Body Suspensions - two experts explain ...

A suspension is the act of suspending a human body from hooks that have been put through body piercings. These piercings are temporary and are performed just prior to the actual suspension.

(Wikipedia)

LEE LA ENTREVISTA EN ESPAÑOL AQUÍ

I interviewed two professionals, Joel and Fran of A Sangre Fria Body Art in Madrid, Spain.

How was the step from being a tattoo and piercing professional to being a key figure in the world of body suspension?
Joel: Obviously, we have evolved. From the very beginning on I've been in contact with body piercing, practicing a lot until reaching a certain level of expertize and becoming a professional. I learned about other techniques, materials and piercing methods.
Having experimented a lot with my own body, piercing it, tattooing it, I know quite well how it responds to pain. Over the years, we all have grown more and more our threshold of pain, and one day, surfing the Internet, I saw some images of suspension. And, as any other person would do, I asked myself: "What it is about? How does it feel? How is it done?". And as I had already trained myself as a piercer, one day I felt motivated and said: "I want to get there, I want to try this". So that day Fran and I took our first step in this extreme practice, suspending ourselves for the first time.

Guided by someone already initiated in the art of suspension, I guess?
J: No, no. We are self-taught.

So you see a video of a suspension and just go and try it?
J: As we are professionals of the field of piercing, we know the technique - placing a hook in ones back or chest is actually a form of piercing. Then, little by little, we had to learn about appropriate materials and techniques for different types of suspensions.
Fran: Apart from an evolution that each of us experienced at a personal level, we also evolved as a group. It began long before the first suspension. It was a sort of project that had been growing. The process lasted about one and a half years; we started with play piercings, began experimenting with hooks, tried pullings...

Play piercing?
F: We pierce our bodies temporarily and arrange the needles in a certain configuration to create, for example, geometric shapes, to lace them together like a corset, to sew the eyes, mouth, or arms ... or we simply pierce ourselves for fun.

(Photo by Clare Foxcroft Williams for Sweet Nauseas)

Or to turn yourself into a leopard-man, for example?
J: Could be. In that case it is a set of body modifications – piercings, tattoos, implants – that gives the person the appearance of an animal. Once I pierced my knuckles with protruding needles to make my hands look like claws. It was part of a show during which I was suspended upside-down.

F: But all that happened at a later stage, when we were already combining suspensions with play piercing or pulling, or even a dragging suspended people with a pulling.

What is a pulling?
It’s the practice of piercing the flesh and then pulling by the pierced body parts. It is essential when preparing for a suspension.

If I show up at your studio at, let's say, five o'clock in the afternoon and say: "I'd like to try a body suspension myself". What would you respond and how would you initiate me into this practice?
F: You know, first of all we would have to make you aware of the step your going to take. Because for us, a suspension is something very personal. So it is fundamental to understand that there will be a before and a after.
F: We get to know the person who wants to be suspended, we show him or her the material to be used, we talk about the pros and cons and try to create a certain level of confidence.
J: However, if you come here at five o'clock in the afternoon asking us to suspend you we would probably say no at first.

Why?
J: Because it's obvious that if you knew what this is all about you wouldn't come and ask that way.

And not at five o'clock in the afternoon?
J: Exactly. But if you insist, we would explain you what suspension mean to us, how we initiated ourselves in this art, what materials we use and how; a number of explanations to let you know what you are going to get involved in. You have to know all the details before you start, because it's your body you are going to "play" with, it's an aggression to your body. It's not like putting on a shirt and changing it if you don't like it; you will pierce your body. Hygiene, for example, is a very important issue. If your wounds get infected you can have serious health problems. Hygiene is essential.
F: Indeed, hygiene is a very controversial and heavily criticized question. It is fundamental if the job is to be performed in a professional and we try to inform people as much as possible about the methods to prevent infections. In addition to that, as Joel mentioned, a novice suspendee has to understand the techniques and materials used for a suspension. And we want to understand the reason why a person wants to be suspended. We respect all motives, even the most extreme ones. But it is necessary to know the candidate in order to approach the suspension in one way or another.

After we had a little chat and you know more about me and my motivations - how would we proceed from that moment on, how would you start preparing me for my first suspension? The most extreme piercing I had so far was a neck piercing...
J: First of all we would have to put in contact with the piercing needles. But as you've already experienced the piercing of your neck, you may have a slight idea of what you feel when pierced. When it comes to hooks, the only thing that changes is the caliber: the lengths and diameter of the piercing and the body part that is pierced. But you might say: "A 4mm needle must be extremely painful!". But I assure you that a thinner needle, a 1,2 mm needle, hurts more. Because pain can be sharp or rather dull and intense.

(Photo by Helene Fjell)

You are saying that a thinner needle can hurt more than a huge and thick one?
J: This is all about perception of pain, which is different for each person. A thin needle causes a sharp and slightly burning pain, which may feel a bit like ripping the skin. The pain produced by a thicker needle is rather dull. Besides that, if the pain is very intense, let's say 40 or 50 points out of 100, the brain activates a defense mechanism to make the body be on the alert. For example, if somebody hits your arm and you feel pain, you activate all your senses to be prepared to defend yourself and flee. An analgesic substance is being secreted if the pain is intense. A moderate pain, like the one felt while being tattooed, is not intense enough to activate the secretion of the calming endorphines, which would make the pain more bearable. Another example: if I cut one of your arms, the pain would be so intense that you wouldn't feel it if I cut your other arm as well, because your body's endorphine's, similar tu extasis, would anesthetize you to a certain degree.

Ok, let's say, I feel prepared and want to actually start with the pre-suspension program. Would you now start placing hooks in my back?
F: If we feel that you have been informed and that you have definitively taken the decision to go on with the suspension, we would invite you to come another day. In a very relaxed way we would probably start piercing and suspending ourselves to make you become familiar with the practice and lose the fear you may feel.

I'm ready, let's go on!
J: Well, this would be the moment were we pierce you with a hook and do some "rehearsals" with pullings.

I have to say that the piercing itself doesn't impress me that much, but what I couldn't even look at when I saw the video, was the pulling. It seems like the skin is just about to rip! How is it possible that the skin resists when someone pulls at a pierced hook? I think I just couldn't bear the thought of my skin ripping...
F: That's just natural. That's why we experiment with progressive pullings to make you lose this fear. We place the hooks, for example in your back or chest and then gently pull using a chain or string. Or we tie the string to the wall and you move forwards little by little until feeling the tensi0n, your weight and making yourself an idea of how a suspension might feel. Once you feel comfortable with that we could proceed to a real suspension. Even though there are people who want to be suspended right away, we prefer to do it this way, little by little.

I think we all ask ourselves: how is it possible that the skin resists this incredible tension? I can understand that, when 20 hooks are used, each hooks does not support more than a small percentage of the body weight. But using only two hook in the back (and placing them almost at the same place) or even worse, in the chest or knees?

(Photo: www.delawareonline.com)


J: There are two things you have to consider: the physical and the psychological aspect. At a physical level, you have to understand that the skin has a certain level of resistance to tension. As you said, if several hooks are placed, each of them has to support a certain amount of weight, depending on the body area and on the person's race (black skin is tougher and thicker, for example).
F: The length of the piercing and the hook's diameter are not the only factors that influence the successful result of a suspension. Also the skin is very important. All these factors have to be considered in order to do a good job. It's not about placing a hook without thinking and waiting to see if it can support the weight - or not. Thanks to the experience we have acquired over the years, we have a working procedure where every step has been carefully thought - we know where and how to pierce. For example, some parts of the body are rarely exposed to sun and the skin is much softer there.

But, if using few hooks, you also pierce the muscle so that the hook can support the weight, right?
J: No, no, in no way! If we pierced the muscle, we would cripple ourselves. It would be possible to support the pain of piercing the muscle beneath the skin, but probably only once. It's enough to pierce the skin due to it's enormous elasticity. It has occurred that the hook gets broken before the skin rips, if the piercing is well done. The human body is just a perfect invention ...

Fran performing one of the most difficult suspension. Photo courtesy of A Sangre Fría

The suspension shown in the photo looks like something physically impossible to me. Only two hooks placed very close together in the sternum area!

I can assure you that this chest suspension is one of the most extremes we've ever done. It's like using one single hook, which is possible, if the hook is very thick. A we've discussed, the less hooks you use, the more weight each of them has to support - that's why they have to be thick enough. If they aren't, the act like a knife, cutting the skin and ripping it. And the sternum is a very complicated body area. The skin should neither be too thick nor too elastic. there is not much skin to work with in the sternum area. For this suspension we placed two hooks quite close together, but one of them exerting a force to the right and the other one to the left. By doing so we managed to even up the tension in a way. There are people who have managed to perform this suspension using one single hook. But in that case the hook's diameter has to be 8 mm. The hooks on the photo are 4 mm.
A normal suspension can last a long time, two hours, for example. But in that kind of extremely complicated suspensions it's difficult to withstand more than 20 or 25 minutes.

Has your skin ever ripped?
J: Yes, a little bit (showing his forearm).

Obviously you know quite well your body when it comes to piercing it. But in my case, if it's my first suspension, is it possible that my skin doesn't resist even though there weren't any problems during the pulling?
J: Yes, it could happen but it's our job to make sure it doesn't occur. That means that we will be with you during the whole process, holding your hand. There will be a person pulling the rope, another one behind you (in case of a back suspension) will keep an eye on the hooks and regulate them if necessary and there will be somebody in front of you holding your arms tightly. If you feel confident, you will let go of his/her arms by yourself, little by little, until you are completely suspended.

What do you feel in that very moment? Y mean, it must hurt quite a lot only to introduce these huge hooks; do I have to be prepared for a lot more pain when being suspended?
The perception of pain is different in each person. In my case, for example, the piercing hurts a lot, but the suspension not any more. But there are people who feel less pain when being pierced but when the suspension starts they break down.
When we pierce a person a certain amount of air is introduced in the body. We have to massage the area to remove this trapped air through the piercing hole. That's when most people bleed and it's probably the most painful part of the process. However I specially enjoy it.

In the video we can see that you pinch body area to be pierced with your fingers.
J: It's a kind of warm-up, to prepare the area.
F: For the same reason we "train" with pullings before we start de suspension. Besides that, it's useful to find out if you feel comfortable with the hooks, and to make sure they don't pull more on one side that on the other, which would be very unpleasant during the suspension. When I was suspended from my chest, I started to have breathing difficulties and had to interrupt the session. Because my lungs didn't have enough space to expand.

Let's talk about the spiritual aspect of this practice. It seems like suspensions have been practiced in certain tribes for spiritual reasons, right? Do you aim to reach a higher state of spirituality, are the suspensions a way of meditation for you?
J: In a primitive tribe things are different. The first suspension were performed as early as 800 B.C. Tattoos, piercings and suspensions have been practiced in a great number of civilizations, from the very beginning on. Nowadays, en certain parts of Africa, when a girls has her first menstruation, she gets pierced to let men know that she has become a woman. When she loses her virginity, she gets another piercing to indicate this condition to other men.

But I've heard that in some places suspensions are a way to go into trance through pain. Do you have the same approach?
J: People ask us if we enjoy pain. No, we don't enjoy it it. What we seek is what we obtain from pain. Indeed it's a form of meditation, it's a way to be alone with yourself; there is a before and a after. Our approach is rather spiritual, yes, and that's the reason why we always try to get to know the people who want us to suspend them. Some professionals charge for suspensions, we don't. Because during a suspension we act as shamans. Asking for money would destroy the positive energy necessary for this practice. But obviously there are people who do suspensions as if it was a sport discipline, or something crazy, or simply a show. Or just to be able to say that they've hung themselves from hooks.

Book recommendation: "Dune" by Frank Herbert

Do you want people to prepare themselves psychologically before a suspension? Through meditation, for example.
F: I think there are different methods to reach the same state of mind. Sometimes we have meditated before a suspension, but there are days when we are so happy and euphoric that we don't need it. There is a routine preparation, but it depends on the situation and how the person feels at that very moment. And it also depends of the reason why somebody wants to be suspended - because something very bad or very positive has happened to him/her or just because of a physical necessity. These are the suspension we really enjoy because we can obtain something from them, they are curative. It's different if we are hired for a show for a certain day. In that case it's just a job, no meditation, nothing. But still, even in that case we are nervous and tense before the performance.

Why exactly are you nervous before a suspension?
J: It doesn't matter if you prepare yourself through meditation or not, a suspension is always the acceptance and overcoming of pain. To know and to accept that what you are going to do will hurt. And that you will overcome it - or not.

And does it still hurt as much as the first time?
F: Sometimes even more. Because after piercing the skin so many times it has become tough.

Are there differences between men and women when it comes to withstand the pain?
F: It's easier to pierce woman and she will bear the pain more easily because she is prepared to give birth to children.
J: You, just because you are a woman, are psychologically better prepared to withstand pain than any man. It's just nature. I mean I don't want to make generalizations, but it tends to be like that.

Would you say that people who practice body suspensions belong to a kind of urban tribe and share other interests as well?
F: I don't think that they belong to a urban tribe, it's simply a way of escape for the people who practice it. You can find any kind of person among the suspendees - people who dress smartly wearing their office suit or people who deal with tattoos and piercing, which is the most common case. The latter are usually pierced and show an interest in body modifications in general. So you could say that the majority share an interest for this kind of practices, but more and more there are also other people who are curious about suspensions.

I guess that it's absolutely not recommendable to drink alcohol or take drugs before or during a suspension, am I right?
J: We have never suspended anybody who was drugged or drunk, to be true. And we won't do it in the future.
F: But there are different ways to perform a suspension. There are people who even use anesthesia, but we are not in favor of doing so, because there is no sense in doing it that way. I could also put on a harness and do aerial acrobatics.
J: And there are people who do it just in any way, simply to say that they've done it. And their environment perceives their act as something impressing and brave and the image of the person changes. But we are actually completely normal people, we drink, we eat, we sleep; we have just found our own method to experience drug-like sensations. Other people may experience something similar practicing meditation or parachuting.

I've read that there are certain people who instead of piercing themselves to place a hook before each suspension have chosen the option of an implant under their skin with a kind of connecting piece for the hook sticking out.
J/F: We were unaware of this practice.
J: But one of the fathers of body suspension, Fakir Musafar (in the photo), has a piercing whole so huge, that he can put his finger into it. The whole has healed, so he doesn't have to pierce again before every suspension.

Wouldn't that be the logical thing?
J: Probably, but in my opinion part of the ritual gets lost. The process has to be painful, otherwise it would be like a garden without flowers. Pain is the essence in this case. Pain produces this special sensation that we seek and that makes every suspension so unique. It's something different each time.

Can you do other things while you are suspended? Eat, drink...
J: Or play Parcheesi, if you want.

Stefanie Kaiser, 2010.

The little people

Dwarfism is short stature resulting from an abnormal medical condition.[...] It can be caused by over 200 distinct medical conditions and as such the symptoms and characteristics of individual dwarfs vary greatly. In the USA people who are affected by dwarfism are often referred to as Little people.

(Wikipedia)

In the picture, the Filipino couple Martina (68,6 cm) and Juan de la Cruz (73,7 cm), who were considered the tiniest living couple of their time. For comparison - 70 cm would be the size of an average baby of about 8 or 9 months.

Maybe you have wondered why there are so many dwarfs with apparently big heads and short legs and arms and others, who are just petite?

There are two kinds of Little people: "dwarfs" and "midgets". I write "midgets" even though the Association of Little People of America is attempting to ban this "m-word" at least on TV, as they consider it as offensive as the word "nigger". But, as you will see, in the entertainment industry, not all little ones consider the term discriminating, actually, being a midget can turn them into millionaires!
Due to a genetic disorder, dwarfs are extremely short and have disproportionate body parts. They often suffer from associated problems such as nerve compression or disproportionate organs. The word "dwarf" is not considered offensive.

Midgets are just short in height. Their condition may be inherited or consequence of a nutritional deficiency (in this case it can be treated with growth hormones in some cases). If they are attractive, they can be extremely sought-after in the entertainment industry. The Don Juan on the left is definitively a good choice...

Nowadays, at least in industrialized countries, it is easier to see short-legged dwarfs than cute midgets.

On the other hand, lots of pictures of vintage petites in elegant garment can be found. Maybe this is due to the fact, that because of the poorer nutrition standards in the 19th and the early 20th century, more people were short in height as a consequence of a lower production of growth hormones during their childhood. In the photograph (http://photobibliothek.ch): The wedding of the century - Charles Stratton alias Tom Thumb (1837 - 1883) marries Lavinia Warren in 1863.

Book recommendation: "Chiquita" by Antonio Orlando Rodríguez (Spanish)


But before I present you some extraordinary entertainers, you will want to know: What do little people do for their living if they are not interested in exhibiting themselves? How is their daily life? I've got no idea. But the scriptwriters of the TV-series "Little people, big world" do. Everything you want to know about ordinary people of the dwarf community and the problems they may experience in a world made for giants:




Let's return to Little people in showbiz. Same as you can hire an Argentinian clown, an Asian stripper or a giant black hulk for gay parties, you can also hire Little people for almost any purpose (I guess there are specialized agencies for some of these purposes...). There are lots of hiring agencies around.
That's what recruiters say:
Are you less than 4'10" in height? Is your short stature caused by one of the more than 200 medical conditions known as dwarfism? If so, we are interested in hiring you. We receive numerous requests each day for Little People. Such requests include hanging out at a bars, dressing up in costumes for holiday parties, entertaining at birthday parties, anniversary parties, and performing on TV shows and commercials.

Some, as the cute lady on the left, are real professionals. Specially midget strippers are highly valued in the entertainment sector. I think we can all understand why...

The movie industry has always paid a lot of attention to Little people and a lot of small actors have gained world fame, such as Verne Troyer ("Austin Powers"). Some of them play roles of seductive and slightly cocky half-sized Don Juans. If you're interested in movies starring dwarfs or midgets, check these:

• "Little people" (1984, documentary)
• Midgets vs. Mascots (Ron Carlson, 2009)
  
• Im Reiche der Liliputaner (F. Goethe, H. Jülich & U. Schultz, 1939)
  

And of course, Werner Herzogs "Even dwarfs started small" ("Auch Zwerge haben klein angefangen", 1970) - a quite unpleasant film about a bunch of naughty dwarfs at a kind of orphanage somewhere in Southern Spain or Northern Africa. The man in the video doesn't want to stop laughing in an attempt to overcome the shock of having lost everything.



The most important thing to be successful in the wrestling business is to find the right characters to fight against each other. Disguised hulks, hot chicks in bikini or recently even Peruvian indigenous housewives. But midget wrestlers have always been the stars among insiders.
Check the Half Pint Brawlers - Psycho midget wrestling - for videos and tour dates.

This is America. But unimaginable things happen in other continents. The Cambodian Midget Fighting League (CMFL) was a team of 42 wrestlers. An angry fan claimed that one single lion could defeat the whole group of puppets. The proud president of the CMFL readily accepted the challenge shipping in an African lion for the - legal - event.
After 12 minutes, 28 fighters were declared dead. Read more

!!This is a nice story, but has been reported to be fake (thanks, Alicia)!!

Fortunately, this was only an exceptional event. In Asia, were a lot of handsome and talented midgets can be found, a lot of them turn into great dancers and showmen. Look at this one:




A final reflection: sometimes, I wonder how I would feel if I were an elephant, of great size and power, being dominated by tiny little humans. Let's imagine for a moment a world ruled by the Little people - that's how an elephant must feel. This funny video sketch makes you realize that our supremacy can't be taken for granted.



Never forget: it was Frodo, not Gandalf, who saved us from the dark forces.

Some useful links:

• Little people of America on Facebook
• Midget strippers
• Little people dating network
• Rent a midget
  
• Hire a midget
• Puppet, the psycho-dwarf
• The midget manifesto
  

Click here to see the video about "Bridget the midget", a fantastic pregnant midget stripper (see photo below).

Plastic surgery

When I was 17, plastic surgery was considered an invention for brainless, rich American women. That was over 10 years ago. Nowadays, it's part of our society. A friend is getting a nose job, uncle Tom got some hair implants for last year's father's day and grandmother Abigail has been saving money for the last 2 years to get her turkey double-chin removed. I have some ideas about what I'd get done if I just had the money: I definitely need to change my armpits - they just don't go with the rest of the body. And of course the usual program: get some nice tits, full-body hair removal, tummy tuck, arm liposuction and ear reshaping. And I want my little daughter to look half Korean. It's just more fashionable than simply being white. I'm just kidding.

I think nowadays it's perfectly ok to improve one's physical appearance. I mean, not actually changing it, only fixing some little defects or even handicaps. But why would a good looking person want to completely change in shape, color and size until turning into an unnatural looking freak? On the right, good old Donatella Versace.
Some people just don't know when to stop. Their problem is that they never run out of money. And the surgeons don't stop them. And they should.

The best example is Jocelyn Wildenstein (left), the World's scariest celebrity by plastic surgery. She was born in 1940 in Switzerland and was a real beauty in her youth. She married the billionaire art dealer Alec Wildenstein. After years of marriage her husband started to date other women and Jocelyn decided to attempt transforming herself into one of Alec's beloved giant cats. With the help of plastic surgery. She has received several silicon injections to the lips, cheeks and chin along with a facelift and eye reconstruction to look more feline like. (Remember "stalking cat", discussed in the article "body modifications").



Or poor Michael Jackson. Recently I saw one of his older videos: "Don't stop 'til you get enough". He was so charming, with a truly enchanting smile. He was nothing but a boy, just at the doorstep of real manhood - a maturity he never reached as a man. Instead, he did everything to turn into a gender that had been unknown to the World before.
By the way - have you ever noticed that his sisters Janet and La Toya probably chose the same type of nose when they got their rinoplastia?





I have to say that most of the people who choose the way of plastic surgery try to improve their physical appearance. But as energy can't be created nor destroyed (e=mc2), the patients more than often take the energy for the reshaping of flesh from a poor source of prime matter: their central computer (they turn kind of stupid,that's what I wanted to say).
This is the case of Cindy Jackson, a farmers daughter from Ohio. She used to play with Barbie dolls when a kid, which fueled her escapist fantasies, as she admits. She dreamed of a happy and glamorous life for the doll and herself. In the late 80ies she was left with an inheritance and started her journey from homely young woman to a Barbie look-alike. She is the record-holder for having more cosmetic surgeries than anyone else in the world (over 30 procedures): facelift, 3 mini facelifts, 3 eyelid surgeries, upper lip lift, liposuction on her knees, thighs, abdomen, waist and jaw-line, 2 nose operations, breast augmentation etc etc.
But what is more incredible is that a friend of her, Tom Whitfield-Lynn, felt inspired by Cindy and decided to transform himself into Barbie's boyfriend Ken. In Ohio farming communities, everything is possible...

Breasts of course. Half of our female friends probably have thought about changing size or shape of their bust. Some eccentric individuals don't just get a boob job done (not to be mixed up with blow job) but voluntarily accept to permanently carry to melons in front of their chest. This is possible thanks to string breast implants which continue to grow after they are surgically implanted and can result in abnormally large breasts. Due to a number of medical complications, the device has been banned in the European Union and the United States. In the photo, Maxi Mounds, an American adult entertainer. Each of her breasts weighs 10 kilos!
I try to imagine how she deals with certain situations of everyday life: putting her shoes on, entering an elevator, eating without seeing the food on her table etc. And there is the problem of the shifting of her center of gravity... I imagine her trying to pick up some coins she has lost, losing her balance, landing on her mega-boobs and bouncing away like a rubber-ball...

Sometimes, the scalpel can give hope. Controversy brews over plastic surgery used in children with Down Syndrome. On the left, 29 years-old Julio Camblor, 10 years after he decided to undergo aesthetic surgery.
It is a challenge for the aesthetic surgeon to make good-looking people more handsome. But it is even more rewarding to "normalize" people who are isolated because of their ugly facial expression so that they may be reintegrated into a group of friends from which they may have already anxiously withdrawn. Children with Down's syndrome are frequently concealed from the public by their parents. The children suffer from two disadvantages: Their mental abilities are limited and they have ugly facial features. (statement of a surgeon)

I can completely understand the motivations of parents of children like the five-year-old British girl with Down syndrome, who has undergone three aesthetic procedures. The only thing they want to achieve is to make their and their daughter's live more bearable. Normally, the operations that are chosen for individuals with Down syndrome are the following:

• Shortening of the tongue to stop it from protruding and make the patient look less deficient
• Removal of folds of skin from eyelids to reduce the mongoloid appearance traditionally associated with Down syndrome
• Pinning back of ears to prevent them from sticking out
  

Of course these physical changes should always be followed by a complete stylistic change: haircut, contact lenses, clothing etc.

Talking about eyelid surgery: the most common surgery in Asian countries is the westernization of the eyes. Chinese, Japanese or Koreans complain about their sleepy and sick looking eyes and get them "opened" or "rounded", even at very tender ages (performed in children and ocasionally in newborns, specially if they have been adopted in a Western country). See some examples of eyelid surgery in this video.
Hispanics living in Europe or the US choose operations that make them look less indigenous or Latin (rinosplastia, cheekbones, eyelids) and lower their ethnic stigma.



Hope can also be given to transsexuals. Female facial proportions are completely different to male ones. The case of the woman in the video shows how many operations have to be programmed to achieve the desired result, which, in this case, is the feminization of a male's features.





Last but not least, the odd case of Korean Hang Mioku, a woman addicted to plastic surgery who has been left unrecognizable after her obsession led her to inject cooking oil into her face.


See you next Monday with the last post of the "extreme bodies" series.

Rare diseases

The blue people of Kentucky

A large family known as the Blue People lived in Kentucky until the 1960’s. They didn’t suffer from any serious illness nor did they die young. They just had blue skin. The (simple recessive) trait was passed from generation to generation. Their only pain was being blue in a world of whites, blacks and in-betweens. The doctors suspected methemoglobinemia, a blood disorder resulting from excess levels of methemoglobin in blood. Methemoglobin is blue and is a non-functional form of red hemoglobin. A researcher injected them methylene blue (seems like a paradox) and within a few minutes, the blue color was gone from their skin – they changed color!

Fish odor syndrome

Due to a mutation of the gene FMO3, people who suffer from Fish odor syndrome have an excessive excretion of trimethylamine (TMA) in urine, sweat, breath and vaginal secretions. Their problem is that they smell like rotting fish. Since the 1970 only about 200 cases have been described.
The chemical TMA, responsible for the revolting odor, is the same that can be transiently present in vaginal secretions during menstruation (you know, that fishy smell during the period).

This inborn metabolic illness is usually discovered when fish is introduced in a baby's diet. The liver cannot metabolize the TMA, which is produced by intestinal bacteria from the chemical choline, present in fish, egg yolk, legumes and other food products.

The psychological suffering of the patients is enormous - it's difficult to lead a normal life, specially for teenagers. The body smell is so offensive, that social contacts seem to be almost impossible. Some people choose jobs where they can be on their own. Others start to smoke to disguise the fish smell. But fish and smoke together...
The unnatural body odor can be reduced avoiding foods that contain cholines.

Acromegaly

This disease most commonly affects adults in middle age and can result in severe disfigurement and premature death. The body produces too much growths hormones. But unfortunately not all parts of the body increase in size. Enlargement of only hands and and feet is very common. Also the jaw and other facial bones can be affected, giving the patient's face a rather unintelligent aspect.

The development of the symptoms is often slow and gradual. So many people do not even notice the changes in their physical appearance. But a familiar visiting his elderly aunt for the first time after 10 years might be surprised when meeting a bawdy ogre instead of a fragile ancient woman.
The man on the photo is Rondo Hatton, actor, who was exposed to poisonous gas in WWI. Acromegaly progressively deformed the bones of his head, hands and feet.

Fatal familial insomnia

Having family members who have been victims of FFI, means that any day, usually when you're around 40 - 60 years old, your body doesn't allow you to sleep anymore. Your mind dies, and after some months, your body, too.
Fatal familial insomnia is a rare inherited prion disease (a prion is something like a killer protein that affects your brain) that interferes with sleep and leads to mental and physical deterioration until death occurs within a few months or years. Have you ever stayed awake for one or two night? If you remember the physical sensation when you're back at work in the morning - imagine being deprived of sleep forever from now on! Sleep deprivation has also been a common torture method for centuries.
The first symptoms are minor difficulties falling asleep and occasional muscle twitching, spasms or stiffness. Eventually, the sufferers cannot sleep.
The disease has been identified in only about 40 families worldwide, most of them concentrated in very specific regions, such as the Spanish basque country.

Man without face

Many cases of people with massive growths in face and body have been described. One of them is José Mestre, from Lisbon who developed a tumor that took over his face completely. He was born with nothing more than a red-colored birth mark on his under lip. The face started growing at puberty and has now reached a weight of 3 kg. When the tumor was still quite small, he refused to have surgery due to religious beliefs and lack of finances. Now, after 51 years of carrying thegrowing tumor, it would be almost impossible to remove the massive growth and reconstruct the face.

José Mestre was born with a face and lost it. Other’s are born without face and, with the help of modern science, are fighting to reconstruct something that at least reminds of a human visage. In the video, little Juliana Wetmore, who was born with 30 to 40 % of the bones in her face missing.





Odine's curse

Ondine was a water nymph, who’s mortal lover swore to her that his “every waking breath would be a testimony of his love”. The romantic Adonis shared his bed with another lady and Odine cursed that if he should fall asleep, he would forget to breathe.
That’s the great obstacle in the life of people who suffer a disease called “Odine’s curse” (without having cheated on the aquatic and vengeful lady).
People afflicted with this congenital disorder stop to breathe during sleep due to an inborn failure of autonomic control of breathing. For them, breathing is a conscious action – impossible to perform while asleep. Patients require a lifetime mechanical ventilation. But the disease is often not recognized in the first months of life and most of the victims don’t survive infancy.

Foot in brain

About a year ago, a boy named Sam Esquibel was born in the United States. At the age of three days he was operated after what looked like a microscopic tumor had been found on an MRI scan.
The doctors were removing the growth when they couldn’t believe their eyes – they found a nearly perfect little foot and a partially formed second one inside the infant’s brain. They reported that it looked like a delivery of a baby out of a babies brain.
Sometimes, in the womb, a twin begins to form within a foetus. Another explication is that sometimes cells can “get confused” and differenciate into tissues they are not supposed to. But such growth, called “teratomes” are usually much less complex than a foot or hand.



Alien hand syndrome

A pacient suffering from this neurological disorder is unable to control the movements of one of his hands even thought he or she has full sensation in the affected limb. The hand is not felt as part of the body and becomes personified, with a will of its own.
The cause can be a brain surgery or a trauma. Depending on the injury, the movements of the alien hand may be random or have a purpose and may interact or not with the other hand, being dominant or non-dominant.
When the syndrome is the result of a brain tumor, it is possible that the alien hand starts to engage in complex and purposeful behaviors. A case has been described, where, while the patient buttoned his shirt, the alien hand undid the buttons.
Sometimes the sufferer is not aware of the action of the strange limb, until it’s too late. It’s like sharing the body with a naughty stranger. Some patients start to hate their hands because of its unacceptable behavior.





Progeria

Premature senility is a severe genetic condition. It occurs in one per 8 million live births. They usually die at the age of 10 to 15 of heart failure. At that age, the victims have the physical condition of an 80 year old.
Some of the first symptoms is the poor weight gain, a physical growth failure and a localized scleroderma-like skin condition. At the beginning of puberty they usually have the aspect of a fragile, elderly person, with typical symptoms such as alopecia, wrinkled skin or atherosclerosis.
Most of them age eight to ten times faster than an average person.





Human horn growth

Cutaneous horns are rare, keratinous skin tumors with the aspect of horns, wood or coral. Most of them are small, but in rare occasions they can actually look like an animals horn.

Body modifications

This week's article is on one of my favorite topics. We've all seen these young rasta guys who suspend their bodies from hooks that have been put through body piercings - originally, the idea of suspension was to gain a higher level of spiritual fulfillment but nowadays mostly it's nothing but pure entertainment. Some women also introduce hooks into their back to emulate the appearance of the lacing on the back of a corset (corset piercing).
But body modifications are much more. Some people even try to do everything to look like their favorite animal. Keep reading and you'll find out.
This is not an article about body modifications for ritual reasons. This article is not about African tribes, giraffe women or Asian monks punishing themselves introducing knives into their cheeks.

Splitting and removal

In some countries of the world (obviously in the Netherlands), the splitting of certain body parts for aesthetic reasons is legal. The most common body modification is the splitting of the tongue. I think the bifid tongue, which allows very exciting movements, is a groovy thing. It's one of the first "mods" most of the extreme weirdos such as lizard man or leopard man get done.
Now I have to say that the result depends extremely on the owner of the tongue. The cute Asian girl in the video, who kindly shows us the splitting process she suffered, has definitively not lost her female attractive due to the surgery:




Tongue splitting is one thing. Even being a women, penis splitting seems just too hardcore for me. But, for unknown reason, there are always people willing to try that stuff (well, they only try once).
A lot of questions arise: how do they pee? Who do they eyaculate? I heard that some of these guys, after splitting their peter, put a piercing ring into each of the halves and a padlock to keep the penis shut during the day. What else could they do??
The genital bisection still allows for erection, though often the two halves curve into each other (I thought the purpose was to improve sexual activities, but I see it's not).
The photo shows the most extreme case, a complete splitting. But parcial "solutions" such as the meatotomy (splitting of the underside of the glans) are much more attractive, in my opinion.

There are people, some suffering from body integrity disorder (look for "amputee fetish" here) who have parts of their body removed. Fingers, penis, nipples or limbs can be victims of nullification. One of the weirdest examples are Ryan and Dave, twins from Phoenix, Arizona. Dave got his entire right arm amputated at the shoulder to have it surgically reattached behind his brother's right pectoral muscle. This is not a joke, you can read more here.


For some people it's not enough to modify their bodies; they want to modify their mind. Trepanation is a medical intervention in which a hole is cut into the human skull and left open permanently.
"Modified Mind" describes his experience:
This weekend I had a hole drilled through my skull. I read that this increased one’s consciousness permanently. I read about the supposed de-conditioning properties. I read about more parts of the brain working simultaneously as there would be more blood up there to help this happen. The arguments for it all seemed to be quite lengthy, quite detailed, thought out and researched, and very intelligent. The arguments against it were based solely on the opinion that it is ‘crazy’ and talk like, "What’s more conscious than conscious?". Read more

Eyes

Modifications of the eye? If you think of Chinese women having their eyes fixed to look more Western - maybe I'll write about that in a post about plastic surgery. Or people who have their whole body tattooed, including their eyelids. But what I have in mind is this:
Ever heard of "eyeball tattooing"? That's what's necessary to attain the electric blue eyes of the Arrakian spice melange addict (read the "Dune" trilogy by Frank Herbert) without having access to great amounts of the spice melange.
The problem is that you can't change the color to match it with your make-up or evening dress...

Eyeball jewelry is definitively the more elegant alternative. For 500 - 1000 € and in just 15 minutes the little platinum "jewels" are implanted in the conjunctiva.




Complete transformation

Some few people in the world decided to undergo a complete modification of their body to transform themselves into an animal or fantastic creature. They use all the tools that modern "science" can provide: extreme tattooing and piercing, subdermal implants to modify the body shape, tongue splitting, tooth filing, ear shaping etcetera, etcetera.
Famous example are Pauly unstoppable (photo on the left), who makes us discover the insides of a human nose. On his website, a full list of his body modifications is available.
67-years-old "Leopard man" lives away from modern society scampering around on all fours like a leopard.
Brazilian Elaine Davidson is the most pierced person in the world, she wears over 2500 piercings, 500(!) of them only around the genitals.
Kala Kawai (photo on the right) split his tongue using dental floss and did all his own piercings. Today he looks like an angry bull.

Probably the most famous case is "Stalking cat". Dennis Avner, native American, wanted to transform himself into his totem animal - the tiger: Tattoos, silicon implants on his face, filed teeth, pointed ears, attachable whiskers, claws and even a bifurcated top lip make him look like this (photo on the left).
Check out this website for the Top 10 of physically modified people.

This post would be way too long if I wrote about all the forms of modifying a body that I found on the Internet. But keep researching and post a comment sharing your conclusions with me.