# 8 limbed child born **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [November 6, 2007, 8:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/8-limbed-child-born/425392 "2007-11-06T08:44:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![brewha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/91b2a8/32.png) [@brewha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brewha)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2007, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/8-limbed-child-born/425392/61 "2007-11-08T17:19:57Z")
[QUOTE=auRa] …oh, child **b** orn. Thank god, I read something a little disturbing there at first… [/QUOTE] And yet you still opened the thread. Sinner! Also, see post #2. ---
**Author:** ![rocking\_chair](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rocking_chair/32/2918_2.png) [@rocking\_chair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rocking_chair)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2007, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/8-limbed-child-born/425392/62 "2007-11-09T00:53:26Z")
thanks, anaamika, i should have caught that with the verb thing. of course, i was and am still a bit confused by the sacrificial butter. i usually imagine a sacrificial something to be a violent bloody affair. i can’t wrap my brain around how butter would fit in to that. ---
**Author:** ![Kythereia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/e8c25b/32.png) [@Kythereia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kythereia)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2007, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/8-limbed-child-born/425392/63 "2007-11-09T01:08:11Z")
[QUOTE=rocking chair] of course, i was and am still a bit confused by the sacrificial butter. i usually imagine a sacrificial something to be a violent bloody affair. i can’t wrap my brain around how butter would fit in to that. [/QUOTE] Have you no compassion for Mrs. Butter and the Littlest Pat of Butter, you monster? _shakes head_ Really glad to hear she’s doing well. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Pullet](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/edb3f5/32.png) [@Pullet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pullet)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2008, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/8-limbed-child-born/425392/64 "2008-03-15T23:37:02Z")
[She’s up and walking!](http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2008/02/18/wlakshmi118.xml) ---
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2008, 11:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/8-limbed-child-born/425392/65 "2008-03-15T23:54:13Z")
Yay! 🙂 (She’s still cute, too…) ---
**Author:** ![Ruby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/13edae/32.png) [@Ruby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ruby)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2008, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/8-limbed-child-born/425392/66 "2008-03-16T00:00:31Z")
Wow… just WoW! Modern medicine is amazing. ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2008, 1:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/8-limbed-child-born/425392/67 "2008-03-16T01:06:20Z")
Buy her a pony. Name it Sleipner. ---
**Author:** ![Audrey\_Levins](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/73ab20/32.png) [@Audrey\_Levins](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Audrey_Levins)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2008, 1:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/8-limbed-child-born/425392/68 "2008-03-16T13:05:07Z")
Am I the only person wondering, in an equal parts sad/curious way, both how she goes to the restroom and where her Girl Parts are going to be post-surgery? Her twin is joined to her at the hip…and the picture of her with her mother is almost impossible for me to make sense of. I picture two people joined at the hip, ink-test style, and I just don’t see where her girl bits are going to go and how that could be rectified. Her X-ray just makes the idea even less understandable. Am I the only one who wondered this upon hearing the problem and seeing the girl? ---
**Author:** ![Count\_Blucher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Count\_Blucher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Count_Blucher)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2008, 2:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/8-limbed-child-born/425392/69 "2008-03-16T14:09:04Z")
[QUOTE=Ruby] Wow… just WoW! Modern medicine is amazing. [/QUOTE] She should thank her [doctor](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/b/b6/2826_DocOck.jpg). ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2008, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/8-limbed-child-born/425392/70 "2008-03-16T15:28:25Z")
[QUOTE=Pullet] [She’s up and walking!](http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2008/02/18/wlakshmi118.xml) [/QUOTE] And she’s a big sister now, too! Welcome, Sarawati! She looks great. They are planning on another operation to bring her legs closer together later on, and perhaps to give her additional pelvic floor muscles. [QUOTE=Audrey Levins] Am I the only person wondering, in an equal parts sad/curious way, both how she goes to the restroom and where her Girl Parts are going to be post-surgery? [/QUOTE] Nope, you’re not the only one. I haven’t been able to find out, either. It’s not the sort of details popular press articles seem to cover. I’m sure it’s in medical journals by now, but I don’t have access to those, darnit! There’s a picture slideshow [here](http://technorati.com/videos/youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DMMCfzvmLHuI) which shows her pre-surgery wearing a diaper down by the parasite’s “neck” at about 0:35. I’m not sure if that was an excretory site or perhaps an attempt to treat the pressure sore near the site. WARNING: the next picture in the automatic slideshow (at 0:38) is a graphic one of her still open wound on the surgical table! What I wonder is how much she needed to EAT, before the operation. My understanding was that these parasitic twins are just that - parasites that drain away nutrients from the autosite’s body. I think it’s amazing that, during the years of fastest growth, one little mouth was able to eat enough to not only grow herself, but to nourish an almost full size other body! She’s obviously a beautiful, strong little girl, and I wish her the best. ---
**Author:** ![mnemosyne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c4cdca/32.png) [@mnemosyne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mnemosyne)\ **Post date:** [March 16, 2008, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/8-limbed-child-born/425392/71 "2008-03-16T22:59:31Z")
> **[Lakshmi Tatma](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lakshmi_Tatma)** > > Lakshmi Tatma is an Indian girl born in 2005 in a village in Araria district, Bihar, with "4 arms and 4 legs." She was actually one of a pair of ischiopagus conjoined twins, one of which was headless because its head had atrophied and chest had not fully developed in the womb, causing the appearance of one child with four arms and four legs. She has undergone surgery to remove these extra limbs. > Lakshmi's father, Shambhu, and mother, Poonam, were day labourers who earned less than 40 rupees pe... The Wiki article suggests that the reproductive and urinary organs/structures were shared or part of the parasitic twin, and that they had to be moved into Lakshmi’s body during the operation. She really is a beautiful girl - I can’t imagine the pain she must have gone through, and will continue to go through, as a result of this surgery, reconstruction and rehabilitation, but she’s always shown smiling, and looking adventurous. I wish her a happy life! [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/8-limbed-child-born/425392.md?page=3)