Ep. 80 | Stigmata

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In 2005, at a hospital in Vietnam, a nurse sat at the bedside of her 14-year-old patient.

It was after midnight and the hospital was eerily quiet.

The girl had been asleep for hours.

but the nurse didn't dare get up or even take her eyes off the patient.

She'd been told not to trust the girl.

She had symptoms that nobody could explain, and her doctor thought she was doing something to fake her illness.

And so it was the nurse's job to catch her in the act, or to watch her so carefully, the girl didn't have a chance to pull whatever trick was making her seem sick.

But not everyone thought the teenager was pretending to be sick.

They agreed that she was not infected by a bacteria, a virus, or anything else from this earth.

In fact, some of the hospital staff thought her symptoms might be caused by something otherworldly, maybe even holy.

One of the nurses said the little girl's condition was proof of an actual miracle.

The nurse who was keeping watch had worked in healthcare long enough to know that science could explain away even the strangest of cases.

But she was also a religious person, and some small part of her hoped that this girl's condition was really a sign from God.

Just then, the girl began tossing and turning like she was having a bad dream.

Sweat beated on her forehead.

The nurse stood to grab a towel and wipe it off.

But then, in the dark, she saw something and the nurse's blood ran cold.

She ran to call the doctor and then she said a silent prayer because what she just saw was not of this world and she couldn't tell if it was a sign from God or the devil himself.

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From Balin Studios and Wondry, I'm Mr.

Balin, and this is Mr.

Balin's Medical Mysteries, where every week we will explore a new baffling mystery originating from the one place we all can't escape, our own bodies.

So if you like today's story, Please replace the follow-button's toothpaste with mayonnaise and then turn their water off in their house.

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This episode is called Stigmata.

On a humid Monday morning in Vietnam in the fall of 2003, 12-year-old Anbui sat at her school desk.

She was bent over her notebook working on a writing assignment when her left hand got sweaty and started cramping.

She dropped her pencil to shake her hand out and noticed the pencil had blood on it.

An looked down and saw a smear of blood across her palm, but she didn't remember cutting her hand on anything.

She grabbed the tissue from her backpack and wiped off the blood.

She thought maybe the pencil had given her a splinter, but she couldn't see a cut anywhere.

And the red liquid on her palm definitely was not paint or some other substance.

It was blood, and it seemed to have come out of nowhere.

An didn't like it when people looked at her, so she threw the bloody tissue into her backpack before anybody noticed.

She decided not to tell anyone what had happened.

The blood must have just gotten on her hand at some point that morning, and she didn't notice.

An figured, whatever it was, it was not worth worrying about.

So she turned her attention back to the lesson and tried to put the strange moment out of her head.

A few months later, An was reading at her desk, trying to ignore a headache.

It was hot and muggy, which only made the headache worse.

Her forehead was covered in sweat, and she felt a bead of moisture slide down her nose.

She wiped it with the back of her hand, and as she did, she noticed a smear of blood.

Her forehead was bleeding.

Anna immediately looked down at her desk and let her hair fall around her face so nobody could see it.

She tried to be inconspicuous as she touched her forehead, searching for a cut.

The skin was unbroken.

but there was more blood on her fingertips.

And to make matters even stranger, there was a small pool of blood in her palm as well.

She was stunned.

Blood seemed to be seeping out of her hand and forehead for no reason.

Then, An heard someone whispering behind her.

She turned around and saw two of her classmates huddled together and pointing at her.

Then another girl noticed and tapped the boy next to her on the shoulder.

Within seconds, the whole class was gawking at her.

An was mortified.

She darted out of the room and down the hall to the bathroom.

She made sure nobody else was inside.

Then she turned on the faucet and scrubbed her hands and face until all the blood was gone.

And then, after that, she inspected her forehead and palms in the mirror, but there weren't any cuts on her body.

An couldn't understand where this blood was coming from, but she still didn't want to tell the teacher or her mom.

To her, that would just make the whole problem worse.

And right now, all she wanted to do was forget this morning ever happened.

One afternoon, a year later, An's mother, Tui, was walking Ann home from school.

She tried to ask her daughter about how her day went, but An just stared at her feet as they shuffled down the busy sidewalk.

An, who was 13 years old now, had spent the past year acting very quiet and withdrawn.

She was always checking her reflection in shop windows and running her hands over her face like she was checking for acne or something.

Plus, An wasn't in any school activities this year.

An had always been shy, but she was becoming a loner.

Tui wasn't sure what to do about it.

Once they got home, An kicked off her shoes and went straight into the living room without saying a word.

But Tui cried out in surprise when she saw that An was leaving a trail of bloody footprints on the ceramic floor.

She ran to her daughter to see if she was hurt.

An whirled around and looked down at the floor, but instead of checking her feet for an injury, she began wiping her forehead and inspecting her palms.

Tui asked what was going on.

But An didn't say anything.

Instead, she just flopped down onto the couch and buried her face in her palms.

Tui felt like her daughter must be hiding something.

And so speaking very firmly, she told An to explain right now.

An looked up, her face shiny with sweat.

Then, red droplets began falling down An's forehead.

Tui couldn't believe her eyes.

It looked like An was sweating blood.

But An didn't seem shocked by this at all.

Instead, An just seemed sort of embarrassed.

Then Tui remembered something.

Over the past year, she'd occasionally found small traces of blood on An's clothes.

She hadn't thought much of it.

She figured An got little scrapes and cuts sometimes, like all kids do.

But now, Tui asked her daughter if all those stains had been this bloody sweat.

An nodded and said yes, then burst into tears.

An said she was absolutely miserable.

For the past year, in addition to sweating blood, She'd been spontaneously bleeding from her palms, the soles of her feet, her scalp, sometimes her arms and legs, and even her torso.

And so her classmates thought she was really weird, and they made fun of An every time this happened.

And also, her friends didn't talk to her anymore because of the bleeding.

The whole school basically shunned her for being this freak.

An said she had tried her best to hide the bleeding, but occasionally she would bleed through her school uniform and everybody would see.

Tui didn't know what to think.

I mean, she couldn't believe that she hadn't realized this was going on.

But at this point, all she thought was her daughter clearly needed help.

She had to get get An to the doctor as soon as possible.

A few days later, a physician at the local hospital named Dr.

Nye Nguyen stood in an exam room with An and Tui.

As she inspected An's scalp, An explained how this spontaneous bleeding had basically made her a laughingstock at school and was ruining her life.

Now, Dr.

Nguyen could tell that An was clearly deeply distressed here.

But far more pressing to the doctor were these symptoms.

They were so confusing.

Dr.

Nguyen had never heard of anybody spontaneously bleeding from their extremities like this.

It was totally alarming, and while Dr.

Nguyen would never say this out loud, especially to Ann, it was a bit creepy too.

The doctor was very cautious as she combed through Anne's hair, searching for cuts, scars, ulcers, anything that might explain the bleeding.

But there was no markings of any kind on An's scalp or anywhere else on her body.

And so after the exam, Dr.

Nguyen peeled off her latex gloves and told Tui that she wanted to admit her daughter to the hospital to run some more tests.

She would test An's blood to see if An had an underlying disease like anemia or a blood clotting problem, which might explain the sudden bleeding.

She would also check for infectious disease.

Whatever was wrong with Ahn, Dr.

Nguyen was confident that the lab work would show what was going on.

But a few days later, Dr.

Nguyen got the test results back.

And Aun's blood work, her urine test, the chest x-ray Dr.

Nguyen ordered, all of these tests came back normal.

On paper, An was completely healthy.

Even a malaria test came back negative.

Dr.

Nguyen couldn't find a single reason for An's bleeding.

And unfortunately, even though An claimed to have bled at least a few times since being admitted to the hospital, Dr.

Nguyen had never been present to witness the onset of the bleeding, which made Dr.

Nguyen consider a different possibility.

On said she often bled from her palms, feet, forehead, and torso.

And while Dr.

Nguyen was not Christian, she still knew these were the same locations on the body where, according to Christian doctrine, Jesus had bled from during his crucifixion.

And according to some Christians, They believe these wounds can appear on others like a holy marking.

These markings, which mirrored the wounds from the nails in Jesus' hands and feet, the crown of thorns on his forehead, and the spear wound in his side, are known as stigmata.

And so Dr.

Nguyen began to wonder if An wasn't actually sick, but faking these stigmata-like wounds for religious reasons, or just for attention.

An did say that everybody in school knew who she was now because of this bleeding, so she was getting lots of attention.

She said they treated her like a freak, but Dr.

Nguyen knew that attention seekers didn't always search for positive validation.

Negative attention could feel just as rewarding.

If An was faking this, that would also explain why An hid the condition from her mom for more than a year, and why no one at the hospital had actually seen An while she was actively bleeding.

The blood always seemed to appear when she was alone, so doctors hadn't been able to determine where it was actually coming from.

Dr.

Nguyen realized this situation was going to be very tricky.

An would almost certainly insist that her symptoms were real, and it would be up to Dr.

Nguyen to figure out if she was lying or in genuine need of medical intervention.

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The next morning, Dr.

Nguyen walked into Ans hospital room as Ahn was finishing breakfast.

Tui sat in a chair against the wall, flipping through a magazine.

Dr.

Nguyen closed the door for privacy and told Tui and An about the test results.

She explained that without any evidence, it was going to be very difficult to diagnose Ahn with a medical condition.

As An and Tui absorbed the news and looked pretty upset about it, Dr.

Nguyen turned to An and told her very gently that, you know, school can be very stressful and bullying especially can make people really upset.

And so it would be totally understandable if when An was feeling overwhelmed at school, that maybe she had begun to fake these symptoms, maybe to get out of a test or just to get out of a room or something.

But the second Dr.

Nguyen said this, An just stared at her with a look of pure disbelief on her face.

She promised Dr.

Nguyen that she had never faked the bleeding.

She said she would just feel achy sometimes and then the blood would appear.

She had no idea why this was happening, but it was ruining her life.

She would never do this on purpose.

Now, Dr.

Nguyen was expecting this reaction, and so in an attempt to catch An off guard, She just said, An, are you causing these wounds yourself to look like the stigmata?

An and her mother exchanged very confused glances.

Tui shifted uncomfortably in her seat and explained that they were not Christian, they were Buddhist.

There was nothing in their beliefs about bleeding hands or feet.

And An said she'd never even heard of stigmata.

The room fell into a brief silence, and then Dr.

Nguyen had to admit that if An wasn't Christian, it was unlikely she was faking stigmata wounds.

She could still be faking the symptoms for attention.

But Dr.

Nguyen still thought it was possible that An truly had a mysterious medical illness.

And so if Dr.

Nguyen was going to be able to help An, she would need more information.

And so on her way back to her office, Dr.

Nguyen stopped at the nurses station.

And she gave the staff strict orders to watch An closely and to let her know if the girl did anything unexpected or strange.

A few hours later, Dr.

Nguyen was getting ready to go home when she got a call.

An Bowie was bleeding.

Dr.

Nguyen hurried down the hallway to Ans' room, and when she stepped inside, she saw An sitting on the bed just staring back at her.

And there was blood all across her pillow.

An's mother was standing next to the bed looking very confused.

Dr.

Nguyen asked Tui if she had seen the bleeding begin, but Tui said no, she was asleep when it started.

When Dr.

Nguyen looked over at the nurse on duty, she shook her head no as well.

She had not seen the bleeding start.

She said that she had checked on An 15 minutes earlier and nothing was happening.

And when she came back, An was bleeding.

Dr.

Nguyen snapped on a pair of latex gloves and then told An she was going to search for the source of the bleeding.

Then she started moving her fingers through An's hair and pressing down on her scalp.

And as she did, she could see blood smeared in An's hair, but she couldn't tell where it was coming from.

She asked if An was in any pain and An said yes, she had a headache.

and she said she was feeling very tired.

Finally, after not finding the source of the bleeding, Dr.

Nguyen stepped back and told An that she wanted to take a few samples of the skin from An's scalp for testing.

The procedure was called a punch biopsy.

She would numb An's scalp and then cut out three little patches of skin and hair follicles, each about three millimeters long.

After hearing this, An began to cry and said she did not want another test.

Dr.

Nguyen nodded and said she understood, but she told An this test could help them figure out what was actually wrong with her.

And then hopefully she could get treated and go go home.

It took a minute for An to calm down, but eventually she did, and then she told the doctor she was ready to get started.

The following morning, Dr.

Nguyen received the biopsy results, and they showed something fascinating.

Ann's scalp was covered in these microscopic pockets filled with blood.

Dr.

Nguyen didn't know why these spaces had formed or what was causing them to burst, but she intended to find out.

Dr.

Nguyen during the biopsy had also collected some of the bloody mixture that coated An's scalp, and results showed that it was actually a mixture of red blood cells, white blood cells, platelets, and sweat.

And it was the sweat that gave Dr.

Nguyen an idea.

She told An to go to the stress testing room in the cardiology department.

And when Dr.

Nguyen arrived, An was already standing glumly on the treadmill.

An stared angrily at Dr.

Nguyen while a technician clipped the safety cord to her shirt and a nurse double-knotted Anshoelaces.

Dr.

Nguyen couldn't blame An for being annoyed here, but she didn't have time to argue with an angry child.

She had a case to solve.

Because the bloody mixture contained sweat, Dr.

Nguyen wondered if she could induce the bleeding with vigorous exercise.

And so she was going to have An sprint on the treadmill to see if she could make her sweat turn red.

Once everything was all set up, Dr.

Nguyen nodded to the technician.

The treadmill belt began moving, and the technician ramped up the speed until An was running.

In no time she was breathing hard and sweating.

Except there wasn't any blood in the sweat.

So Dr.

Nguyen had the technician turn up the speed of the treadmill.

As the belt moved faster, An struggled to keep up.

Dr.

Nguyen crossed her fingers, hoping that blood would appear on the girl's forehead.

An's face grew pink and then beat red from the exertion.

For a moment, Dr.

Nguyen thought the blood was poking through An's skin.

But then she realized An was just bright red from running so hard.

Her sweat was still clear.

Dr.

Nguyen felt defeated as she told the tech to shut the treadmill down.

Dr.

Nguyen forced herself to smile.

She told An she did great work, but she was secretly very frustrated.

If a stress test didn't cause the bloody sweat, Dr.

Nguyen didn't know what would, and so it made her turn back to her initial suspicion.

that An might somehow be causing the bleeding herself.

Now, she couldn't understand how An might make her own scalp bleed, but it had been more than a week, and still no one at the hospital had seen the actual onset of An's bleeding.

Her own mom hadn't even seen it.

And so, if An was deceiving everybody, then Dr.

Nguyen wanted to put an end to it today.

And so, Dr.

Nguyen pulled An's nurse aside and told her to sit by Ans bedside overnight and to watch the child like a hawk.

She told the nurse not to leave An alone, not even for a moment.

A few hours later, An was startled awake in her hospital bed.

Her forehead was pounding and she was drenched in sweat.

It took a moment for An's eyes to focus, but when they did, she realized her nurse was standing right over her, looking absolutely stunned.

An sat up and instinctively felt her face.

And as she did, she immediately understood why this nurse was staring at her.

An's face was covered in red, sweaty blood.

She could feel it oozing out of her pores and trickling down her chin.

But instead of helping her clean up, the nurse was just gawking at her.

An closed her eyes and hoped the nurse would go away.

She felt like a zoo animal on display for the whole hospital.

When she opened her eyes again, the nurse was still looming over her.

But instead of staring at her, the nurse smiled and told An she was going to call Dr.

Nguyen.

And she told An that she was now certain An could not be faking her symptoms.

An was so relieved.

A few days later, An would get her diagnosis.

Once An had begun bleeding in her sleep in full view of that nurse, Dr.

Nguyen was convinced the bleeding truly was spontaneous.

But she still didn't understand why it was happening.

After thoroughly searching medical literature for cases of spontaneous bleeding from the hands, feet, and head, Dr.

Nguyen eventually discovered a rare condition that matched An's presentation.

Its Its scientific name is hematodrosis.

Now, not much is known about hematodrosis, but it's a condition that causes tiny blood vessels in the skin to break open.

The blood inside these vessels might get squeezed out through the sweat glands or leak into hair follicles, causing the patient to essentially sweat blood.

Doctors don't know exactly what triggers hematodrosis, but they think it could be related to stress.

like the fight-or-flight response.

This condition has been reported only in a limited number of documented cases, making it difficult to study extensively.

However, there are some historical reports of similar cases.

Some scholars believe that many documented cases of stigmata throughout history were actually just misdiagnosed cases of hematidrosis, which technically would have made Dr.

Nguyen's initial diagnosis correct.

An was suffering from stigmata.

but not for religious reasons.

In fact, Dr.

Nguyen never discovered what actually caused An's bleeding episodes.

But she did find a way to cure them.

Dr.

Nguyen prescribed An lorazepam, a mild benzodiazepine commonly used to treat depression.

It helped reduce An's anxiety, and after two months on the medication, the bleeding stopped.

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From Balin Studios and Wondry, this is Mr.

Ballin's Medical Mysteries, hosted by me, Mr.

Ballin.

A quick note about our stories.

They are all inspired by true events, but we do sometimes use pseudonyms to protect the people involved, and also some details are fictionalized for dramatic purposes.

And a reminder, the content in this episode is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment.

This episode was written by Aaron Land.

Our editor is Heather Dundas.

Sound design is by Matthew Cilelli.

Our senior managing producer is Nick Ryan, and our coordinating producer is Taylor Sniffin.

Our senior producer is Alex Benedon.

Our associate producers and researchers are Sarah Vitak and Tayshia Palaconda.

Fact-checking was done by Sheila Patterson.

For Balin Studios, our head of production is Zach Levitt.

Script editing by Scott Allen and Evan Allen.

Our coordinating producer is Samantha Collins.

Production support by Avery Siegel.

Executive producers are myself, Mr.

Ballin, and also Nick Witters.

For Wondry, our head of sound is Marcelino Villipando.

Senior producers are Laura Donna Palavoda and Dave Schilling.

Senior managing producer is Ryan Lohr.

Our executive producers are Aaron O'Flaherty and Marshall Louie for Wondry.

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