What Is Your Most Gross, Yucky, Disgusting Nursing Horror Story?

By the way, does anybody have any idea how this man's body fluids got on to his ceiling?!!! I guess even thick body fluids can precipitate the way water does. Yikes!!!

I have another story to share. But I think I'll save it for later. I'm getting a little queasy!

Okay, this is my last story (For now anyway!). It's not as bad as the others. But it still gives me the willies non the less! This one took place in Alabama in the 1940s. The story is from a 77-year-old fishing buddy of mine. He was a boy at the time. But still a very good eye witness to the scene.

Okay, so here it is: A man who was a chronic drunk and philanderer had a bad habit also of beating his wife severely when ever he felt like it. The townspeople would always notice new scars, black eyes, bumps, and bruises on her. In fact, they never seen her with a sound body once the whole time she stayed with her husband.

Anyway, I guess one day she got really tired of it. And she decided to take her revenge on him. She heated up an extra large boiler full of water. While the water was boiling, her husband was fast a sleep from a long night of philandering and drinking. Well, as soon as the water was as hot as she could make it. She took the boiler full of piping hot water into the room where her husband was <:-( sleeping. And you guessed it! She dumped the hot scalding water all over his face and torso! Then she fled out town. She was never caught or charged with any crime.

But this man suffered severe burns to his face and torso. Some of his flesh fell off in route to the hospital. He sustained severe infections from his burns which disfigured him even more. Part of that was because his immune system was faulty due to chronic alcoholism and poor diet. And part of that was because he didn't properly follow medical advice.

Anyway, he looked and walked like a mummy for quite a while. And he was disfigured for life.

The good thing about this whole thing, though, is that to anyone's recollection, he never abused another woman again!!!

Some of Ryan's stories reminded me of when I was 17. My mom managed an apartment building. One Monday morning these people came to the door and said that their friend had not shown up for some get-togethers over the weekend and they were concerned about him. They said that he was a hemophiliac and they were afraid he was ill. Well, my mom got her key and opened his apartment door so they could check on him. They found him probably about the 3rd day after he had died, and my mom was so shaken by the sight and smell that we moved a few months later. That was the only time I have ever smelled that stench, and to this day over 30 years later, I can still remember the smell. That's the only thing that has stopped me from going into forensics.

What does the smell of decomposing human flesh smell like? I've never smelled it. If I have, I don't know it. I've smelled rotting puss, rotten blood, a tampon that was in someone's body for a week. I've also smelled rotten chicken, beef, and pork. Do any of these smells come close?!!!

Oh, one Vietnam veteran told me that she was on a detail assigned to clean up after the infamous Jim Jones massacre in which several followers were forced to drink poisonous grape flavored Kool-Aid stuff.


She said the smell resembled a bunch of rotting garbage at a city dump.


I've also heard it described as smelling similar to dead animals.

And Knoxville, Tenn. officials working on the Body Farm have said it smells sickeningly sweet. They said it does NOT really smell like garbage or anything else they've ever smelled.

I'll tell you what I did smell before: I smelled very bad cases of necrotizing gingivitis combined with rotting food from patients who had very bad oral hygiene.

Now, there was a Alz. female pt. who came up missing in our town. And they finally found her body in the Great Miami River. Well, the river in any section of town does NOT usually smell.

But I happened to be near the area where they found her a couple of days before they found her body. And I did smell a very horrid smell that resembled the foul odors of dental pts. with severe oral diseases. Maybe is was the poor woman's decaying corpse I smelled after all. Who knows....

What do you think?!!!

It doesn't smell like anything else on this world, imho. But I know I will never forget... ever.

OB is not immune from gruesomeness! One of my favorite births I attended as a NICU nurse was where a baby was being delivered by a rather cocky OB attending who at a previous hospital I happen to know was well known for romancing the nurses (among other things)....he wore his own glasses, not safety glasses and no hat....let's just say sometimes projectile meconium stained amniotic fluid is just the cure for what ails you...as long as it is dripping out of the other person's hair and off his chin! (hee hee...we laughed amongst ourselves for hours after returning to the NICU...and the baby was fine by the way).

Great stories Ryan! I could almost visualize the scenarios in my head. I know it's morbid and disgusting ....but very interesting. It must be that Steven King in me

Ryan, about your first story: I'm not a lawsuit monger, but if that man had a wife and/or kids, I hope none of them ever had to work another day in her life.

In Dr. Thomas Starzl's autobiography, one of the first things he ever saw as an intern was something like this. IIRC, it had to do with a rock quarry and a practical joke gone haywire.

Edit: I understand that Layne Staley and Kevin DuBrow, prominent musicians who OD'd and who were not reported missing (and whose bodies were not found) for 2 weeks and 6 days respectively, were found under similar circumstances to the man with the dog.