So last night I was out with my friend and his wife. They were staying at a hotel (they’d moved out of their old apartment; something about one of their roommates pulling a knife on them). Friend’s wife was feeling sick and bloated. Her belly was swollen and hard; she thought she was either pregnant or had appendicitis, he thought it was just gas.
He had her lie down on the bed, and he started pushing on her belly. And she farts. Loudly. At that point, I retreat to the bathroom to change into my swim trunks. He continued squeezing for at least a good five minutes, getting a good series of artistically redeeming farts out of his dear wife.
She did feel better when this operation was done. Apparently the olive pizza she’d had earlier had given her a bad case of gas, and she was just holding it in in a ladylike fashion. Only she’d been so used to holding in the flatus that she wasn’t really accustomed to farting.
Considering the usual activity that consists of a woman lying on the bed with a man on top of her, pushing down, perhaps we should be happy they learn to hold in the flatulence?
Assisted Farting is really best left in the hands of trained medical personnel, who can first rule out more serious causes of abdominal distention, rigidity, and pain. The patient may well be suffering from Terminal Flatulence (TF), and this sort of maneuver is absolutely contra-indicated as it can lead to the death of both patient and Assistant.
A very wise Professor Emeritus of Medicine from Johns Hopkins once gave me a bit of advice on the subject, and said advice has never failed me. Dr. Tums, as we called him, was a veteran of WWII where he served as a doc in the south pacific, with their myriad of tropical diseases. He told me: “Never force a fart.”
Seriously? A quick Google only turns up fart jokes and webmd doesn’t have anything. Or did I get whooshed in the worst way and have my sense of smell obliterated ?
I’ll admit, I was wrong in not stopping him. It could have been serious if it was, say, appendicitis. Not to mention it would have made for a much better story if it was some medical assistant squeezing farts out of her.
Yes, the post was partly tongue in cheek. But only partly. Probably the assistant would survive, but one could do serious damage to the patient. If a patient is unable to expell their own flatus, squeezing them could cause colonic rupture. Better to let nature take its course, and let the colon work to pass things as designed.
If that fails, measures such as enemas or even a sigmoidoscopy to relieve impaction would be preferable and safer than trying to squeeze someone like a toothpaste tube.
I’m glad that it appears that her situation turned out well, but I think the advice to not force anything out is very important.
You never know what might go wrong. This story reminds me of a sad situation a coworker is experiencing: her FIL was constipated and used an enema to try to get things moving. The enema evidently caused an enormous abcess that was pressing on his colon (source of the constipation) to rupture. He had to have emergency surgery. Last I heard, he was incontinent and incoherent due to an infection that the abcess caused. I’m sure he never expected all that to happen from using an enema.
I’m sure he never expected all that to happen from using an enema.