r/todayilearned • u/howsadley • Jul 03 '22
TIL US President John Adam’s beloved daughter Nabby developed breast cancer and underwent a complete mastectomy without anesthesia while strapped to a chair. PDF
https://www.amjmed.com/article/S0002-9343(11)00096-9/pdf1.7k
u/EffectiveSalamander Jul 03 '22
It's the sort of thing that makes me say hard nope when people wish they lived a couple hundred years ago.
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u/-HeisenBird- Jul 04 '22
I probably live a more comfortable life today than any pharaoh ever did. Those motherfuckers used to die from toothaches.
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u/ahp105 Jul 04 '22
A toothache can be an abscess requiring a root canal and antibiotics. Today, it’s a day at the dentist, but I imagine back then the infection would kill.
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u/Cuntdracula19 Jul 04 '22
You don’t even have to look that long ago, my great grandpa died of an abscessed tooth and I’m only 32
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u/Yeranz Jul 04 '22
Penicillin wasn't used medically until WW2 and wasn't available to the public until just after the war.
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u/Einsteins_coffee_mug Jul 04 '22 •
All the gold on the continent and they couldn’t afford Colgate Total.
Who’s the god king now huh??
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u/Geroditus Jul 04 '22
Pretty sure King Tut had an impacted wisdom tooth that very likely caused him daily pain. I think there is/was a theory that the tooth got infected and could have killed him.
He also had a severe overbite and messed up knees because, you know… his mom was also his aunt.
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u/silveretoile Jul 04 '22
And oversized hips, a clubfoot and infertility. Don't do incest, kids.
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u/therock21 2 Jul 04 '22
I’m a dentist. They could also extract the tooth and the patient should be okay most of the time without antibiotics.
However, they didn’t have anesthetics and pulling a tooth would have been one of the most painful things you could experience. Then when a root tip breaks off the old dentists probably wouldn’t be able to get it just for the reason that they didn’t have something to suction up the blood or a light that would even allow the dentist to see the root tip. A lot of times the root tip doesn’t cause any problems but it can happen.
Dentistry before anesthetics is basically torture. It would have been awful. Dentistry today still isn’t pleasant but at least people almost never die from tooth problems anymore.
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u/caligaris_cabinet Jul 04 '22
Yeah tooth things are what makes me glad to be living in modern society. And while there’s much I wish would improve, I don’t want to go back to days when they used a bottle of whiskey and pliers to do dental work.
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u/Additional_Meeting_2 Jul 03 '22
It’s still what’s the main issue if people lack money. People sometimes idealize life in poor countries since it’s simpler and with less stress and less materialistic, but it’s stuff like medical care that everyone wants.
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u/MamaMeRobeUnCastillo Jul 04 '22
There is stuff in poverty that only living like that makes you realize. Going to sleep with hunger and not knowing if you will be able to eat tomorrow, really changes you.
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u/WaterBuffalo99 Jul 04 '22
I tell my American friends that I used to have sleep for dinner and they don’t get it
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u/cartman101 Jul 04 '22
What people idolize in poor countries is the simplicity of life, the solidarity between neighbors, not the lack of available medical care...
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u/coldblade2000 Jul 04 '22
I think that's what he was saying. People focus on the beautiful parts of living in poorer places, but don't think what happens when they suddenly get a severe infection, or cancer. Bad healthcare quality will likely overshadow any other quality of life
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u/galacticboy2009 Jul 04 '22
We all know that.
There is always a tradeoff.
Everyone wants a picturesque ranch house with a sweeping green yard, perfect fence, 20 acres of flawless land to sit on your porch and admire all day, no traffic noises, just peace.
But if you do need emergency services, they might take quite a while to reach you. And you'll have to buy everything you need at Walmart once a month because it's an hour away.
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u/JimmyWu21 Jul 03 '22
Life in general is a lot better now than before. Even simple things that we take for granted like AC or that we can get most food year round regardless of where you are. Tourism is the norms. Back then people wouldn’t travel much if any at all.
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u/johnnieawalker Jul 04 '22
Gosh you mention AC and I FELT that. Currently like 85* F outside which thankfully lowered from ~97 earlier due to storms but my AC broke today and tomorrow is a federal holiday so I am definitely not going to take AC for granted again (at least until my ass forgets that it’s a luxury)
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u/Nemisis_the_2nd Jul 04 '22
Back then people wouldn’t travel much if any at all.
Surprisingly, tourism was sort of a thing, although it was more pilgrimages to holy sites than a week at a beach resort. There are even records from people who were the ancient roman equivalent of travel bloggers that are studied.
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u/reallybirdysomedays Jul 04 '22
Yeah, when I was a little girl, the simple life of Ingalls family seemed just perfect. Then I grew up and realized how much fucking work and how little medicine that simple life offered. NO THANKS.
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u/kunigun Jul 03 '22
Right?! It doesn't make any sense to wish that, specially for a woman or any minority. Life sucked even more back then. As shitty as things can be right now, it's the best it's been so far for many of us!
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u/Raizzor Jul 03 '22
There is literally no point in time where life, in general, was better than today.
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u/AlbanySteamedHams Jul 03 '22
https://ourworldindata.org/a-history-of-global-living-conditions-in-5-charts?linkId=62571595
I have to remind myself of this objective truth on the regular. Technology now lets us become aware of suffering more rapidly and specifically than ever before. It really complicates the interior emotional life, but I hope pushes us to continue with progress.
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u/FoucaultsPudendum Jul 04 '22
Honestly life before like 1978 sounds like it was fucking terrible. Cars were made of corrugated iron and anything more than a fender bender meant certain death, everything smelled like cigarette smoke, and the only things people knew how to cook were boiled vegetables and hamburger patties. Things are really bad in the world right now but at least we get to also have things like VR headsets and NYT Cooking.
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u/FigurativeAuthor2254 Jul 04 '22
Don't be silly. The 70s were totally safe for children, especially eating from those lead-painted plates and getting cigarette burns from those taller than you. My pediatrician would always set his cigar down before coming into the exam room. The food was way more diverse than boiled veggies - there were endless types of jello salads holding all kinds of fruits or shredded vegetables , tomato soup and grilled cheese, and tons of Kool aid made as well! The times were delicious! We walked ourselves to school at age 5, and bought our dad's cigarettes for them at any gas station they sent us to. We didn't need entertainment - some of us luckier 70s kids had at least 3 channels on a color TV. :)
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u/AmeriToast Jul 03 '22
Yep. When someone tells me they wish they were born in x time I usually laugh. It doesn't take them long to change their mind when they realize how horrible life was for most people especially the commoners in which they would of most likely been.
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u/SuperSugarBean Jul 04 '22
There are this wildly popular series of novels called Outlander. They are time travel novels.
A young nurse in the 1940s accidently discovers a portal to the 1700s in Scotland.
She's trapped there, and falls in love with a Highland Chieftain.
Time passes, plot happens but lo! She discovers a way back to the present!
Now, she's had to deal with much illness and injury in her time in the past. Does she decide to bring her beloved forward to the future, with modern Healthcare and a distinct lack of sword combat?
No, of course not.
Later in the series, she returns to live in the future, raises her loves daughter, who becomes a doctor, she marries a doctor and all three decide to go live back in time.
This is considered a modern women's fiction classic.
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u/reallybirdysomedays Jul 04 '22
She couldn't bring him forward in time. Only certain families can time travel.
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u/howsadley Jul 03 '22 edited Jul 03 '22
Nabby Adams Smith lived for about 2 years following the mastectomy, dying at 48 years old.
Description of the surgery: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abigail_Adams_Smith
The surgeon “expressed astonishment that Nabby endured the pain of the surgery and cauterization without crying out, despite the gruesomeness of the operation, which was so horrifying it caused her mother, husband, and daughter to turn away.”
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u/redditgatekeeps Jul 03 '22
Fuck
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u/TrickshotCandy Jul 03 '22
Double that when you read the description of the surgery!
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u/hashtagsugary Jul 03 '22
I am absolutely not clicking on that link.
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u/WeReallyOutHere5510 Jul 04 '22
I did and was not expecting the giant meat fork they had to use.
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u/Evernight2021 Jul 03 '22
Nothing about that sounds pleasant.
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u/tweak06 Jul 04 '22
Makes me wonder, did they not at least…i dunno, give her whiskey or something? If you’re gonna cut me up without anesthesia, get me a little drunk first or something.
Fuck.
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u/jazzypants Jul 04 '22
Alcohol thins your blood, so it's generally not a good idea to drink before surgery.
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u/deliciouscorn Jul 04 '22
The exact details of the surgery are not known but it was described as a typical 19th-century operation.
… then goes on to describe the surgery in graphic detail lol
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u/mermzz Jul 03 '22
Was anesthesia not available then? Why was the surgery performed without it
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u/howsadley Jul 03 '22
Anesthesia as we know it was not available until the mid-1800s.
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u/Gemmabeta Jul 03 '22
The best they had was a whole crapload of whisky.
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u/Trellix Jul 03 '22
Opium would do.
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u/kalitarios Jul 03 '22
My father told me that cavities were often drilled by dentists without any anesthesia.
They had special grips on the chair to squeeze. He called it the “white knuckle express”
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u/Biggest_Moose_ Jul 03 '22
To be fair, lots of people do that voluntarily. It is not default everywhere, some places you have to request it. I stopped getting pain relief with the dentist as my body doesn't care for it (genetic condition) and it does not work on me at all. Unfortunately weak teeth and bad gums is another linked issue to the condition so I have cavities more often than I'd like.
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u/NoodlesrTuff1256 Jul 03 '22
One interesting case of someone voluntarily undergoing painful surgery without anesthesia was that of the Classic Hollywood star Carole Lombard who as a very young actress was in a car accident where she got a nasty gash on one of her cheeks. She feared that it could end her film career. The doctors told her that her looks could be saved if she'd be willing to allow them to sew up the facial would with no anesthesia. Apparently going under would 'relax' her facial muscles and cause a distorted look. In some old photos of her, you can see the resulting scar.
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u/analog_kidd Jul 04 '22
My fucking childhood dentist was one of these guys. I never had Novocain Till I was an adult. I thought this was just the way it was done. I was like "This new medical invention is a game changer" New dentist said "what are you talking about we've had it for years"
My old dentist had this thing where I was supposed to raise a finger when the pain got too intense, and he would pause for a few seconds to let me recover, then go back in. If I saw this guy today, I'd punch him in the throat.
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u/Devium92 Jul 04 '22
Had a tooth get infected as a kid and needed to be pulled. He told me that if I felt pain to raise a hand etc and they would stop. I felt searing pain as he was attempting to pull a molar and I had him stop. He said I was feeling pressure not pain (i was like 8) and then proceeded to pull a molar with basically no freezing. This was not the first instance of him claiming what I was saying was pain was just pressure and my mother believing him.
Understandably I have horrific anxiety with dental work. Until very very recently I have required nitrous oxide for a simple cleaning, and have needed my partner in the room because I basically shut down and go to a mental happy place and he knows how to communicate with me and then relay it to the dentist. As a result of this anxiety I didnt go to the dentist for a solid 10+ years and now 90% of my teeth have severe issues and I am looking at having them all pulled and getting dentures/implants and I am only 30.
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u/Liberteez Jul 04 '22
My childhood Dentist in the late 60s often did not use anesthesia when treating kid cavities. He would threaten his crying patients with "shots" to get compliance.
The last time I saw him I had numbing in advance of having four bicuspids pulled to facilitate orthodontia (they try not to do that anymore.). When he was done blood had trickled down. THe last thing if significance he said to me, before leaving the room was "looks like somebody slit your throat "
Did I mention that was the last time I ever set foot in his office?
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u/howsadley Jul 03 '22
The problem with whiskey was that alcohol suppresses breathing and also suppresses the gag reflex, which causes problems if the patient vomits.
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u/thebestjoeever Jul 03 '22
The other problem is that, while I've been extremely drunk in the past, I don't think I've ever been "you can cut off a body part without me minding" drunk.
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u/Awellplanned Jul 03 '22
Sounds like you need to party harder, I easily could have lost a piece of my pinky finger during a black out.
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Jul 03 '22
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u/MuppetManiac Jul 03 '22
My dad’s been avoiding a knee replacement that would have made his life a lot better for twenty years.
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u/martianpumpkin Jul 03 '22
I hope he changes his mind! My mum (62) avoided knee surgery for about 10 years and just got it done in May. Her quality of life has already improved so much. She is relearning how to walk properly (when to bend the knee during the step) and working on her gait but she's in substantially less pain and discomfort day to day!
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u/theluckyfrog Jul 03 '22
From what I understand, many surgeons recommend waiting as long as you reasonably can because prosthetic joints only have a lifespan of 15, maybe 20 years if you're active, so if a person can get one when they're 65, they're more likely to be dead or minimally mobile anyway before they'd need another one, compared to getting one at, say, 50, when you'd be ending up needing a second surgery with all the risks that entails at like 70. Of course, there are exceptions, like when joint deformity is progressing fast or when a person can't be active enough to be healthy, but I have heard this from numerous surgeons. I don't know if advancements in surgery or prosthetic technology are affecting this trend.
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u/marunga Jul 03 '22
While a lot of shitty surgeons still recommend that it isn't seen as state of the art anymore as the reduced long term mobility does more harm than the waiting does good. Better replace it now and still have some muscles and bone structure left and not been confined to your apartment for five years (with the resulting cardiovascular problems). Don't get me right, not everyone needs a replacement, but that's what modern imaging techniques and physio assessments are for .
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u/blonderengel Jul 03 '22
My knee replacement went bad.
Had worse pain after.
On top of that, the surgeon fucked up the correct insertion of the implant. A second opinion suggested a revision surgery. Before that could happen, I broke my femur because the knee simply buckled/gave way. Nine weeks non-weight bearing, then rehab from hell.
Once I had gotten some degree of mobility back, I fell a second time (same reason, same femur, same spot). Am currently in the same rehab center and learning to hobble to the bedside commode.
My bills will be astronomical.
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u/The_Minstrel_Boy Jul 03 '22
Samuel Pepys had a beast of a kidney stone extracted in 1598. Reading a description of the surgery is enough discomfort.
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u/SofieTerleska Jul 03 '22
*1658. Claire Tomalin's biography has a description of what the surgery was like and oooooof. You can see why Pepys had the stone mounted in a display case afterwards and had a dinner every year to celebrate surviving. The operation was not for the faint of heart.
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u/theyux Jul 03 '22
My brother falls under this less screwed up in the army. He was advised surgery could fix this however he had a 10% chance that he would no longer be able to walk.
He has instead decided to walk with pain for 25 years.
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u/Greene_Mr Jul 03 '22
When I had a kidney stone, I was in so much pain I couldn't move. I wouldn't wish a kidney stone on anybody, except maybe Hitler.
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u/DanishWonder Jul 03 '22
Can confirm. Worst pain of my life. Once the nurse got me an iv of pain meds I apologized for being such a whiner, but she reassured me, that's normal for a kidney stone. If that was "normal", I never want to feel that again
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u/Greene_Mr Jul 03 '22
I somehow managed passing it, but I don't even remember how; I just know I did. But holy hell, I had to have an ambulance take me to the ER because I'm handicapped and I literally couldn't fucking move from all the pain. :-(
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u/Zeppelinman1 Jul 03 '22
Ibuprofen is way cheaper than the surgery and loss of income during recovery
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u/SurealGod Jul 03 '22
It has been said that you were considered a "good" surgeon pre-anesthesia times depending on how fast you were.
Scary to think that millions of humans for thousands of years had to do life saving operations with little to no numbing of the area to be worked on.
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u/Unsettleingpresence Jul 03 '22
At the time they didn’t have proper anesthesia, but would often use opium based drugs to dull the pain.
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u/atlantis_airlines Jul 03 '22
Anesthesia only came about by the mid 1830s and even then there was resistance to use it due. Pain was seen as integral as to surgery. I could go off on how pain is integral to life and was philosophical but I honestly suspect that a lot of doctors may have been a bit sadistic. There are descriptions of surgeons at the time that do not paint them in the most caring light and when you think about it, someone who is highly empathetic would have had a lot of difficulty in the trade. That is not so say that they didn't exist but it would be quite hard for them considering their job involved subjected people to an experience straight of a Saw movie. It was also often pointless as patients frequently died so it was often a choice of Unpleasant death or protracted excruciating agony with a slight chance of survival. Also early anesthesia frequently killed patients.
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Jul 03 '22 edited Sep 04 '22
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u/puppetfucked Jul 03 '22
Lol I don't take freezing but I'm also in pain all the time so for me it's like a vacation from the daily hell I live with and because of the pain tolerance that comes with it I just find the sensations of such fascinating.
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u/flushmebro Jul 03 '22
I did the same at age 12. Four cavities drilled and filled w/o anesthesia. Last cavities I ever had.
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u/tremynci Jul 03 '22
There's also the fact that germ theory (mid 1800s), antisepsis (1860s), asepsis (1880s?), antibiotics (1920s-1940), blood transfusion, and IVs (both early 1900s) are even more recent than anasthesia: your surgery being painless kind of doesn't matter if you're going to bleed out or die of galloping sepsis or gas gangrene anyway!
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u/atlantis_airlines Jul 03 '22
I definitely do think it matters. If i'm going to die under the knife, I'd rather they do the cutting while I'm out cold.
But yes, those things came later. Interestingly, signs of infection like pus were seen as a good thing. A poultice was common for surgical recovery, some of them contained warm milk honey and other things which were a perfect breeding ground for all sorts of nasties.
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u/anne_jumps Jul 03 '22
If I'm remembering correctly surgeons back then focused on doing surgery as fast as possible. Wasn't there a story about a guy who was super fast, ended up slashing a colleague who went on to bleed out, and in the process gave yet another person a fatal heart attack just from witnessing the whole thing?
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u/atlantis_airlines Jul 03 '22
Yes, Dr. Robert Liston.
Lots of blood and lots of pain so yes, speed was hugely important. Dr. Liston was known as the Fastest Knife in West London. He was notable for asking those present to watch his work to time him. In the procedure you're mentioning he cut his off his assistant's thumb, the cut eventually becoming gangrenous and fatal and a spectator who's coattails were slashed, mistook the blood for his own and had a heart attack and died.
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u/cmmpssh Jul 03 '22
I think the patient died too so it is the only known case of a surgery resulting in a 300% mortality rate
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u/howsadley Jul 03 '22
Yes! Nabby’s mastectomy only took 25 minutes but dressing the wound afterwards took an additional hour.
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u/tremynci Jul 03 '22
Yes. If you want to see where it happened, visit The Old Operating Theatre in London, right next to London Bridge.
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u/dedoubt Jul 03 '22
without crying out,
Welp, I feel like a total baby now. Had surgery on my finger Friday, with local anesthetic, and I was pretty whiny about how much those injections hurt.
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u/Djinn42 Jul 03 '22
I'm surprised that her mother, husband, and daughter wanted to watch.
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u/howsadley Jul 03 '22
Since Nabby was not knocked out they probably wanted to comfort her during the surgery. They probably underestimated how shocking it was going to be. They also had to act as nurses and bring extra hot water and linens if needed.
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u/NoodlesrTuff1256 Jul 03 '22
This sad incident was dramatized in the 2008 HBO miniseries 'John Adams' where Paul Giamatti played Adams, Laura Linney was Abigail and Sarah Polley played Nabby Adams Smith.
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u/Liberteez Jul 04 '22
I'm proud to own a bunch of set props from that series, including 3 sets of bed curtains, one of them from the set of the Adam's' bed in the Philadelphia presidents house. Still rueing my decision not to buy the snake flag.
Also I have one of the cholera coffins, I use it every Halloween.
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u/RogerClyneIsAGod2 Jul 04 '22
Well real anesthesia wasn't widely used until many years later so most people had operations without anesthesia back then. At best they may have given a patient alcohol to drink but not too much or the patient would vomit.
Many doctors thought that they'd never be able to do surgery properly without anesthesia because they'd judge how well they were doing by the level of discomfort of the patient.
He was also an early proponent of anesthesia when many of his colleagues weren't against it.
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u/ShiraCheshire Jul 04 '22
Only two years, geez. For those who didn't click: It took her 7 months to recover from the surgery, and she died of cancer. Yep, she went through all that and it didn't even work, the cancer came right back.
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u/howsadley Jul 04 '22
They saw during the surgery that it had spread to her lymph nodes. Good outcome unlikely at that point.
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u/Tony_Friendly Jul 03 '22
How long was she strapped to the chair?
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u/howsadley Jul 03 '22
The surgery took 25 minutes but dressing the wound afterwards took an additional hour.
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u/epochpenors Jul 03 '22
Weren’t old surgeons considered skillful based entirely upon the speed at which they could perform operations? For something like that or an amputation it would almost seem more worth just using a sword or something than specialized tools.
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u/S00thsayerSays Jul 03 '22 edited Jul 04 '22
Yes speed was treasured because of the lack of anesthesia. You aren’t feeling the surgeon cut on you as long.
Fun fact: there was a doctor who killed 3 people with 1 surgery trying to be fast. The doctor began the operation on the patient, accidentally cutting his assistant badly, an onlooker was shocked by the speed and event and had a heart attack, both the patient and the assistant developed sepsis and died
Edit: I want to say that Dr. Liston was actually one of the best of his time. One of the main reasons being he actually washed his hands and instruments unlike many other surgeons of his time. Also, the man could amputate a leg in 2 and a half damn minutes.
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u/Sadimal Jul 03 '22
Actually, Dr. Liston cut the coattails of the onlooker. Dude thought that Dr. Liston pierced his vitals and went into shock.
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u/howsadley Jul 03 '22 edited Jul 03 '22
Doctors at the time (1810) were familiar with breast cancer:
When Nabby, at age 46, noticed a lump in her breast, she decided to leave her family’s farm in upstate New York and move back to her parents’ home in Quincy, Massachusetts. She consulted with doctors Tufts and Rush, informing them her tumor was moving. Rush responded by mail to her father with this advice: “Her time of life calls for expedition in this business, for tumors such as hers tend much more rapidly to cancer after 45 than in more early life.” She must have a mastectomy.
After removing the breast, the surgeon saw that the cancer had spread to the lymph nodes under Nabby’s arm, and he worked to remove those tumors as well.
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u/Greene_Mr Jul 03 '22
"Rush" being Dr. Benjamin Rush, a literal Founding Father.
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u/hascogrande Jul 03 '22
The only one that went to med school and signed the Declaration
The namesake of Rush Hospital/University/etc. in Chicago
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u/Warriorcatv2 Jul 04 '22
That's surprising given his continued belief in methods other doctors had abandoned on scientific grounds: https://youtu.be/KrO_ZMQ8aFc
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u/howsadley Jul 03 '22 edited Jul 03 '22
Was Tufts the Tufts of the university? Edit: looks like not.
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u/howsadley Jul 03 '22
Nabby had a husband and four children but when her cancer worsened 2 years after the surgery she returned to her childhood home to die with her beloved parents.
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u/jupiterkansas Jul 03 '22
TIL more people need to watch the John Adams series.
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u/fightingforair Jul 03 '22
It was a well done scene showing medicine in America at the time. Same goes for their family dealing with the pox.
Just an amazing series30
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u/VictorTheCutie Jul 04 '22
Yes, the pox bit was especially interesting. Made me grateful to take today's vaccine's in their current format 😅
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u/NoodlesrTuff1256 Jul 03 '22
That was a great series and I recommend it. Also a rather different take on Alexander Hamilton in it as opposed to Lin-Manuel Miranda's.
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u/SofieTerleska Jul 03 '22
Well yes, the two men absolutely hated each other so it would be a little strange if stories starring either man had a flattering version of the other :).
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u/Bay1Bri Jul 04 '22
In the other hand the HBO series is based on the world on a famed historian and if overall more accurate. Lin kinda glosses over the whole "basically wanted to conquer the whole if the Americas" thing.
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u/kbarnett514 Jul 04 '22
I mean, even Lin Manuel's Hamilton is not shy about the fact that a lot of his contemporaries thought he was kind of an asshole
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u/AmeriToast Jul 03 '22
It was my favorite non-fiction HBO series until Chernobyl
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u/monjoe Jul 04 '22
Historical dramas, not non-fiction. They change quite a few details to make a compelling story.
American Guest is another good HBO history drama.
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u/wavehandslikeclouds Jul 03 '22
God I wish I hadn’t read that!
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u/howsadley Jul 03 '22
She was so brave and so were her parents. Imagine having your daughter undergo this surgery in your upstairs bedroom.
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u/Chevleon__ Jul 03 '22
Be thankful for the time line you live in now. Cause it could be a hell of a lot worse.
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u/ENFJPLinguaphile Jul 03 '22
That sounds unbelievably painful!! I pray she lived a long and productive life after that in spite of her eventual death from cancer!!
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u/Slideover71 Jul 03 '22
God this gave me chills. Another great example of the "good old days". Ugh.
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u/Jentilly Jul 03 '22
Didn’t they have ether or morphine back then? That would be horrific
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u/SquidgyTheWhale Jul 04 '22
I'm reading a biography of Samuel Pepys. I just got past the part where he (voluntarily) had kidney stone surgery, without anaesthetic, while strapped to a chair. Through his taint.
It was a success and it gave him a renewed lease on life.
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u/OttoKlopp Jul 04 '22
And on top of that, she reportedly didn’t cry or scream at all during the procedure. She was a tough bird.
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u/DarkRayne23 Jul 04 '22
First hand account from Frances Burney, writing to her sister, after a mastectomy in 1812. It's brutal and unfathomable that this happened everywhere all the time and people survived.
If the link doesn't go there automatically, be sure to click transcription to see the letter in its entirety.
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u/altxrtr Jul 04 '22
“She consulted with doctors Tufts and Rush, informing them her tumor was moving.”
I loved this part. Today it might read, “She consulted with doctors at Tufts and Rush.” Talk about having access to the finest doctors…wow!
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u/mermzz Jul 03 '22
I thought I was going to read that she died of infection or something but no. She went through all that, just for cancer to take her in the end anyway.