Strangers online did not hold back when Redditor Silveo02 specifically asked:
"What is the nastiest thing you’ve ever seen come out of a human body?"
When your body fights off infection, it produces slimy nightmares.
Airborne Goo
"I was congested really bad one morning, I kept coughing to try to hack it out as one does, and right as I was getting out of my car at work, I sneezed something fierce, and a mass of bloody mucus and what I hope were boogers shot out of my nose."
"It was so large that my face felt empty, like I had lost part of my body. I wasn’t even disgusted, just intrigued and shocked, and relieved, but also stressed bc I thought I was missing some brain matter."
– InspectorGajina
Clearing The Pipes
"About ten years ago I had an awful sinus infection and sneezed out what I can only describe as a bloody tubular snot cast of my entire nostril. It felt glorious and I marveled at how something so large and disgusting could come out of my nose."
– MyTapewormToldMeSo
A Staph Infection
"My son got MRSA in his knee somehow when he was like 6. Draining the wound was vomitous."
– amalgaman
Swollen Upper Lip
"I had MRSA in my upper lip from chucking raw clams We'd use to farm in bags. The thing about raw clams is wasps and hornets just can't get enough of the soft meat and packs of 8 of them will fight you for a clam. Needless to say getting stung is one thing but getting stung by a wasp or hornet covered in raw clam is a infection nearly for sure."
"My upper lip swelled about 6 to 8 times or size and had to be juiced like a meaty toothpaste tube."
"I got the lucky end cuz my old step-dad would get stung dozens of times and had infections across the back of his whole head from em."
– accelis
Untreated dental issues can lead to seriously disgusting results.
Leave It To The Dentists
"Severe tooth abscess......whole jaw was swollen."
"Pushed my cheek hard until it popped and blood and puss filled about half my mouth. It hurt so badly that I got tunnel vision, started to black out, and almost vomited at the same time."
"'Do it yourself dentistry'.....don't do it kids."
– Crazy_Fun_3455
Artwork On The Mirror
"Yeah, I had the same thing happen, except it was a top tooth, and the whole roof of my mouth was puffy and sagging like the roof of an 86 Dodge Caravan."
"I had to travel for work, and was in a ton of pain. I had a layover in Denver, and went to the bathroom to check it out."
"I'm standing in front of the mirror, and press my thumb on the roof of my mouth. Green pus and blood erupts from around my front tooth and sprays all over the mirror. The smell was overwhelming, as was the pain."
"The guy who was washing his hands next to me couldn't take it- he immediately vomited in the sink and bailed out of the bathroom. I quickly tried to clean up as best as I could and made my way out of the carnage as well."
"Once that was gone I did feel a lot better."
"Edit: To the mustachioed gentlemen in the Denver airport, if you're reading this, I'm really sorry. You didn't need to see that- I had no idea it was going to happen, and I hope this hasn't affected you beyond your initial chunder."
– OnionMiasma
The One That Stayed Behind
"When I was in college I interned with a dentist and he would do a free dental day where transients and stuff could come in and get dental work done."
"One guy came in complaining of jaw pain, turns out that he had a baby tooth that never came out that got engulfed by an adult tooth that then pressed the baby tooth into his jaw. The tooth rotted and festered underneath the permanent tooth."
"The dentist extracted the permanent tooth and when he did it shot out a brown fluid that smelled exactly like death, followed by the baby tooth pieces. I pride myself on being pretty calm but when this happened I had to leave the room and vomit."
"It pretty much turned me off to wanting to be a dentist."
– itsthattedguy
These patients endured intense pain and suffering they couldn't soon forget.
Burrowed Friends
"I’m a dermatological surgical technician for skin cancer removal, aka Mohs. After removing a cancer from an older gentleman’s leg, we stitched him up and applied steri strips (which fall off by themselves within a week) so no wound care would be needed. The pressure dressing on top of the steris would simply have to be removed in a day or two."
"This older gentleman came back to the office 1 month after his surgery complaining of an odor coming from his post surgery wound. When he arrived, the 'odor' was far worse than expected. Employees of the office were gagging."
"Also, keep in mind, in dermatology we deal with smelly things such as cysts on the regular. Odor typically doesn’t bother us. Upon further examination, we realize this patient never took off our original dressing. Once the doctor came in and removed the dressing we saw anywhere from 60-100 maggots burrowed in this man’s open wound. All of which had to be manually extracted."
"Just another maggot Monday."
– Alexiwitchwork
Birthing A Bug
"I seen a fully grown botfly get removed from someone's arm while doing my college co-op at my local hospital."
– SnowyInuk
No, Thank You
"My daughter had pinworms when she was in kindergarten. For those who don’t know, they are small worms that crawl out of the anus and lay eggs, then crawl back inside. It was like something out of a horror movie."
– rupret1
Projectile Pus
"Lancing one of those diabetic cysts and what came out was a mixture of blood, pus and some thick black, what looked like a burnt French fry. At the end the last bit of pressure shot out everything and hit the wall. Smelled like a copper penny and what your cast smells like after a week or so."
– donutdong
After The C-Section
"A week after leaving the hospital from having my son via C-section, I was in horrific, screaming pain. Ended up in the ER, where it was discovered that I had a softball sized abscess directly behind the C-section cut. They needed to open me back up and get me cleaned out, but didn't want all that nasty sh*t to just spill out of me. So they put a tube in me and attached it to a bag to drain it. So I spent a day in a hospital bed with this clear bag filled with putrid, brown, rotting gunk attached to me. It smelled so bad, and looked even worse. Why did the bag have to be clear??? It's been 15 years, and thinking about it makes me gag."
– sallyface
The Attached "Gunk"
"I had a drain similar to yours after my appendix surgery site got infected, but I had mine on for several days. I honestly don’t know why they had to make it clear, the gunk was so damn nasty, but that wasn’t the worst part. That was the fact that since it was attached to me, I could feel how warm the gunk was and it made me feel so damn sick whenever i felt it."
– lonely_catt
Poor Elderly Resident
"A seriously compacted resident in a nursing home I worked at had stool coming out of every orifice. This poor man was throwing up stool it was horrifying. He passed shortly after that."
– AlienGoddess91
While many of these people experienced excruciating pain, the lingering memory of those moments appeared to be what they smelled as a result of their various infections being the worst.
Horrific, indeed.
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Reddit user StarGG4358 asked:
"Which part of the human body is horribly designed?"
... I am wholeheartedly convinced that Nature has it out for us on purpose.
Fragile Face Bones
Finding Nemo Smile GIFGiphy"For me it’s teeth."
"You have one set for around 10 years and then another for the rest of your life. It doesn’t even repair itself. They also need high maintenance."
"Sharks are lucky bastards, they keep growing more"
- StarGG4358
"I concur. And cavities hurt too!"
- catlay0420
Better Without Cakes?
Nicki Minaj Twerk GIFGiphy"The butthole right next to the genitals seems made by a sh*tty city planner that puts the toxic waste area right next to an arcade."
- BeepBeepWhistle
"The location of the anus."
"It's deep in a crevice that needs to be manually cleaned of fecal residue every time after use. Would have been better if it was like many other animals and the feces was ejected unimpeded by butt cheeks."
- PovoRetare
Designed To Fail
Stretching Banged Up GIF by 60 Second DocsGiphy"Knees last about 35 years, while everything the are attached to lasts 80."
- monkeybawz
"I am 35. No they don't."
"Seriously though, my knees are f*cked. My dad is 60 and just had his right replaced. Once that heals, it's back in for the left."
- Buwaro
"Eh, I’m 20, and my knees are already bad."
"Wtf does that spell for my future?"
- lmatier
Good Enough
Thatll Do Schitts Creek GIF by CBCGiphy"The eye is evidence that 'good enough' is what drives evolution."
"We have a blind spot where the optic nerve connects."
"The lens is so poorly formed that one scientist in the 1800's said if he had been sold it by a lens maker he would be justified in returning it and never doing business with the lens maker again."
"Everything damages it."
- S_and_M_of_STEM
"The mollusc lens moves back and forth while the vertebrate lens gets squished and stretched."
- Masterdeetectiv
"The eye and it's blind spot! It's so dumb."
- Statakaka
Beta Testing
Season 3 Nbc GIF by The OfficeGiphy"The Male reproductive system."
"I mean, who thought this up? The most important part of the system, the testicles, are positioned outside the man’s body, inside a fleshy pouch, with virtually no protection from the elements or worse, physical injury."
"Women’s ovaries are deep inside her body, protected by surrounding muscles."
"Men have this floppy bag that has zero support - they get crushed when you ride a bicycle or sit in a chair, get caught in your zipper and ache like hell at the smallest impact."
"And you’ll tell me that sperm cells need to be kept cooler than the 98.6F body temperature of the human body? Why? Who thought that up?"
"I think what happened was that God created man without a reproductive system but after He created woman, the man’s body had to be redesigned to accommodate a reproductive system."
"I think the design never got past the beta testing phase and went into production as is, flaws and all. And so here we are."
- Keithninety
"Testicles so easily hurt or injured. Why aren't they on the inside instead of being exposed?"
- Back2Bach
"Instead of designing new sperm cells evolution said: F*ck it let’s hang them outside to keep them cool and remind you how important they are by making them really sensitive to pain."
"I mean, some animals got their sperm cells redone so they can be placed inside their body. For example: elephants."
- StarGG4358
Those Should Be Separate
choking kim walker GIFGiphy"The air hole so close to the food hole. Those should be separate."
- [Reddit]
"We breathe and eat through the same hole."
- xyanon36
"You eat and breathe from the same space."
"Look at birds. They swallow stuff like fish whole cuz their windpipe is completely separate."
"Snakes push out their glottis when swallowing."
"Then there's us, choking on our own spit..."
- Masterdeetectiv
These Low Effort Jobs Have Surprisingly High Salaries | George Takei’s Oh Myyy
Have you ever worked one of those jobs that paid you to kinda sit there? If you have, you know the joy that comes with watching the entirety of Breaking Bad ...Exterminate!
resolution exterminate GIF by Doctor WhoGiphy"The part of the immune system that gets bored and spontaneously decides that things like pöllen, cat dander or even your own body (lung tissue, hair follicles) are dangerous and need to be exterminated AT ALL COSTS!!!"
- StoicDonkey
"No one mentioned immune system. It works fine most of the time but autoimmune effects are pain in the @ss."
- Ake-TL
Bi-Pedal Problemos
infomercial movement GIFGiphy'Sciatic nerve."
"When I was pregnant with my son, something was pushing against it. Woke up one morning and within 45 min I went from 'Wow! My leg hurts!' to 'Holy sh*t I can’t walk 5 feet!' "
"I spent the next 5 days walking with a walker."
- fart-nomster
"Hips and lower back. We evolved to be bipedal but our spine hasn't fully caught up to that so the design is sub-optimal for us."
- 123throwawaybanana
"There are much more drawbacks to walking upright. Knees are under constant stress, thankfully the patella solved that issue."
"Also walking upright made the vaginal tract smaller which makes it hard to deliver babies who also have extremely huge heads."
- Masterdeetectiv
"No one has mentioned feet."
"Feet had a terrible "design" to them. We are the only animals effectively walking in the heels, all other animals walk on toes."
"Why we walk on heels? Because we walk upright and toes can't take that weight. So evolution basically bio-duct tape our leg ends and made feet for walking."
- Edge17777
Furniture Detection System
legs GIFGiphy"Our shins."
"Quite often they're the fastest moving part of our bodies when we are walking or running, so a little cushion on the front would have been nice."
- snotwimp
"Oh that's because they're meant to be used as a highly sensitive furniture detection system."
- [Reddit]
OK so ... can we all agree that walking upright was a bad idea?
If we're going to stick with it, we're going to need to start using our obnoxiously big brains to compensate for pretty much everything you just read.
Sounds fun!
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I have pain everywhere. Just because I'm not twenty anymore doesn't mean my body gets to just give in. I know I could help more with that issue, but I feel like my design should be more automatically durable.
Murderers
season 5 GIFGiphy"Honestly our appendixes try to kill us too often. Something ain’t right with it." ~ moonbarrow
The Nerve
"The sciatic nerve routing. Going through the periformis muscle was a bad idea." ~ Sleepdprived
"Just FYI: actually passing through the muscle is an anatomical variant. For the majority of people, the nerve just travels alongside the muscle. Still, that variant is a... uh, pain in the butt." ~ EauEwe
"I'm currently experiencing sciatica right now. It's a nerve being pinched by your spine or muscle in the lower back. The best way I can explain is like a scalpel scraping off your bone marrow throughout your entire leg 24/7."
"It's physically and mentally excruciating so much so that people who suffer from it would rather have their entire leg amputated than live through it. And the thing is this is not an uncommon medical condition. Since the cause is usually a spinal injury, it takes way longer to recover than other injuries, so you're pretty much sleep deprived and exhausted from the pain at every moment until it resides. I'm 25 right now and my first sciatic episode started when I was 21" ~ psyatica
Jaws
"Teeth, one set while we're a child, one set for 60/70 years." ~ godca_grema
"Meanwhile sharks, the lucky bastards, just keep growing new teeth." ~ XxsquirrelxX
"We used to call my brother Shark Boy growing up. That dude had LAYERS of teeth. He had one tooth that grew in the roof of his mouth."
"He also had teeth growing sideways in his gums which torqued his other teeth. It took 2.5 years to get him prepped for orthodontics and then he was in braces for another 5 years after that. Worth it though, he looks like a Colgate commercial now." ~ justuselotion
Too Loud
"The ear. Eyes have eyelids, you can close your mouth, but if there’s an extremely loud noise, your ear drum has to just take it and be irreversibly ruined." ~ sicknessandpurgatory
"Well technically there is a muscle that can tighten your ear to prevent damage from extreme noise, it’s the same reason you don’t hear yourself chew. Some new cars will make a sound to trigger this muscle to prevent hearing loss from the noise of an accident." ~ engineer_doc
Heeled
Soccer Celebrate GIF by Indiana HoosiersGiphy"Achilles tendon. Single point of vulnerability that has no bone sheath and will absolutely cripple you if it's f**ked with." ~ Torvaun
Why do we have an appendix? And why is it a ticking time bomb? All good questions.
Cat Dancing GIF by TikTokExposed
"The elbow. Why the f**k is there a nerve that's so exposed, when you hit it at just the right spot it sends a jolt down your arm?!" ~ hikoboshi_sama
"It’s not just one nerve. You’re talking about the brachial plexus. It’s a bundle of nerves that come from your spine and innervates all the muscles in your arm. That’s why stingers hurt so much, it’s taking out every nerve."
"It’s also a good site for nerve blocks when you have upper limb surgery because you can disable the arm and reduce post operative pain by applying anaesthesia around the nerve roots. Also, in the case of brachial plexus avulsions, you lose all function permanently. And on that note, nerve injuries are freaking crap. We should be able to regenerate them more easily and quickly." ~ ShibuRigged
Cardboard
"Knees are a good idea, but needed a bit more R&D before being rolled out." ~ ChampionshipMission
"Came here to say this. Have you ever seen a child try to make a spaceship or a suit of armor out of cardboard, but they don't have enough cardboard and none of the pieces really fit together anyway, so they end up lashing it together with dozens of strips of tape at every possible angle until it just barely holds together? That's knees. That's how your knees are made." ~ DerCatzefragger
Tiny Humans
"Having sharpened rocks that slowly push their way through the sensitive gums of tiny humans who are too small to understand or explain the reason for their incessant crying. Bonus bad points for these tiny humans being designed to get 100% of their nutrition by latching their new razor teeth around the nipples of another human." ~ PoetryOfLogicalIdeas
E is for Empty
poop toilet GIF by Poo~PourriGiphy"Bowels. I should be able to decide when to empty them completely! In one go and not little bit now and more later!"
"Edit: All this fibre talk, I get it. I now understand more about the importance of fibre. But that kinda adds to what I'm saying. Imagine not needing a summoning ritual. Like deciding when you do and don't drop the kids off at the pool. A human eject button." ~ J1ra1y4
The bowels, they never let up. And like I said earlier, the knees have it. Ankles, knees, elbows, the keys to a happy life.
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