11: You Forgot to Deliver my Twin

The year was 1932, and Mary Knight was almost 9 months pregnant. She began to feel repeated kicking for a long period of time so she thought it was time to deliver her long-awaited child. Mary had a fixed income that required her to live paycheck to paycheck; it was going to be Mary’s first time seeing a doctor. She walked unto Dr. Monroe’s office and he began to assess Mary’s complaint. He pulled out his Stethoscope and tried to hear the baby’s heartbeat. But there was a major problem, there was no heartbeat coming from Mary Knight belly. Dr. Monroe was shocked because she had all the symptoms of a pregnant women, enlarged breast, tender nipples, morning sickness and abdominal stretch yet there was no fetal heartbeat. She was experiencing a phenomenon known as “Phantom Pregnancy” also known as pseudocyesis.

What concluded his diagnosis was Mary’s belly button, which was still inward, usually with pregnant women the belly button gets “pushed out”, Mary’s belly button was still inward which lead to a diagnosis. Mary was exhibiting a phantom limb like syndrome; she had wanted a child so badly that her mind has changed her body completely. Her Hypothalamus began to secrete more hormones that mimic pregnancy systems. “The body's effects on the mind are just as profound as those of the mind on the body, giving rise to complex feedback loops involved in generating and maintaining false pregnancy”. There are many hypothesis that can explain these strange symptoms which include, the dropping of the diaphragm, an increase in gas internally, the pushing forward of the pelvic portion of the spine, the growth of the omentum, and finally in some rare occasion the enlargement of the uterine.

Studies have shown a correlation between depression and cessation of menstruation, it could be due from evolutionary strategy for avoiding a waste of precious resources on ovulation and pregnancy when you are disabled and depressed. So this question arises, how does false pregnancy cause the female to stop the menstrual cycle? This question still remains unanswered, the goal is to apply the learning’s in these strange cases and relate them to possible illness inside them body either from tumors pressing onto an organ or lack of neurotransmitters for a normal healthy functional brain. As a child we were all once told that if you put your mind to something you can achieve anything and I totally believe in that because I do believe that mind is greater than matter. As I learn more about the brain in this class the more I believe in this statement, phantom limb syndrome is something that western practices should study more.