain. The doctor and I both agreed there was very little chance of it working, but he said there were absolutely no other alternatives.
5. I’d Like To Lodge A Complaint
person in blue gloves and blue denim jeansPhoto by Clay Banks on UnsplashI’m a student psychiatric nurse. While on a ward for the elderly suffering from dementia, I had one experience I will never forget. I was helping a client eat, when I got a call from one of the rooms in the corridor. The client I was helping was pretty much done, so I went to investigate, hoping that it wasn’t a fall as the call was from a room belonging to a very unsteady lady. Oh god, how I wish it were just a fall.
The lady who called—let’s call her Betty—was in the corridor outside her room. The first thing I noticed were her hands. They were covered in what could only be excrement. I asked her if she’d had some trouble in the bathroom. Hey, it happens, sometimes when you’re older you may be a bit shaky or confused, and I’m not one to judge the unwell.
So, I move into her bedroom to help her clean up: that’s when the smell hits me. For a second I just stare and try to take in what has happened. What follows is how my brain tried to process what I saw. There were traces of excrement everywhere: on the walls, on the wardrobe, on her clean clothes, on her bed, on the door. I think: that’s okay, we can clean this. But there was something strange.
The thing is, I can’t see any major, er, “movement,” from which it would have come. Then I notice there’s something on the floor. As if someone had defecated on the floor and…picked it up? Yes, there’s slide marks from someone obviously moving…Oh my god. She has taken a dump on her dinner plate. I saw, on her bedside table, a plate piled high with excrement.
And I just stood there. I stared for what felt like an eternity—more like five seconds in reality. Eventually, I called someone to give me a hand. Perhaps it was a political statement about the state of the food in the hospital, I don’t know. Regardless, I now have the best dinner table story.
6. This Dora Over-Explored
I was seeing a three-year-old little boy in the clinic. His mom noted that for the past week she had noticed a foul smell around this kid’s face when she kissed him, brushed his teeth, or got anywhere near his mouth. I examined him a little closer and saw that his right nostril was clogged with something whitish, but obscured by mucus.
I pulled out the alligator forceps and recruited two nurses to hold this kid down—he was actually quite strong. I eventually pulled a wadded-up sticker out of his nose. It was soggy and coated in green slime, but the smell was the worst, just putrid. His mom then told us that she’d recently bought him a set of Dora the Explorer stickers at least a month ago and some were missing. Mystery solved.
7. I’m Still Standing
On a night shift in a psychiatric ward, a patient somehow got out his window and jumped from the second floor. We all ran out and were surprised to find him still standing on the lawn outside. It was an incredible miracle. Mind you, he was screaming his throat out, but he was still standing upright for some inexplicable reason.
As we got closer to him, we realized why he was standing. He’d snapped both his legs straight off in the fall. This caused his splintered shins to impale the soil. It was kind of like a couple of organic javelins. Even years later, I still shudder when thinking about the blood, the creaking of the bones, and the screaming.
8. He Was Missing A Head
man in red shirt driving carPhoto by Mat Napo on UnsplashEMTs got called to the scene of a bicyclist that got hit by a bus. Upon arrival they found him without vital signs at the scene. This was no surprise, as he’d been decapitated. The EMTs searched for his head, but couldn’t find it anywhere. Eventually, they gave up and took the body to the hospital. The doctors there X-rayed the guy and were shocked. The mystery of the missing head had been solved.
The head had been pushed straight into his chest cavity and was sitting where his lungs and heart were.
9. It Broke Her Heart
I’m in veterinary medicine, and kids are what get me the most. Don’t get me wrong, adults can be big babies too, but I guess I just feel terrible for the kids because I got to keep all my beloved childhood pets until I was at least well into my teens. The worst one was when I was a receptionist. We had a puppy with a parvo infection dropped off that was already in bad shape. In addition, the family was dirt poor.
It was a cute little lemon beagle. When the owner came in to pick the dog up and heard that even with the best, most expensive supportive care, this puppy might not make it, she opted to just take him home for the short time he had left. There was a little four or five-year-old girl waiting in the waiting room, and when mom came out with the beagle she lit up, ran over, smiling.
She thought the puppy was okay and she’d have it for a long time. The look that went over the mom’s face absolutely destroyed me. Horrible.
10. His T-Shirt Predicted It
man sitting on the motorcyclePhoto by Harley-Davidson on UnsplashI’m a respiratory therapist in a Level One Trauma Center. One time we had a man come in with an open leg fracture. There was a literal bone, the femur, pointing up and the rest of the leg hanging off and partially resting on the bed. He had been in a motorcycle accident with his wife, who had been riding on the back. The wife didn’t survive the accident.
The worst part of the story was that he was wearing one of those biker shirts that read: “If you can read this, the wife fell off”. Pretty horrible stuff.
11. They Just Fell Off
I’m a medical student. I was in the ER one shift and a rather obese man was brought in by his family, who said he’d been very confused lately. I went to go see the patients while the lab results from a standard blood count and chemistry were being processed by the lab. Being a medical student, I didn’t have a clue what was wrong with the guy.
After rapidly exhausting my line of questioning on an incoherent patient, I started doing a physical exam. As I removed his socks to check his pedal pulses and reflexes, I noticed that the sock I just pulled off felt like they had rocks in them. Big rocks. Curious, I emptied out the sock onto the bed, only to see that they were his toes. Three of them. It was the most disturbing sight I’ve ever seen.
The lab results came back, unsurprisingly, with a screamingly high blood glucose—totally off the charts. We figured out what happened. He’d had severe diabetic neuropathy and chronic, extreme hyperglycemia. Because of this, he couldn’t feel his toes become ischemic and was too confused to regularly check them, so they had just fallen off.
12. This Coffee Tastes Funny
StableDiffusionOne time, in the Intensive Care Unit, a patient was coughing up loads of sputum and, between changing the apparatus to catch it, the nurses caught some of it in the only thing they had handy: a Styrofoam cup. After a few moments, when the craziness was over and everyone went back to their day. One nurse, mistaking the cup of sputum for a cup of coffee, took a drink.
13. Teenagers Bad, Aunt Good
I’m currently a vet tech, but heading to nursing school soon. Once I had a 75 kg (160 lb) mastiff/St. Bernard mix brought in for a supposed tapeworm problem. One of the female techs lifts his tail to take his temperature and squeals then runs away. I look and see maggots around his tail. I start to shave and see that his skin is full—and I mean full—of little holes that maggots are crawling into and out of.
I keep shaving his very thick fur and reveal more and more skin that looks this way. I shave the entire dog up to his last rib before I found healthy skin. The maggots are everywhere. I have him on a grate above a bathtub so I can spray the maggots off. I spent four hours shaving and cleaning him and removed no less than two gallons of maggots from this dog’s skin. We know there were more because his entire gut was infected with them.
Later we found out what had happened. It turns out that the owners of the dog were in Europe on vacation, and their four teenage children were responsible for the dog. The wife’s sister was watching the children but was terrified of dogs, so she didn’t handle it directly. They were leaving this rather large dog with super-dense fur in the rain during a Charleston spring, which means it’s hot and muggy.
The dog probably got a small area of moist dermatitis that got infected and was left untreated and slowly spread through half the dog’s body. All four children were present when the veterinarian told them what happened and said that there wasn’t anything we could do but euthanize. Not one of them showed the slightest bit of remorse or acted as if they cared.
Only the aunt, who is terrified of dogs, remained with the dog as we gave the injection. She cradled the dog’s head in her lap and wept because of how the dog must have felt. He was so good during the entire ordeal and wanted nothing more than for someone to pet his head.
That is the only time I ever cried because of my job.
14. It Just Spilled Out
man in blue topPhoto by Payam Tahery on UnsplashPharmacy guy here, but I work with anesthesia during surgeries at night and the worst surprise I had was on a simple operation. An obese woman was having a boil on her arm lanced and drained…simple enough…but the minute the tiny incision began there was this popping sound. To our shock, the skin from elbow to shoulder split wide open. Black goo and puss then seeped out from where she had developed compartment syndrome. It was all over the table.
There’s just not enough peppermint gauze in the world to cover up someone’s necrotic flesh smell.
15. Thank You For Sharing
I’m not a doctor or a nurse, but I work in a pharmacy and have heard some pretty awful things. Some people have no shame. One morning, our pharmacist got a call from a long-time customer who wasn’t quite right in the head. She had gotten an upper gastrointestinal done and was prescribed pills to stimulate her bowels to get the radiation out of her body.
She proceeded to explain to our pharmacist loudly—the pharmacist put her on speakerphone so we could all enjoy—that she had been up all night on the toilet. And then it suddenly stopped, and it wouldn’t come out. And, she added, it hurt. So, out of all the things she could use, she grabbed a metal nail file and made “it” come out.
Well, at that point she was bleeding quite a bit, so she decided to stick a tampon up there and call it good. She was not seeking any medical advice, because—according to her—she was just fine. She just wanted to share this story.
16. There Was A Direct Link
A patient came in one day with a dire sore throat. Midway through the examination the patient started violently gagging, opened his mouth and vomited what seemed like every single pint of blood out of his body. It turns out that the patient had a condition in which the esophagus rubs against the nearby artery and, if left unchecked, the membrane will fuse together opening a direct link between mouth and heart.
17. It Went Nuts
A pleasant middle-aged lady was gardening one day when her dog went nuts and went for her in the yard. The ordeal apparently went on for quite some time until finally a neighbor heard, came over, and shot the dog to get it off her. I would have sworn no dog could do what that dog did, it looked like I would imagine a tiger attack.
The worst part was her arms and hands, which she had been using to ward off the dog. She lost both hands. It was, quite simply, horrific.
18. There Was A Boy There
A couple weeks ago an old man, around 90, was brought into the hospital by ambulance, which he’d called for himself. I was reading through his background notes and noticed that he lives alone as many older ones do. It turns out this guy had stopped taking his medication for his dementia because he forgot about it. He then also began to get dehydrated and confused as he also forgot to drink water or eat meals. But here’s where the story gets freaky.
The old man said there was a boy living with him that week, and he was staying in his room with him. He said he didn’t mind because he just sat there on the bed and didn’t say anything. After about the third day of this boy staying with him, the old man began to get worried because the boy had not eaten or had anything to drink. So, the man dialed for an ambulance saying he was afraid the boy was going to collapse.
The ambulance staff turned up and the guy toured them around the house for 20 minutes trying to find the boy. They see his meds are untouched and take him away to hospital for treatment. Poor guy, but his caring for his imaginary friend may have saved his life!
19. Zombie Pirate
I’m an activities director for an elderly home. One morning, I was delivering morning newspapers, when I heard a lady call from down the hall of resident apartments. She asked me, as sweet as could be, if any nurses were here yet. Before I looked up I said I wasn’t sure but I could take a peek for her. Then I looked up.
The woman was holding onto a support beam that we have on the walls like a ballet bar but sturdier. Her left foot is attached only by ligaments and is dragging behind her. She is literally walking on her exposed bone. I tried my darndest not to react and scare her. I gingerly helped her sit on the floor, before running for emergency services and my boss.
I guess at some point in the night she had fallen out of bed and didn’t think it was serious enough to bother a caregiver or someone about. She slept on the pad on the floor that is there in case anyone falls out of bed. Then, when morning came, and she heard me in the hall, she dragged herself up and asked for help.
I feel like a terrible person, but when I calmed down I had to admit for half a second I thought she was a zombie pirate.
20. A Living Anatomy Lesson
person in blue denim jeans with gray and black metal padlockPhoto by Ashkan Forouzani on UnsplashI was working in a hospital in Nepal for a month. A lot of people ride motorcycles there for transportation, and they also have minimal road laws and enforcement. As a result, they see motorcycle accidents at a much higher prevalence. Anyways, during one of my shifts in the ER a man was brought in with bloody sheets covering his whole lower half.
I gathered from the family that he had been in a motorcycle accident. I lifted the sheets up expecting to see a partial amputation or a crush wound, only to see what the doctors would later describe to me as a “degloving”. This is a fairly common injury in Kathmandu. Essentially his leg had got caught in a rotating tire. The torque of the tire and the friction it caused with his skin ripped his skin off and sent it hurling away. The rest of the leg was intact, just without the skin.
His leg was essentially a living anatomy lesson—till they amputated it.
21. She Couldn’t Speak
I’m a medical student and the most distressing thing I’ve seen is a lady who had multiple strokes within days. These strokes left her with many neurological deficits. She had the classic hemiplegic stroke leaving her unable to move her entire right side. She had lost all sensation in her arm as well. The lady was also in constant pain.
The worst part is, she then had another stroke which made her lose her voice. She couldn’t even tell anyone for two days that she was in so much pain.
22. Oh, That’s Where I Left It
man in white thobe standingPhoto by Sasun Bughdaryan on UnsplashAn obese lady came into the hospital and was complaining about a pain that she had in her lower stomach. We asked her where, and she gestured toward the area just above her crotch. We pulled up her shirt, and the pain was coming from below one of her folds of skin. When we started lifting the folds, we found a 20 cm (8 in) splinter stuck inside of one of the folds.
Not only was this piece of wood long, but it was wide too. The end was splintered on it, and that was the pain she was feeling. So, we carefully removed the thing and showed it to her. What she said next floored us. “Oh that’s my plank! I use my plank to hold up my stomach so my husband and I can make love. It must have broken.”
23. He Wasn’t Licking His Own Wounds
I’m a social care worker and care for people in the comfort of their own homes. I went to a job about a month ago and was told in the description that he had a few bed sores. When me and my colleague rolled the service user over, the sores were about double the size of a tennis ball. Also, you could see all the way into his hip bone each side.
The sores were really fresh and still weeping. All I could smell in the air was rotting flesh, not only all this, but I turned up a week later to do my shift again to find the dog had got on his bed and was licking his wound! Poor bloke couldn’t even move his arms. I blame the district nurses for neglecting him for so long.
24. Driving With The Top Off
red vehicle in timelapse photographyPhoto by camilo jimenez on UnsplashA man got in a freak accident driving a convertible. The top of his skull got completely cut off, exposing his somehow unharmed brain. When he arrived unconscious at the hospital, he was being treated by a mass of nurses and/or doctors. As he was lying on his back on the operation table, he started throwing up. Now, I’m sure all of you know how gravity works, but I’ll explain what happened just in case.
He was lying on his back: face up. His brain was exposed. He started throwing up. The vomit traveled in trajectory landing on his brain. In short, he was vomiting on his own brain.
25. I Heard Everything
A few years ago I was visiting a friend in the ER. He’d had some minor heart trouble and was resting in one of the rooms, which he shared with an elderly woman. Shortly after I got there, a nurse came in with a bedpan and pulled the curtain dividing the room in half. I wish the flimsy curtain had blocked out the sound of the old woman’s mostly liquid bowel movement, or at least the nurse’s comment.
“I know that feels like a bowel movement, but it’s mostly blood.”
26. Car Crash Changes Life
black steering wheel in carPhoto by Marek Piwnicki on UnsplashI’m neither a doctor or a nurse, but at one time I was aspiring to go to med school. I loved biology and anatomy and had received the Boy Scout first aid merit badge and CPR certification. I was convinced that my calling was to heal people, and I was leaning toward becoming a surgeon. This changed after I came across a car-car-truck-motorcycle collision on a highway.
The accident was a long ways away from the closest city, so no emergency services had gotten there yet. Bodies were littered everywhere. Mostly the bodies were still. Some, as I later found out from a newspaper article, were already deceased. One woman will haunt me more than the others. She was being held down by three other motorists.
She was screaming and struggling to get away from them and stand up, which wouldn’t have been too successful if they let her, as she was missing most of one of her legs. As much as I thought I was waiting for this kind of situation to prove my medical knowledge, I just couldn’t handle getting involved. Some people helped, some people did a U-turn to avoid the accident.
I did the latter while weeping in shame and frustration. As a result, I ended up majoring in computer science.
27. It Was The Size Of A Grapefruit
I’m not a doctor, but I worked at a hospital in the histology lab. I saw some slightly disgusting things (amputated leg of a morbidly obese person with clogged arteries, that the manager used as an anatomy lesson), but nothing rivaled the teratoma. Oh god, the teratoma. For those who don’t know what it is, it’s a type of malignant tumor that accumulates genetic material from many different parts of the body, leading to some pretty nasty surprises.
So, I was working, filing slides and whatnot, and in came an entire ovary with the teratoma. For reference, the teratoma was the size of a grapefruit. The ovaries gave the impression of a pale small stocking. So yes, it looked like someone had attached a small pale stocking to a pale grapefruit. That should have been a warning as to what would follow next.
My lab manager went up to operate on it, and as soon as he made a scalpel incision into the teratoma, it literally exploded. There was literally fluid everywhere. He had to change everything: the scalpel blade, the tabletop mat, even his gown. He later drained everything into the sink, which took a total of about five minutes.
After opening it up, we saw that it had to have been containing some sort of secretory gland, as there was this grayish stuff lining the inside of the teratoma—complete with strands of hair. He went further, and found a round bony core at the center of the teratoma. We had to bring out a bonesaw to cut through it, while my lab manager told me about the times he’s cut open teratomas and found fully developed eyeballs at the center.
Eventually, we cut through the dense core, and found a fully developed incisor tooth at the center. I was thoroughly disgusted by all that we had seen.
28. Maybe Someone Needs To Define “Lucky”
a person in a hospital bed with an ivPhoto by Olga Kononenko on UnsplashI worked at a hospital for a few years. One night there was a five-year-old kid who came into the emergency room who had apparently been playing with one of those yard marker flags. Well he was running and tripped, and the metal pin went into his mouth and punctured all the way through the back of his throat and out the back side of his neck.
When the kid came in, we had to literally tie his hand together, so he wouldn’t move the wire and possibly cause nerve damage. We ran all the tests and realized that this little kid was so lucky. You see, he had narrowly missed his spinal column. Basically, this meant that we were able to sedate him and just pull the wire out.
29. It Feels A Little Dry Down There
A girl comes to the hospital, and she’s complaining that she’s unusually smelly “down there”. The doctor takes a look, and sure enough there is something not right there. Upon further inspection, the doctor notices that there is an object deep inside her. The doctor asks her if she knows why there is something stuck inside her. And also if she knows what it might be.
The patient says that she knows what’s up there. It’s the cap to her deodorant. The doctor doesn’t even ask why the cap is up there, but just tells the woman that he’s going to take it out. It was her answer that shocked both the doctor and me. She said: “No please don’t touch that. I’m keeping it there as a contraceptive”.
30. I Had To Pick Them Up
yellow round fruit on pink surfacePhoto by Allec Gomes on UnsplashI’m a nuclear medicine technician and last week I was performing a Lung V/Q scan on a man who had congestive heart failure. Due to the buildup of fluid caused by congestive heart failure, each testicle was literally the size of a grapefruit. The reason I know this is because I had to pick them up and set them on a pillow—because them sitting on the table was too painful.
31. He Was Big But Also Small
I wasn’t a doctor or a nurse, but I worked as a patient transporter for almost five years. One of the responsibilities of the job was taking deceased patients down to the morgue. One evening, I was called to the ER to take an expired patient to the morgue. Another transporter and I entered the room to find something very strange.
The patient was extremely obese, yet also extremely short. I don’t know the exact numbers, but I would guess he was about 120 cm (4 ft) tall and 155 kilograms (350 lbs) which left him almost as wide as he was tall. There were pockets of air under his skin. I am guessing his tiny lungs collapsed under all the weight.
We couldn’t fit him onto our morgue cart, so we ended up having to cover the body under blankets and take his bed all the way to the morgue, escorted by security. The problem was that the weight distribution/balance on the bed was so different that we had a hard time steering in the hallways.
32. He Couldn’t Control Himself
I once did a wet-to-dry dressing, then placed a wound vac on a man that got flesh-eating disease on his thigh. In an emergency surgery he had received a fasciotomy from just above his knee to his hip and groin. It was rough at first but kinda like the body world exhibit so fairly manageable. I was able to dehumanize this portion of his leg.
That was when he lifted his leg up, so I could get to the underside. To my horror I saw that the thigh meat hung like an old person’s tricep. At about the same time, the man was overcome with uncontrollable gas. So what had previously been more like an exhibit in Vegas, had just become a man who has been skinned from balls to knee and is now farting all over me.
If you’re having trouble imagining this, look down at your thigh and just imagine no skin. No fat. Just muscle, tendon, and a light layer of blood. No, it’s not disgusting like some of the stuff I have read about, but there was just no way to compartmentalize that thigh. I was sweating profusely as I made my way through the long process. I kept my voice together and chatted with the guy, who was way cool, and got the job done.
Based on my limited experiences that was the worst thing I have seen yet on the job.
33. He Kept A Chunk
person in blue long sleeve shirt holding black and white trayPhoto by Quang Tri NGUYEN on UnsplashSo, my dad’s a dentist, and one night we get a call at home from the local ER asking if my father is willing to come in and deal with a patient because…well…they have no idea what to do with this woman. My dad is a rather stand-up guy, so he goes and opens his practice to treat this woman. I go along with him and help set up the room.
An ambulance pulls up and wheels this elderly woman into the clinic. From the get-go, the first thing that hits us is the smell. Her face is bandaged up pretty well, and we can see blood seeping through the gauze and all down her shirt. We both put on the double gloves, and double masks and my dad dives in. He discovers that she has something penetrating her lip. It’s mustard yellow, and has the consistency of rock candy.
My dad plays with it a little bit, and a large chunk breaks off. What’s attached is four of this woman’s teeth or rather, the decayed remains of her teeth. Apparently, this 78-year-old woman had never brushed her teeth a day in her life. What had penetrated her lip was an obelisk of plaque. My dad continued to clean away what he could, but the plaque buildup was so massive that she had literally rotten away all of her teeth and most of her gums. One spot was abscessed clear down to her jawbone.
To this day dad keeps the chunk in a jar in his office, and scares little children into brushing their teeth everyday.
34. He Can’t Forget
I’m an MD here. While in residency I was rotating through two months in general/vascular surgery, where amputations were very common. I was assisting with a bilateral below-knee amputation on a poorly controlled type 1 diabetic. Basically we were severing both legs a little below the knee. The patient had terrible circulation and hardly bled during the procedure.
The staff surgeon commented that we’d likely have to perform another amputation higher up in the future as the poor circulation would not allow healing. After the surgery, the patient promptly had a massive heart attack and was sent for stenting and a trip to the ICU. Several days later we were following up as the wounds were not healing well as predicted.
In an attempt to examine the amputation sites, myself and the surgeon began to unwrap each bandage. As we lifted the upper leg to make this easier, the 10 cm (4 in) of lower limb below the knee on each leg clearly began to separate from the leg above it as each side was mostly gangrenous, lifeless tissue. I’ll never forget the sound and smell.
35. Scouring Pads Are For The Kitchen Only
a room filled with lots of shelves filled with boxes and boxesPhoto by Árpád Czapp on UnsplashI work in a community pharmacy, so I don’t see the most disgusting stuff, but I do see the general public’s stupidity now and then. A regular came in one day. He had been complaining of anal itch, a bit of blood in his stool, and painful defecation—all of which had lasted for a long time. I told him it was likely hemorrhoids that were bad enough he shouldn’t self-treat it, but should have it looked at ASAP.
I guess he didn’t listen to my advice. He came back a week later and was asking for 90 or 99% isopropyl alcohol. I decided to ask why he needed it. It turned out, to deal with his anal itch/hemorrhoids, he was using a wire scouring pad to his entire anus. He was worried it might be infected so he wanted to kill off the germs with 90% isopropyl. I just pray I kept the horror off my face.
He then went on to say that the Crown Royal he was using was too painful and not working, so he needed stronger stuff. I told him NOPE!! NOPE!! As he walked away, I noticed the back of his sweat pants were stained with what looked like blood/pus/excrement. I called him back and told him to wait while I called an ambulance.
I later found out he had the beginnings of cellulitis, which is an early form of a bad skin infection that can progress to flesh-eating disease, on his anus/bum skin and a bacterial infection of the blood was beginning.
36. There Were Two Snakes On That Picnic
There was a couple who were having a romantic picnic out in a field and things got a little…hot and heavy. So, while they were occupied, they failed to notice a large red-belly black snake (rarely fatal, but intimidating-looking thing) coming closer. Well, this snake isn’t without a sense of humor and decides to go for a strike. But wait! Where do you think it bit him?
Yep, right on the poor guy’s shaft. So the guy and his girlfriend run all the way into the emergency ward. He’s got his junk in his hand, and both of them are naturally freaking out. The nurses treated him quickly and, thankfully, all was fine. I’ll tell you one thing: there wasn’t a straight face in the whole hospital for a week after.
37. He Was The Creepiest Creep
I won’t say it’s the worst thing I have ever seen on the job, but when I was a medical assistant, I assisted my boss, a doctor, in an autopsy. He was looking for the cause of a patient’s passing because another doctor made a diagnosis my boss wasn’t comfortable with. The entire procedure was quite a shocker at first seeing the woman I had known as a patient lying there completely opened up.
To start with, there wasn’t any blood, because she had already been drained. Also, she was morbidly obese and the amount of fat under her skin was amazing to see. When my boss began exploring her intestines, he tied off the ends. You can imagine what it would have smelled like if he hadn’t. He took samples and placed them in plastic containers.
I think the worst part for me was having to look at the mortician who was there working on other people. I swear, he was the creepiest dude I’d ever seen in person. He was very nice, but he reminded me of leather face from that horror movie. He had very bad acne scars, dark, dark eyes, dark hair, and was wearing a thick, white rubber apron with blood all over it. Gawd!!!!
Another thing that freaked me out was when I asked him who the person was covered up close by and he told me. It was my dentist! I didn’t even know he was deceased!
38. It Was Moving
a black and white photo of various mri imagesPhoto by National Cancer Institute on UnsplashThis story is creepy: about a dude I saw on neurology when I was an intern. He was from Southeast Asia with altered mental status and abdominal pain, and altered liver function tests. The pictures of his belly on plain films, CT scan, and MRI showed a mass, but the mass kept looking blurry and like it was changing shape and size.
We sent him for an ultrasound and the tech nearly had a heart attack, because the “tumor” was moving. Turns out the guy had picked up some nasty parasite on his last trip back to visit the family. We finally saw the 8 cm (3 in) worm moving and swimming around inside its little ball of goo on the recording of the exam. The whole team almost blew chunks that morning.
39. Tires Would Have Saved Him
I’m not a doctor, but I’m a firefighter so I see my fair share of trauma. About a year ago, we responded to a call that went out as an “individual who had a car fall on his face”. He was hotboxing in his garage while working underneath his car that was supported by scissor jacks. Something to note, the car didn’t have any tires on the front end where he was working.
One of the scissor jacks had slipped out from underneath the car, and the whole weight of the car landed directly onto the side of his head with no tires to stop the fall. We got our rubber airbags out, lifted the car, pulled him out, and got him onto a stretcher. After taking over a thousand kg (2,500 lbs) of weight to the head, he somehow got out of it with only a fractured orbital and a laceration on his cheek.
40. He Couldn’t Stop It
red round fruits on white and blue surfacePhoto by National Cancer Institute on UnsplashThe first year of my core surgical training, I was on call in a very small rural hospital. This hospital only had two doctors on at night, me and a medical trainee, and no emergency doctors.
It was about 11 pm and this guy, about 26 years old, came in after being in a fight. Blood was pumping from his nose, which was clearly fractured.
I suspected he probably had other facial fractures underneath, but he was awake and talking to me. Otherwise he seemed fine. I spent about 45 minutes trying to stop the blood, using all sorts of nose packs, pressure, and even tried a catheter balloon to try and tamponade it. Nothing was working, and he was starting to go into shock. I was getting really scared at this point.
Based on his vitals I’d estimated he’d lost almost 1.5 liters (50 oz) of blood so far. The nearest proper surgical hospital was 45 minutes away, and my consultant was at home, which was 25 minutes from the hospital. Eventually, I got four bags of O neg from the lab (the lab tech happened to be in, which was very lucky), put this guy in the back of an ambulance, still bleeding, and sent him blue lighting to the surgical center in the city.
I got a phone call about three hours later from a surgeon at the other hospital, saying he had brought the patient to the theater and was able to control the situation. He was probably 15 minutes from dying. If you come into that kind of small hospital with that much bleeding, all stats say you’re in trouble. The guy was very lucky his friends got him in so quickly.
41. He Carried Him In
I was a junior doc on the trauma team. One day the doors to the emergency ward fly open to reveal a man carrying a second blood-soaked man in his arms. We get him onto a stretcher and it is clear he has been shot in his chest and has gone into cardiac arrest. Chest compressions start, and within minutes the senior doctor is cutting into the guy’s chest in order to start cardiac massage.
Cardiothoracics join us quickly and get to work on the heart, where a hole in the right ventricle is identified and plugged with a Foley catheter. All the while, bag after bag of O Neg is being pushed into the patient in an attempt to replace everything that had pumped out of his heart and into his chest cavity.
After 15-20 minutes of this the impossible happens: the heart starts beating on its own. The patient is taken directly to the theater, where the hole is definitively repaired and bilateral chest drains are inserted to drain the blood filling his lungs. Somehow his heart continued beating and after a couple weeks on ITU, the patient is returned to the trauma ward awake and alert.
Several weeks, some mild hypoxic brain injury, and a gnarly chest scar later, and he walks off the ward with his dad, the man who carried him in.
42. They Used Her As A Case Study
black car headrestPhoto by Alexandria Gilliott on UnsplashI’m a researcher rather than a doctor, but during my undergrad my anatomy tutor told us of an interesting case study. A woman in the same department had been in a car accident going at a considerable speed. The seat belt failed to lock, and her face flew into the steering wheel. Her mouth, nose, cheekbones and forehead were shattered, yet she suffered no brain damage.
Apparently, the front of her face acted as a crumple zone, and the fact that her skull shattered meant the cranial swelling didn’t cause any damage because the brain had more space to swell into. Of course, she needed significant reconstructive surgery, but a year later she and my tutor teamed up in a research project.
They used her case as the basis for looking into new ways to treat severe head injuries and developed new treatment protocols depending on where the skull had taken damage. They basically found out that, if you’re going to have a head injury, try and get hit in the face and not the temples because you’re much more likely to survive.
43. He Just Had To Squeeze By
I worked in the kitchen, so I was the lowly peon delivering food trays. I delivered to one guy who had a horrendously infected foot. Most of the toes were necrotic and black, and the rest of the foot wasn’t doing much better. I wouldn’t be surprised if he was waiting for an amputation. His dietary requirements were diabetic, so it was likely. The room smelled awful.
Anyway, these rooms are small, with typically two beds in them. Because of the smell from his infection, the other bed is empty. I still have to squeeze by the foot of his bed, and as I’m paying attention to the tray, so I don’t knock it into equipment, I accidentally brush my leg against his infected foot that he has sticking out of the covers and hanging off the bed.
To my horror, his big toenail—with bonus flesh—comes off onto my leg. It’s just stuck to my leg. We look at each other in horror. I clear my throat, ask my usual questions, clear and adjust his table, give him his tray and wish him a good day. I leave calmly, and then run to the nurse’s station and ask for help getting this dude’s entire necrotic toenail off my leg.
The nurse who got it off soaked that portion of my pant leg in some disinfectant liquid that smelled like it could take the paint off a car.
44. Don’t Be A Baby
woman in red dress holding white penPhoto by Nylos on UnsplashA woman came into the emergency room with complaints of abdominal pain. She wouldn’t stop screaming: “My baby’s gone! My baby’s gone!” There was one really weird thing though: her record showed absolutely nothing about even being pregnant. After having her change into a gown, the most ungodly stench filled the room.
My doctor began a pelvic exam, with me as a standby. I will never forget his face as he removed a pinkish-brown clotted mass: it was a huge chicken leg. It turns out that what she was calling her ‘baby’ was actually an uncooked chicken she had chopped up and inserted into her hoo-ha. She may not have lost a baby, but she did gain a chicken.
45. Our Jaded Jaws Dropped
I was working at an emergency room in Ft. Walton Beach, Florida. This is a resort area, with pristine white beaches, sport fishing—you know the drill. I was taking a body down to the morgue with another medic, and the shift supervisor, who had the drawer assignment and paperwork responsibility. We pulled open the huge metal drawer, expecting there to be nothing—or maybe a body—and saw something that made our very jaded jaws drop.
Inside the drawer, there was a monstrously large sailfish. This thing was so huge that it could hardly fit without its body curved and sail pushed down. We stood there in surprise wondering what our procedure should be. We had no idea. The NCO said, “It would be a very good idea not to remember this. I’ll deal with it in the morning.” He then moved on to the next drawer.
Later it was rumored it belonged to one of the senior surgeons.
46. It Was The Size Of A Bagel
person wearing gold wedding bandPhoto by National Cancer Institute on UnsplashAbout thirteen years ago, when I was in medical school, I saw a lady who had flown in from South America to have US doctors help with her breast cancer. She was pretty well off but apparently her family had been picky and choosy about her treatment. By the time they got her to the states, the situation had turned horrific.
So what we discovered was that she had a metastatic tumor on her arm that was the size of a bagel. Also it smelled of necrotic tissue. Even worse was the fact that her chest wall was replaced by a tumor. In fact, you could actually see her rib cage. Her family got mad that we couldn’t just cut the tumor off her arm. The whole ER smelled like rotten flesh.
47. Get Back In There
There was a primary care physician, PCP, who went to some part of Africa—I don’t remember where specifically—for the Peace Corps. When he came back, he found he was always more tired than he was when he left for Africa. The cause was straight out of a nightmare. One day he felt a pulsation in his eye and went to the ER. Once there, the doctor found a small worm wriggling around in his eye.
Apparently, this kind of worm normally lives near the brain, but had somehow made its way out from there and into his eye. The emergency room doctor hadn’t seen anything like it, and so he called in another doctor to come and look at it. By the time the other doctor got there, the worm had made its way back out of the eye.
Cut to about a month later and the PCP feels the pulsation again, but instead of returning to the hospital, he decides to take care of it himself. He takes a needle and heats it up using the stove. He then puts it into his own eye in order to remove the parasite. Over the course of the next year or two, he removes—if I remember correctly—around five of the worms this way before feeling better.
48. Not Your Ordinary Blackhead
person in white and black stethoscopePhoto by Ashkan Forouzani on UnsplashI was working at an old folks center near our house, and I was with this one older gentleman. On his hip, was a blackhead the size of a dime, on top of a decent-sized lump, about 5 cm (2 in) long. So, I threw on some gloves, made sure I had the permission of the man of course, and squeezed the black head. To my shock, out popped this roll of gauze that was left over from his hip surgery 10 years prior that he never bothered to get removed.
The smell was horrid and I will never forget it.
49. A Repeat Offender
So there is a homeless guy that comes to my emergency room regularly. Apparently this guy had a major surgery in the last 10 years where they removed something from his stomach, or that general area. After the surgery, he woke up and just left the hospital without letting himself heal. He proceeded with his drug habit, and his body was never able to heal properly.
The guy comes to the ER about once every week to get his intestines re-bandaged. The nurses have to rinse and sanitize the intestines and re-bandage him up every time he comes in. They simply take a large bandage and wrap it around his midsection. He has been seen many times outside the hospital holding his intestines with a plastic bag pressed to his stomach—having a smoke.
50. This Experiment Went Very Wrong
person wearing orange and white silicone bandPhoto by Jon Tyson on UnsplashA kid, about 13 years old, and his mom came into the emergency room. The mom had dragged the kid in because he was complaining of real bad ‘digestive’ problems. The kid had convinced her he was fine, until he couldn’t hide the bleeding coming from his rear end. We take him in for X-rays—but never in a million years was I prepared for what we found. There on the X-ray, clear as day, is a 14-inch black rubber phallus.
Of course, we didn’t know it was black then, but we found out later, obviously. This thing had wedged itself up far—most likely due to his efforts to remove it. It was pushing on the walls of his intestine and had three days’ worth of excrement piled on top of it. We take him into a private room and ask if there is anything he wants to tell us before they discuss specifics with his mother.
The kid didn’t want to say anything, so we told him that whatever is up there had to be removed surgically. The kid said no, and that he just felt sick. We then asked him again, what could possibly be in his lower intestine. His response almost made me laugh out loud. He said he may have sat on a marker.
People Who've Had A Serious Illness Describe The Exact Moment They Knew Something Was Really Wrong
As a kid, I never raised alarm bells even when I started to feel sick. My mom got stressed easily and was busy taking care of my younger brother, so I never wanted to be a burden by making her take me to the doctor only to find out nothing was wrong.
However, in fifth grade, my ears started to hurt and I knew something was wrong. I told my mom, she took me to the doctor, and I found out I had an ear infection.
Now, an ear infection isn't serious at all, and it was easily treatable. Still, I learned something from that experience: no one knows your body better than you. You know if and when you're sick and how serious it is, even if you don't now exactly what is wrong.
Redditors can corroborate this. Many of them have experienced symptoms that told them they were sick in some way -- usually with a very serious illness -- and are ready to share those experiences.
It all started when Redditor thelearner18 asked:
"People who have had a serious disease (cancer, MS, organ failure, etc) when did you realize something was really wrong?"
A Lesson Learned
"Hust found out i have rectal cancer. 42 yrs old. multiple stools per day, not fully emptying, thin poop. so got a colonoscopy. bam! cancer. starting chemo next week. lesson learned for everyone....if your stools or stool schedule changes, go see a doctor"
– shawngee03
A Lucky Break
"I had been having a lot of pain in my midsection, and all around my torso for several weeks. I went to the doctor and it was dismissed as gynecological cramping (menopausal?). It remained. After several weeks (6-8) I couldn’t take it anymore. I went to emergency in the middle of the night. I got a CT scan that showed a large kidney stone. They also found a mass on my ovary. The kidney stone lead them to finding a rare ovarian cancer. If not for that stone, I wouldn’t have known about the cancer and might not have caught it in time. I have been in remission since September 2021."
– peachsqueeze66
Cause For Concern
"My kid, who was 14 at the time, kept throwing up in the morning and having weird headaches. Her doctor thought it was migraines. She went back a couple of times, but the doctor was not concerned. Then one day she complained of a whooshing noise in her ear. Went to the children’s hospital and found out it was a brain tumor near her cerabellum. She was in ICU for a month, but turned out it was non cancerous and it never grew back. She is doing great now."
– Evilelfqueen
"I heard a whooshing noise in my ear a few years ago I only really heard it at night when it was quiet it would sometimes switch ears now I basically never hear it. I'm pretty sure it was just pulsatile tinnitus but still scary."
– fallen-summer
It Was The Salt
"I have Cystic Fibrosis (terminal lung disease) and it was found out when I didn't sh*t for 3 days after I was born and then my mother gave me a kiss and said I tasted REALLY salty."
"Now I'm on a gene modification drug called Trikafta and this is some serious witch craft a** sh*t because I no longer feel sick to death and I basically feel like a normal person. It's f*cking wild!
"Went from 19% lung function to 87% in 3 months. I no longer cough my a** off or feel like I'm suffocating from mucus. Go science!"
– Sudden_Blueberry_477
A Funky Optic Nerve
"I was diagnosed with MS when I was 22 after having blurred vision in one eye after a ski trip. I went to the optometrist and they said I had a dry eye probably from not wearing goggles while snow boarding. So they gave me steroid drops. After a week it kept getting worse, so I went back and they told me my eye looked much better so they did a field of view test, which showed I couldn’t see anything out of the lower half of one eye. They sent me straight to the emergency room since nothing was wrong physically wrong with my eye. They did some tests and I was diagnosed with MS and ended up going completely blind in one eye. My vision eventually came back and I got on medication within a month so haven’t really had any symptoms or issues since thankfully. I’m only 29 now though."
– johnjohn9312
Caught It In Time
"This isn't me, but this happened to my best friend VERY recently. Like in the last couple of months."
"Was perfectly fine and healthy one day. Then the next he started feeling a little bit of pain in his kidney. He'd had kidney stones before, so he figured it was that again. Then he started peeing blood. He thought it was still part of the kidney stone thing so let it go for a couple days, but he was still peeing blood and the pain was getting worse."
"That's when he decided to go to the doctor. They did an X-ray and found a mass in his kidney and told him that based on where it was located they can't remove the mass, and they can't do a partial kidney removal, and it's about a 90% chance it's cancerous, but they wouldn't be able to do a biopsy without removing the kidney first. They did the whole insurance dance, but it went fast and within two weeks he was in surgery having his kidney removed."
"He's still recovering at home right now, but they got the biopsy results last week. It was indeed cancerous, but they caught it before it spread."
– SweetCosmicPope
Happily Ever After
"I couldn’t walk anymore with my crutch I had been using to get by. Had Been on Percocet for 8 months because of the extreme pain. Nobody was finding answers to my pain but I knew something was wrong, badly. After finally having an ultra sound on my hips at the age of 26 I found out I had to undergo a double hip replacement to walk again due to a serious rare disease. I was stage 4 Avascular Nercrosis. Took a year to recover from both. But Happier ending, I’m doing good now. However it was very very upsetting news to get over a phone call at 26."
– heartpathetic
It Really Sneaks Around
"My wife started getting numbness in her right arm. The breast cancer had spread to her right shoulder and the tumor was crushing the nerves. She has stage four breast cancer in her bones."
– zenos_dog
A Turn For The Worse
"For me, it started May 14, 2014. I went to work and was having a good morning. Then, at about 9:00 in the morning or so, I started to feel some lower abdominal pain. Not to be crude, but it felt like that cramp you get when you really need to go to the bathroom. I did so, but the pain didn't go away. It got worse. I started to feel chills, was sweating, and felt nauseated. My employer has a clinic on site, so I went there. After some poking and prodding, the nurse asked me if I wanted to go home or if I wanted to go to the emergency room. I decided to go home, and if the pain didn't subside, then I'd go to the emergency room. As I was saying that, though, I noticed that my pain had gotten a LOT worse. They always make you rate your pain on a scale of 0 to 10, with 0 being no pain at all and 10 being the worst pain you've ever felt. When I went into the clinic, I was mostly uncomfortable, maybe a high 2 going into a 3. On that very subjective scale, I was now a 6 or a 7."
"I changed my mind and decided to go straight to the nearest emergency room. My boss drove me, and by the time we got there about 15 minutes later, I was now a 10. This was the worst pain I'd ever felt. My previous definition of the worst pain I'd ever felt was when I broke 7 bones in my wrist, it was misdiagnosed as a sprain, and I had to have them rebroken 2 weeks later. The pain in my abdomen was now worse than that. The emergency room admitted me and put me in a wheelchair. They wheeled me to a room, I curled up on the bed they put me in, and passed out."
"At some point, a nurse came in and gave me some morphine. Great stuff. No pain at all anymore. A doctor came in and told me they suspected a kidney stone. He wanted me to get a CT scan to confirm it, and I agreed. An orderly wheeled me off to imaging. I got scanned without contrast and was wheeled back to the room. My wife had arrived while I was getting scanned. Shortly later, the doctor who told me he thought it was a kidney stone came into the room. With another doctor. And two nurses. They all crowd around me with solemn looks on their faces."
"The first doctor told me it was a kidney stone. A 2 to 3 mm kidney stone had been lodged in the ureter of my left kidney. That's the tube that goes from the kidney to the bladder. It passed into my bladder when they gave me the morphine, but they could see evidence of it on the CT scan. Then the other doctor said they were more concerned about the 6 cm mass they found on my right kidney. They had my attention."
"They did another CT scan, with contrast this time, and it was impossible to see anything but a tumor in the pictures they showed me. They made an appointment for me with a urologist for the next day, as well as an appointment in a few days time to get it biopsied. It was an after-hours appointment for the urologist, but he was nice enough to stay late to see me. He looked at the CT Scans and cancelled my appointment to get it biopsied. He said there was nothing else it could be but cancer, and the kidney would have to go."
"Two months later, I had the kidney and the tumor removed laparoscopically. I was incredibly lucky. They caught it in stage 1. The doctor said there were signs it was going to start moving soon. I have no idea how doctors can look at a softball sized lump of cancer and tell anything other than 'gross', but that's why they're the doctors and I'm not."
"My recovery was smooth, and I've been cancer-free for 9 years. I was incredibly blessed. I didn't have to deal with chemo, or radiation. While those can save your life, they are also horrible experiences with nasty side effects. I didn't have to deal with any of them. I was bracing myself to have to. They said it was a possibility. But I didn't. I have every respect for those not as fortunate as me, and wish them all the best in recovery."
– mnementh9999
Reason #5,622 To Start Exercising
"I started jogging again to try and get back into running shape. I kept noticing that just after a mile or so, I'd stop and get REALLY lightheaded. Kept thinking, "oh, I'm really out of shape" and kept going. Went in a few weeks later for my annual physical and doctor said "you ever been told you have a heart murmur?", no. Two months later I spent Christmas of 2017 in the ICU after having a section of my aorta cut out and a new valve put in. Surgeon said it was bad. Said it wouldn't have made it too much longer."
"Edit: for clarification, it was an aortic dissection."
– Itsawlinthereflexes
Slow And Steady
"My dad's friend went on a hike with a doctor who knew him and he was winded not far from the car. The doctor clocked it right away and told him to get his heart checked. He had 98% blockage in his heart arteries."
"He tells my dad so my dad gets the test to see how his arteries are doing and they found a massive aneurism on his aorta. He is getting it removed tomorrow. He had no symptoms but the doctors said if he had overdone it he would be dead before anyone would even know what was going on. Crazy how a random friend's hike may have saved his life."
– Pencilowner
It Takes A Village
"I never did, my teacher and parents did."
"I was seven, usually an active kid and my first grade teacher noticed that rather than running around at recess I sat down and took a nap. It happened a couple more times and after I fell asleep in class (totally out of character), she gave my parents a call, we had been visiting the doc fairly regularly cause I was also complaining of joint pain and frequent ear infections combined with the new symptoms and a new doc at the practice I was finally diagnosed with leukemia."
– greenmachine11235
Thank goodness for that teacher (and of course, the parents)!
People Who've Battled Cancer Describe The First Sign That Made Them Go To The Doctor
Being diagnosed with cancer is news no one ever wants to hear.
For some people, the diagnosis might come as a surprise, with no signs or warnings whatsoever.
Others, however might have detected some irregularities, or suffered from symptoms which led them to believe something wasn't quite right, leading them to run to a doctor.
Only to have their worst fears realized.
"People of Reddit who have gone through or are going through cancer, what was the first sign that made you go to the doctor?"
Lucky To Be Scolded By Dad.
"I was fooling around in a mall as a kid."
"So My dad grabbed me by the neck to make me behave."
"He felt a lump on my neck and immediately began to get nervous."
"We went to the doctor the next day, caught the cancer before it spread and was able to surgically remove it about a month later."
"Got super lucky."- SockFeetLover
Misdiagnosis
"My sister noticed a small painful lump in her breast shortly after having her second child."
'Doctor diagnosed a blocked mammary gland."
"A couple weeks later it still wasn’t gone."
"Again doc said blocked gland."
"Months later it’s still not gone and she insists on getting a second opinion."
"Stage 3 breast cancer."
"Double mastectomy immediately followed by months of agonizing radiation and chemo only to find out it’s now stage four."
"She’s been stable for a few years but now it’s spreading again and we don’t know how long we have with her."
"Trying to be as positive as possible."- KidGorgeous19
Persistant Headaches
"My 33 year old husband was diagnosed with inoperable glioblastoma, most aggressive brain cancer, in January 2019, when he was 31."
"What caused him to get a check, was persistent headache that didn’t go away with paracetamols and sleep."
"We discovered the tumors after taking an MRI."
"Needless to say, our lives were changed forever."
"Now we are at the end of our journey, and it’s been a harrowing experience for me as his wife and caregiver."
"It’s a lonely journey."
"I don’t wish it upon anyone and no one has any idea what glioblastoma is like, unless they have gone through it."
"The median survival time is 14-18 months."
"Viktor has passed away yesterday, on 1st August."
"He was surrounded by his brother and me and smiled a lot to the very end."
"At his final resting position, his face looked relaxed and a little smile can be seen by us too."
"I am still in shock, processing what has happened to us. I’ll take the time I need to process this and grieve."
"I just miss my husband."
"I miss his laughs."
"I miss his smile."
"I feel loved."
"I know I’m loved."
"So that’s keeping me together."
"May Viktor find peace."
"I know he’s not in pain now."- syarkbait
Swollen Head and Neck
"My head and neck area became very swollen."
"At first I thought I was just getting fat, so I worked out a lot and ate better."
"This did not help."
"I also went to a local clinic and they thought it might be an allergic reaction and gave me steroids, which also didn’t help."
"The thing that finally made me go to the emergency room and not leave until I had an answer is that I started to develop unexplained bruises on my chest."
"Turns out I had a huge tumor in my chest which had grown around my heart and was compressing the superior vena cava so blood couldn’t flow back down from my head."
"Not great!"
"The good news is that it turned out to be very treatable and I’ve been cancer free for 11 years now."- eskimospy212
A Different Lump
"Funnily enough, it was a totally unrelated lump."
"'Nope, that lump is fine, just a lipoma'."
"'However, we found another lump in the corner of your x-ray and we need to biopsy it'."- something_crass
Excessive Bleeding
"Super heavy periods that would last for 10 or more days."
"Got an iud to help control bleeding."
"Actually hemorrhaged so bad the iud came out."
"Endometrial Cancer, huge tumor in my uterus."
"Ladies, it's not normal to need a tampon and pad at the same time."
"It's not normal to need to change them every 10 minutes or even every hour."
"An average period is 2-3 Tablespoons, just for reference."
"Sorry if TMI."
"I am one year NED (no evidence of disease)."
"I was diagnosed at 40."
"The main take away is if something is not right, keep looking for answers and the right physician."
"Heavy periods do not usually mean cancer in pre menopausal women, but there is no reason to suffer through them."
"Post menopausal women should not experience any bleeding, one drop and you should go to the doctor right away."- Icewaterforall
If something seems off, or doesn't go away in a reasonable amount of time, it's always best to see a doctor.
Even if you have the slightest doubt.
Working in the medical profession simply builds a whole lot of heartache. Doctors watch, day after day, as some of their patients fall ill, only to never recover.
It's a part of the job to break gentle news both to the patients and to their families that their loved one is most likely not going to make it. Having to tell someone they're dying, and force them to deal with their own mortality, brings up a special kind of hell.
Some people have had to develop coping mechanisms to get through it.
Redditor roblixepic asked:
"Doctors of Reddit, how do you tell a patient that they're dying?"
Here were some of those answers.
Compassion Goes The Distance
"My dad’s surgeon discovered what he called 'cement' in his abdomen from cancer that had spread so aggressively that it damaged his colon and required emergency surgery. I asked the doctor while waiting for my dad to wake up if it was terminal."
"The incredible man told me he was not God and could not declare certainties. He said other patients with similar onset had anywhere from a few months to five years. He told me could not tell the future but suggested we discuss care options with my dad."
"I asked his opinion if we should tell my dad right away or give him time to recover from surgery. I’ll never forget his response: 'In my experience, patients know when their bodies are giving up. He will know before you or I do.'”
"My dad had almost 3 years after that conversation. When his body was finally giving out, he asked my mom to take him to the hospital, and for the only time ever in his adult life, he left the house without shoes. My mom said he must have realized he wouldn’t be walking back into the house."
"That was almost 9 years ago. Cancer sucks. But some of my dad’s doctors were incredible and compassionate, and the ICU nurses were amazing."-OlderAndTired
Simple And Direct
"If you’re an amazing doctor like my dads doctor was, you say, 'I gave it my last shot, buddy. I gotta turn you over to hospice now but know I don’t want to.'”
"And he had a tear in his eye. He’d been my dads doctor for a long time (and a few other relatives, actually. This guy had been our end of life a few times-no fault of his own though!). I’ll always remember his compassion in that moment. It was simple, direct and caring."-MonsoonMermaid
Clarity
"ER Doctor: Sit down with the patient and family. Introduce myself. Explain clearly in layman's terms what has been found on the scan/lab/test etc. and the accompanying poor prognosis."
"I then pause because reactions vary considerably here. Some people cry, some people are frozen with shock, many in between."
"After patient/family has had their reaction I ask what (if any) questions they have for me and reassure them I will be in the ER until whatever hour (end of my shift) to help them or provide clarity."-Fancyphones123
Eloquently Frank
"I heard a neurologist tell a brain cancer patient once: 'Some illness have cures, and others treatment. We have reached the end of all possible treatments with respect to your wishes. What life you have left depends on will and time.'”-CriticalCareTaker
Here's The Plan
"In the US, we have an agreed upon guide at my institutions surrounding end of life care. Here's what we do, if the patient is lucid:"
- Initiating the conversation.
- Clarifying prognosis
- Identifying end of life goals
- Developing a treatment plan
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1495357/
"Actual conversations and details are tailored to the situation, patient, and culture."–thewaybaseballgo
These unimaginable situations are a daily occurrence for some people.
It's Important To Find The Pain Source
"I'd had scans and tests done for unknown stomach pain. The doctor came in and told me the results were back and the news was not good. Explained that I had a cancerous tumor on my bowel that had ruptured and spread to other organs."
"That it had spread too much and couldn't be cut out and chemo wouldn't make it fully go away. He told me unfortunately it was terminal and he reassured me that they would do all they could to give me more time and make me comfortable. At this point I began bawling my eyes out and crying 'my children, my poor children.'"
"He was compassionate towards me and gave me time to process it. Then came back later to explain things in greater detail once the shock had worn down a bit. There's no easy way to hear your dying in your 30s but he did an ok job."-SquelchingNoises
Undivided Attention
"There are actually pretty structured and formulaic ways to do it, but each person ultimately has their own style. Step one: hand your pager and cell phone off to someone else or silence it."
"Two: walk in, very clear introduction of your name, role, etc. if meeting them. Sit down, and don’t let anyone between you and the door. Ask the name and relation of anyone in the room. Ask if they prefer having someone else in the room (or FaceTime now because of Covid)"
"Three: ask what they know or have heard (I had patients outright say 'I know I am dying.' Or 'Everything is fine right?'). Ask what their understanding of that diagnosis is."
"Three: Warning shot and brief pause. 'Unfortunately, I have bad news.' Or 'I know we were hoping for X, but I’m sorry to have to tell you it isn’t what we were hoping for.' Pause. Let the patient panic, then they start listening again.
"Four: Be very clear, very direct when possible, and absolutely honest. Pause. At this point, I usually want to word vomit or backtrack but you cannot do that. The pause is awkward but they are thinking a million things. They will want to cling to, 'but this is curable right?!!'”
"At this point I ask if they want me to explain, give them a moment, call someone, etc. After I’ve explained, I ask them what their understanding was of what I just told them. Go from there."
"Finish by having clear plan for what happens next (oncology appointment, chaplain, etc.) and how to contact with questions. That’s my mental checklist. It’s a process."-ConEffe10
It's Not Easier For Vets
"Different perspective here, as I treat animals vs people, and thus I'm not explaining it to the patient itself."
"I usually tell people that we've reached the limit of what is possible and fair as far as curative treatment goes, and outline what they can expect as far as progression of disease and palliative care options."
"And, as I'm treating in a realm where this is a legal option, I also discuss what euthanasia entails and discuss at what point it will be warranted."-Moctor_Drignall
The Places You Have Come To Fear The Most
"We knew my mum was dying and that she didn’t have long. It was one of her nurses on the ward, clocking off her shift just before 2 days off. She knew she wouldn’t see her again."
"She hugged me, and hugged my mum, and told her that it had been a pleasure to care for her. We stepped outside and cried together and it was in that moment I knew. She passed the next morning, about 12 hours later."-juneradar
Being Straightforward
"Hospice and Palliative care doc here Do it every day I work. I do it with straightforwardness and honestly and compassion. I tell them most of my patients say they aren't afraid to die but are afraid of suffering along the way. Most agree this is how they feel. And I get to assure them me and my teams entire career is committed to making sure that they do not suffer emotionally, spiritually or physically."-Idontsuckcompletely
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It Becomes The Process
"Not a doctor but a nurse. My last job I was the one you didn't want to come talk to you and I got oddly good at it."
"You tell them straight and make sure they understand exactly what you are saying because denial can be a hell of a thing. You don't joke. You be human and be upset too as that gives them permission to break down too."
"You listen and stay as long as they need but not so long that you annoy them. Answer any questions as best you can but don't give false hope. More than anything, be straightforward and be honest. That goes a long way."-rhett342
What An Awful Moment In Time
"They wouldn't tell my Dad. He took me and his sister in to see a CT scan and it looked like he swallowed golf balls the cancer (pancreatic) was everywhere."
"Dad asked about surgery and chemo and the Doctor just said it wasn't really an option. I spent the last two weeks watching Dad get worse and worse. He couldn't sleep, couldn't eat and couldn't get comfortable."
"We managed to get him into hospice the last few days where his girlfriend wouldn't stay in the room with him so I would only leave to grab food from the vending machine."
"I had to tell her he passed. She thought he was getting better. Wouldn't wish pancreatic cancer on anyone."-Auferstehen78
How To Take Care
"It's never easy. You have to be sincere, make sure you don't give false hope but you have the have the people skill. Trying and say something like 'we have exhausted all resources' or 'we have tried all angles,' because it should be true and coming from the heart."
"Be polite and sensitive, not all the way, but to them and the family. Say you're sorry and that you'll try the best to make their time worth. Allow visits as much as you can, send them home, if allowed."
"Make sure you talk to their families and let them know they fought to the end, even if it's not true. Treat the family as you would like to be treated, as the family. It sucks but it's the least to do."-eat_the_canvas
No Lying
"‘I’m not going to lie to you, I don’t lie to my patients. And although this is the first time we are meeting, you are my patient today. You are dying. We will do everything we can to assist you and keep you comfortable. Do you have any questions for me?’ My friend shook his head no. ‘Ok, then, the nurse will be in shortly to….’"
"Doctor left the room and I followed him out as I had questions. My friend was in the last stages of lung cancer that had spread. He passed within three hours. I had so much respect for that doctor. He gave it to us straight, but his voice was full of compassion." – friendofjay
An Observer Weighs In
"Not a DR but saw this on 24 hours in A&E and the person seemed to take it really well…"
“I’m afraid that you are really ill, in fact you are the illest person in Wales right now. We have tried XYZ but unfortunately they haven’t worked, we are going to keep trying whatever we can but there’s a high chance that you may die, so we are going to try and help you with being as comfortable as possible. We have your family here who are going to be by your side, I think it would be a good idea to say your goodbyes. I’m really sorry there isn’t more I can do”
"It was beautiful and the DR was calm, cool but also very moved and clearly very sad."-Hour-Cow-4348
Putting It Bluntly
"i took my mom to the ER in september cause she couldn’t move the right side of her body. they immediately took her into a CT scan and a white coat doctor walked in 30 minutes later, leaned on the counter in front of my moms bed and said 'we found 3 tumors and we think you have cancer”' i don’t remember much after that cause i was in shock and crying, but he basically outlined everything that would be happening from then on and then left the room. she did have cancer and she died a month later"–straightupgong
Being in a profession dealing with people's lives is an upsetting occurrence, and you have difficult things and situations to navigate almost on the daily.
Developing a system might spare you some of the more acute pain of doing the unthinkable.
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People Diagnosed With Cancer Share The Symptom That Made Them Seek Help
I hate cancer—it has claimed too many lives.
I'm also deathly afraid of it. So that's a fun combination.
Until the day comes when we have a cure, the best we can do is to be vigilant with our bodies and our health.
If something feels off or if something pops up out of the ordinary on the body... get it checked out.
It's hard news to hear, but the sooner the better.
Redditor mrgrinchisameansong wanted to know what warning signs to look for regarding our health.
They asked:
"People who were diagnosed with cancer: what symptom made you go to the doctor?"
It all begins with recommended health screenings and self checks.
They suck doing, but better safe than sorry.
Stage 4...
"I had sporadic stomach pains that felt like gas pain for like 6 months. Even did a video chat with a doctor about it who told me he wasn't concerned because it didn't sound like appendix or gall bladder issue. Some months later pain was terrible one night."
"Went into the ER and found out I had stage 4 colon cancer. So basically terminal the day I found it at 38 years old. I definitely recommend getting a colonoscopy early or at the very least doing a blood test for CEA which is often produced by colon cancer." ~ Detroit1000
She got lucky...
"They found the cancer on my mom's intestine when they did a hysterectomy... which they only did because she was having abdominal pain and kept insisting something was wrong. Finally her OBGYN was like 'maybe it's a menopause thing? we can remove the uterus?' And then during the surgery they found it (that was a fun post-op visit)."'
"And the surgical oncologist on call happened to be an expert in her exact cancer, which is a rare one. So we were very lucky, and she's in remission now. But they would never have found it in time if she hadn't kept insisting that something was still wrong even when they tried to diagnose her with anxiety." ~ curiouscat86
A Fluke...
"I felt a lump in my wife's breast and convinced her to have it examined. Luckily it was relatively early (stage 2?) and after surgery and chemo she's fully recovered. The funny thing is, I sometimes think her other breast feels kind of lumpy, but she gets examined multiple times a year now and I'm sure they would catch it, so I figure I didn't really know what I was talking about, and it was only a fluke that I thought it was cancer and made her go see the doctor." ~ resolutefool
Better safe than sorry...
"Not myself, but my dad. Mostly little minor things that may or may not have been because of cancer, but the big indicator was his rather sudden inability to poop. Within about two or three months he went from normal to 'haven't been able to poop in 5 weeks.'"
"First doc misdiagnosed him, a month and a half and an ambulance ride later found out he had late stage 3/stage 4 colon cancer. Wasn't a whole lot they could do at that point, but there were things that improved his quality of life for the remainder of his life. They gave him 6 months, he lasted 2 years. The moral of the story is if you can't poop, go see a doc ASAP. Not being able to poop is not normal, and is not okay. Better safe than sorry." ~ Alphalfa91
Being 11...
"Had a grapefruit-sized lump forming in my upper thigh/hip area. Seeing as I was a naive 11 year old I thought it was a hernia or puberty related. Turned out to be primitive small cell sarcoma that spread to my lungs. Been all clear for 13 years now. Just left to deal with the mental aftermath and the potential of aftermath of the high strength drug treatment I was given at such a young age." ~ TheIconSting
This is all a lot, I know.
But so imperative to know.
Every little bit of information can be life saving.
Back in 2013...
"Woke up one morning with extreme abdominal pain. Went to the ER and was diagnosed with appendicitis. Had surgery that night to remove appendix and was released from the hospital the next day. A week later my surgeon called me and told me they found a tumor in my abdomen and sent a biopsy to the Mayo Clinic. Was diagnosed with psuedomyoxoma peritonei. 2 months later had surgery and chemo to remove the tumor. This was back in 2013." ~ user deleted
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"Blood in my poop. Told my doctor, had a colonoscopy and they found stage IV colon cancer. Been dealing with it for almost 2 years now." ~ ericlathrop
"I pray you're doing well now. Can I just ask, how did you detect blood in your feces? Was it full on blood, or dark spots in your feces? Because I've got dark spots in mine, not full on red blood... it might just be a result of what I eat, but I'm scared it might be something else." ~ Sky-lander
Oh Dad...
"Not me, my dad. He bought one of those stair lifts, used and after it was installed he fell off it (I'm not sure about exactly what happened) and was injured. He went to get checked for this injury because it kept hurting. They found a tumor in his kidney."
"Had a colonoscopy pre-op and they found another spot as well. They did surgery for both, removed the one kidney in full and two places on the colon. Neither cancer was related which is good because that means one had not spread. My dad will be 80 later this month."
"He is 2 years later and cancer free. He gets regular checkups and includes prior colonoscopys. The only way they might have found this would be a CT scan of the body, which they don't just do. I did recently hear that they don't recommend colonoscopy after a certain age which I find strange. But maybe it was without family history or something." ~ iluvminiatures
Bloodwork...
"I had a cough that got progressively worse over a few months to the point I was barely able to talk above a hoarse whisper. X-ray showed a shadow near my lungs, CT showed a softball-sized mass crushing my left lung, bloodwork, bone marrow biopsy and PET confirmed non-hodgkins lymphoma. Not what I was expecting at 25, but I went through 7 months of treatment and have been in remission for almost 8 years now!" ~ barnettjm2
The Aorta...
"I woke up struggling to catch my breath. Went to my physician and was told it's nothing, despite being able to feel a bulge in my abdomen. After another day of wheezing I got a CAT scan and was diagnosed with stage 4 kidney cancer, it'd already spread to both lungs and the other kidney, with the original tumor being the size of a grapefruit and had attached to my aorta. Been cancer free for 15 years now." ~ drumeradam11
CHECK-UPS!!!
"I had no symptoms; it was caught on a routine mammogram when it was too small to feel, even by experienced doctors, and it was just below the skin. Get your screenings! Mine was like a web, and you know when you look at a crack on the sidewalk and there's a slightly wider area? That's what the mammogram looked like."
"And I almost didn't have the biopsy because the doctor thought it was probably benign. ZOMG am I glad I did, except for one moment when I thought, 'If I hadn't had that biopsy, I wouldn't be going through this right now' and then went, 'Nope, nope, nope, you'd be going through something worse later if you hadn't done it.'" ~ notthesedays
Allergic to Air
"Around Thanksgiving last year I had a lump on my neck and that was the one that made me go in for cancer specifically. For a whole year I had been scratching myself crazy as if I was allergic to air. Had been going to the doctor every couple months trying to figure out what the hell was wrong with me. Night sweats so bad I'd change my sheets every day for a month."
"A week of no hunger at all towards about when the lump showed up. Never weighed myself but I dropped down to 120 lbs apparently. Wasn't till that lump showed up that everything clicked. I had Hodgkins lymphoma (blood cancer) stage 4. Obviously I'm alive but they don't call you cured till you've gone 2 years without a problem. A year and some to go till I'm cured." ~ AhegaoMilfHentai
The Healthiest
"Not me, my ex boyfriend. He had a UTI that wouldn’t go away. Scans revealed non treatable cancer throughout his major organs (can’t remember the name of it but it was very rare). He had surgery, chemo, radio, the works. Died less than a year after being diagnosed. He was 21 and the healthiest person I’ve ever met." ~ moonshadowfax
Sensations
"Only semi-relevant as it wasn't cancerous, but the symptoms were caused by a primary tumor. It started with I thought were weird migraines. In addition to headaches, I'd just randomly vomit with only about 2-3 seconds warning and occasionally get really intense deja-vu like sensations about memories I knew couldn't possibly real. Later, this progressed to full tonic-clonic seizures." ~ Moctor_Drignall
X-rays...
"I had knee pains, started in my right knee, than my left. Had x-rays done, they found nothing, then pain started in my hip than to my back, more x-rays, the doctor notice a spot, had a cat scan or MRI down, don't remember and that when the notice the tumor on my spine." ~ ColEvilDead
If in doubt...
"Found a lump just above my collarbone. Only found it by chance when I woke up with a bad neck. In hindsight I'd been suffering with crippling fatigue - no energy to get off the couch, sleeping for 9 hrs and waking up as if I'd never had a sleep, napping for 2/3hrs at a time. Turned out to be stage 2 Hodgkins lymphoma, unfavourable due to the spread in my lymph nodes. I'm halfway through treatment and responding well. If in doubt, always go and get checked out." ~ hobslaur
Throat
"I got out of the shower and was drying my legs, for a few weeks I felt pressure around my throat but this time it was immense. Looked in the mirror and my face had turned blue. I had an 11cm tumour putting pressure on my throat and my arteries. I'd had breathing problems and itching and sweats night and day time for weeks. B cell stage 4 NHL. 10 years later and I have another child they said I never would and I'm okay." ~ cupantae88
Again, not normal...
"Can I answer for my brother? (He's no longer with us?) It was his weight gain. Two doctors in the state of Oregon said it was a thyroid problem -- the third in Maryland (USA) finally did tests and confirmed it was, indeed, cancer. He was hungry all the time, which wasn't normal."
"He also began talking about coffins, burial plans, and heaven. Again, not normal. Sadly, they weren't able to do much, but now we can educate others. If you ever feel swollen, sore, or hurt in your lymph nodes, or begin gaining weight randomly. It's better safe than sorry." ~ life_sentencer
Coughing Blood
"December 2015: my Dad passed out in the middle of the day. Luckily he was in public (and not alone at home) and some people called the ambulance. 2 days at the hospital and it's clear: lung cancer that has already spread into multiple other organs. October 1st 2016: died in the middle of the night. Coughed up a ton of blood, tried to reach the phone to call help, fell and cracked his head open." ~ DrPCox85
Hip Health
"Not me, but my mum had a sore hip for a couple of months. She tried Physio, Chiro, acupuncture etc. Eventually I convinced her to see a Dr and get a scan. By then it was too late, she had stage 4 lung cancer (never smoked in her life) which had metastasised and spread throughout her bones. She got lucky and put onto trial so we got to keep her for 2 years, otherwise she would have had 2 months." ~ moonshadowfax
So heartbreaking but with many uplifting outcomes.
Stay on top of research and screening.
We can beat cancer.
One survivor at a time.
Thank you all for sharing.
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