I watch these guys on TV at strong man competitions, pulling 18 wheelers with a chain, carrying 55 gallon drums full of water, etc., and I am wondering could the human body under the incredable strain these guys are subjecting themselves to, just flat out spring a life threatening leak? Or, would the bodys sences kick in and drop the guy into a faint. I am sure they have suffered broken blood vessels and worse, but could things go so far that blood flows from sweat glans? Or, eyes to pop out? Or, am I thinking of a cartoon here?
i have heard of people (other than in the Bible) sweating blood, but i don’t remember what the circumstances were.
Although I doubt your eyes would pop out, it’s certainly possible to have a stroke or some sort of hemmorhaging (sp?), especially if you already have increased blood pressure. I’ve heard of people sweating blood before, although I think it was in entirely different circumstances, and I seriously doubt that those accounts were true.
Well, my SIL broke all the blood vessels in her eyes during labor with my niece. She looked like a prize fighter for about a week.
This being the case, I imagine that someone pulling a really heavy object might do the same. They could probably hearniate themselves. However, I’ve never heard of sweating blood.
People overexerting themselves can certainly have hernias, either in the abdomen or in spinal discs. Muscles can tear, ligaments snap, bones break, joints dislocate. Blood vessels can pop.
I think some of those, at least, could be fatal. I don’t know about sweating blood, though.
While I haven’t information concerning the relationship between extreme physical exertion and sweating blood, such sweating is known to be a real phenomenon.
This past weekend there was a piece on The History Channel about stigmatists, people who more-or-less unaccountably have wounds which correspond with the wounds of Christ (or, in the case of Muslims, with the battle wounds of Mohammed). The documentary cited experiments in which people under hypnosis had been induced to sweat blood from their foreheads.
I recall that around 1980 The Wall Street Journal carried a series of articles about the “hysteria” among flight attendants on a certain U. S. domestic run. Stewardesses complained that they were perspiring bright red sweat. People hearing this (including WSJ staff) interpreted this as an allusion to sweating blood in the manner of Christ and dismissed the stories out of hand as delusional.
Then it turned out that the stwardesses actually did have bright red sweat. Once authorities started taking their complaints seriously, it was determined that they were being dusted with the die from a defective life preserver as they gave the in-flight safety lecture.
Interesting but citeless note on slipster’s stigmatists: apparently some such people get nail scars in their palms (“crucifixion scars”). However, I understand real hammer-and-nail crucifixions were done through the wrist, as the palm tended to tear free under the full weight of the body. Anyone know about this more definitively?
Funny, the things we humans think to do for punishments.
People with stigmata exhibit the symptoms from the areas of the body that THEY personally believe to be relevent, i.e. they will bleed from the palms if they are under the impression that is where the crucifixional nails were drilled, or bleed from the right side of the body from the spear wound inflicted on Christ rather than the left. In this way, scientists who study it believe it is more psychological that supernatural. Also, it only happens to firm believers who seem to have the ability to work themselves up into such a religious fervor that they physically exhibit the wounds of those they exhalt. And I had never heard of the wounds of Mohammed being displayed in this way. Does anyone have a link for me?