I’ve had no serious illnesses and no broken bones. I’m deadly nearsighted, so I might have walked into an oncoming horse and buggy, or starved when I couldn’t shoot dinner, but other than that I’d still be around.
I was hit by a car when I was 15. If I’d been in a similar kind of accident 200 years ago–say, run over by a carriage–I probably would be dead or hopelessly crippled.
This is assuming that I would have been born at all. My mother had serious complications with my older brother’s birth, the kind of thing that used to kill women off by the hundreds.
Good point, Venoma, about having to shoot your dinner - I might not have been carried off by illness or injury, but I never considered that 200 years ago I’d probably not be living in the suburbs with easy access to supermarkets, video stores and dry cleaners. And I’m also thinking, OK, 200 years ago is not medieval times, but it was still pretty primitive here in the US.
I did read recently that there’s a group of people who volunteered to take their families out into the wilderness and live in genuine pioneer style for some ridiculous period of time. They’re apparently filming (or have already filmed) a documentary on this group. Anyhow, I was reading about these people having to grow/kill their own food, make candles for light, beat their clothing against rocks in the stream and so on, and I thought, shoot, the sheer volume of work involved in living day to day would kill me pretty quickly.
(I admit it - I’m lazy. And very glad to be living in a time when laziness isn’t fatal!)
Dead of Appendecitis.
But, since my dad also had appendecitis as a kid, I actually would’ve never been born.
What a coincidence. I had that as an infant too. I was under the impression that if I was born pre-1950 I would have likely died. I am still not exactly sure what they did to fix it but ever since I remember I always would throw up if I ate too quickly or too much even to this day. I swear I am not bulemic. 
Dairy Mary
LifeOnWry - check here: Frontier House Many died while trying to homestead - 2/3 of them? Can’t remember, but appalling death rate in those Montana winters.
I’d have been dead at 4, severe pneumonia. Had it for three weeks, they unofficially quarantined our house and the doctor came to us (several of us kids had it at once, but mine was apparently the worst). So bad that as an adult the scar tissue in my lungs is still visible on x-ray. All I remember is delirium.
Well, now, are we talking about 200 years ago? 1802? There were large cities and some forms of halfway decent medicines, and markets and even some kinds of socialized help, though they didn’t call it that—in some areas of some countries. Some women were even able to earn their own living and not have to get married or have children—there was an active womens’-rights movement in England then.
Now, if we’re talking 400 or 500 years ago, well, we’d all be well and truly screwed.
Well, I think I’d still be alive. The only time I was really hospitalized was to get my tonsils out when I was 7. I don’t think that would’ve killed me, but it could’ve been a chronic problem.
However, at the ripe old age of 22, I’d probably be married with several kids.
Dead as a doornail, repeatedly. And then crippled.
Born prematurely; spent several weeks in an incubator before I was strong enough to undergo surgery for double hernias.
Several rounds of strep throat, with very high fevers. Pneumonia twice, at ages 10 and 15 (on my birthday, both times! Boy, did that suck!) Few rounds of other random stupid infections (UTI’s, sinus,a nd the like). Don’t know how often these can be killed off without any antibiotics, but the sinus ones in particular are very stubborn, and have been known to resist treatment by several different types of antibiotics before they are finally vanquished.
Broken wrist at age 14, but that was a minor fracture and might have healed OK with minimal treatment. The left leg is another story: broke it in about 6 places a few years ago, and it’s taken all kinds of plates, screws, rods, etc. to get it more or less functional. That all came with its own lovely set of post-op infections and complications, including a honking HUGE blood clot which might have killed me on its own. (Of course, it was probably because I was on the Pilll when I broke the leg and had the surgery, so maybe I wouldn’t have gotten the clot 200 years ago, anyway.) So I’d definitely be hobbling around on crutches if I’d somehow made it through the other stuff.
Good point, Linus.
When I was 11, I travelled to a not-so-medically-advanced country with my family, and I contracted some still-unidentified stomach illness or food poisoning that nearly did me in (fever, constant vomiting and diarrhea, weakness, etc.). I had it for a few days before my parents broke down and took me to a local clinic, where I was poked in the stomach to check for appendicitis (negative) and then told to drink a half-gallon of lemonade with baking soda in it a day. Which I did. 2 weeks and no antibiotics later, I was fine.
Ha! Death, I spit at thee!
Alive, probably. I had allergies as a kid, which probably means I had a strong immune system that didn’t have enough to keep itself occupied. I’m a klutz, but so far modern medicine hasn’t had much to say about my various injuries - bandaged and sent home, but in 1802 it’d have been much the same.
I don’t think I’ve ever had an infection serious enough that antibiotics made the difference between life and death (assuming, indeed, that they helped at all).
Both of my parents survived standard childhood illnesses, which laid my father low for about 1/3 of fourth grade. Neither ever had anything that might’ve killed them. My grandfather had a severe lung infection in the 30s that I think only got palliative care - he survived. Oh, but my grandmother almost died of an intestinal blockage. So yeah, I might not quite be the same person…
I do appreciate modern dentistry, even though seriously whacked-out teeth aren’t fatal.
And it’s nice being able to be out. But even in 1802, there were ways to arrange your life…the gay world did not begin in 1969.
No major illnesses, no broken limbs, no birth defects, big and strong.
I LIVE!
But I would likely have wound up a low-ranking monk, as I’m also very nearly blind by now, with crappy eyesight.
Oh, well. At least I’d have been alive to bitch about my life.
My mom and I both would have died when she was giving birth to me. I was a C-section baby and one of the doctors actually told her “Be glad you didn’t live 100 years ago–you’d have been a goner” or something to that effect. Which isn’s the most sensitive thing to tell a new motehr, come to think of it.
If that hadn’t killed me, I’d probably have fallen into a ditch and died. I have horrible, horrible vision.
And while we’re on the subject, let’s not forget that modern plumbing and sanitation keeps us all from contracting cholera and other nasty things.
I am also one of the lucky few that gets to live. I had a few minor ear infections as a kid, as well as the chicken pox, but I think I would have survived that. No broken bones, no need for surgery; the only thing that would be wrong with me is a few crooked teeth. Of course, 200 years ago I would have probably been poor and uneducated, with no hope and no future.
I woudn’t have made it to 25 (pnemonia) or 32 (cellulitis) because I would have been swinging from a tree looong before that (major attitude while being black).
I’d probably be alive, I’ve broken lots of minor bones like fingers, hands, feet, and nose but I didn’t go to the doctor for those anyway. I got Chicken pox at 22 so it was pretty bad with fevef and everything, but again I didn’t do anything special so I figure I would have survived back then.
The biggest problem is the size of my mouth. I’m sure back then someone would have challenged me to a duel and killed me.
I’d have been dead before I was a year old. I don’t remember the details, but I had some sort of semi-serious infection shortly after birth.
Failing that I’d probably be burned at the stake as a heretic. (Yeah yeah, I know they weren’t still doing that 200 years ago), or die of protein deficiency. Us vegetarians wouldn’t have much luck in 19th century england.
I have however never broken a bone or suffered a serious injury, so if I made it past year 1 I wouldn’t have died outright.
Well, they did do C-sections back in Roman times. Risky, but some survived. Premature births weren’t always fatal either.
Me, I’d have been dead–I have Type I diabetes. I also had a bad bout of pneumonia two years ago.
Interestingly enough, my mother’s whole town underwent a scarlet fever epidemic during the 1930s–the only three children who didn’t get it were her and her brother and sister.
Me too. (I was at least nine or ten weeks premature)
F_X
Dead. Kidney infection at age nine.