Listen Now: Mr. Ballen’s Medical Mysteries

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Hey, listeners, I'm here to
tell you about an all new suspense driven

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podcast, Mister Balin's Medical Mysteries.
It's hosted by mister Balin, one of

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the Internet's most popular storytellers. Why
medical mysteries, Well, we've all been

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there, turning to the Internet to
self diagnose inexplicable pains, dehabilitating body aches,

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sudden fevers, and strange rashes.
Though our minds spiral to worst case

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scenarios, it's usually nothing, but
for an unlucky few, these symptoms can

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start the clock ticking on a terrifying
medical mystery. Each week on mister Balin's

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Medical Mysteries, you can expect bizarre, unheard of diseases, miraculous recoveries,

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strange medical mishaps in everything in between, like the unexplainable death of a retired

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firefighter whose body was reduced to ashes
even though nothing around him burned. Or

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the time when an entire town became
ill with nausea and chills. The local

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doctor initially chalked it up to being
food poisoning until people start jumping from buildings

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and seeing tigers on their ceilings.
Each terrifying true story will be sure to

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keep you up at night. I'm
about to play a clip from mister Balin's

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Medical Mysteries while you're listening. Follow
mister Balin's Medical Mysteries on Amazon Music or

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wherever you get your podcasts. Wonder. On a humid summer morning in June

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nineteen ninety nine, thirty six year
old Sanju Bagat was hard at work on

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a farm outside of Nagpur, a
city in central India. The sun had

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just risen and the air was already
so hot that he found it hard to

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breathe. Sanju and a group of
farm hands were hard at work tending to

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the soybean crops. He made his
way through the field, stopping to catch

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his breath every few steps. Sanju
moved a lot slower than his coworkers because

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of his massive belly. For the
past fifteen years, Sanju had struggled beneath

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the weight of his ever growing stomachs. First, when he was in his

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early twenties, his family had thought
he was just filling out a little,

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like all young men do when they
become adults. But Sanju's stomach didn't stop

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growing. It kept getting bigger and
bigger, until it had swelled to the

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size of a massive watermelon, but
his arms and legs stayed stick thin.

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He never understood why his belly kept
growing since he didn't eat much. By

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the time Sanju reached his early thirties, he was in constant pain, and

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his family desperately wanted him to see
a doctor, but he couldn't afford to

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take time off of work, although
deep down he had to admit he was

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a little scared of what the doctor
might find. The sun beat down on

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Sanju's head and he could feel his
chest tighten. He tried to keep working,

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but today it was harder to breathe
than usual. No matter how deeply

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he inhaled, he couldn't quite catch
his breath. Finally, he dropped his

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shovel and doubled over, gasping for
air. Sanju gathered what little strength he

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had left and stood up straight.
He could feel other farm workers eyes on

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him as he gathered his tools and
headed home. It was the longest walk

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of Sanju's life. He felt humiliated
and useless, but he was also afraid.

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He could barely take a breath.
By the time he got to the

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small home he shared with his family, he nearly fell through the front door.

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The last thing he remembered was falling
hard on the tile floor. Early

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the next morning, doctor a Je
Mehta had just started his shift in the

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oncology ward at Tata Memorial Hospital.
He was alerted that a new patient named

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Sanju Bargat had been brought in all
the way from Nagpor and that he needed

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to be seen right away. Doctor
Mehta hurried over to Sanju's room. If

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someone was rushed in an ambulance from
so far away, it had to be

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a serious emergency. As soon as
as doctor Meta examined Sanju's giant, swollen

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belly, he instructed the nurse to
prepare the operating room for surgery. Doctor

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Meta was a specialist in tumor removal
and he was certain that Sanju had a

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massive tumor in his stomach, possibly
the biggest one he'd ever seen. The

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tumor was likely pressing against Sanju's diaphragm, which was why he couldn't breathe,

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and given how big it was and
Sanju's weakened condition, the tumor had to

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be removed immediately. While another nurse
prepped Sanju for the operation, doctor Meta

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gathered his surgical team and headed to
the operating room. As they sterilized their

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hands and put on clean scrubs,
Doctor Meta warned them that the tumor's sheer

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size would make this a very challenging
operation. There was a risk of damaging

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the soft tissue in Sanju's stomach,
his nerve endings, or blood vessels.

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In the worst case, the surgery
could cause severe internal bleeding or even death.

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A few minutes later, Sanju was
wheeled into the operating room on a

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gurney. Once he was under anesthesia, doctor Meida called for a scalpel.

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He placed one hand on Sanju's stomach
for leverage, then he cut into Sanju's

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belly. After the blade broke through
Sanju's skin and opened up his chest area,

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doctor Meida expected to see blood and
a bright red mass of cancerous cells.

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Instead, gallons of thick, yellowish
fluid gushed from Sanju's stomach, spilling

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onto the floor. The entire surgical
team gasped. Doctor Meida jumped out of

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the way, trying to avoid the
surge of file. It had a foul

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odor that made everyone in the room
start to gag. Nurses ran toward him

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with towels, trying to sop up
the putrid smelling liquid. While they cleaned

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up the mess, Doctor Meda remained
calm and carefully inserted his hand into Sanju's

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stomach to low the tumor. At
first, all he felt was thick,

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jelly like fluids sliding between his fingers. Then he grazed something unusual. His

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eyes went wide as he dove a
little deeper, his palm wrapped around something

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soft but with a brittle core.
He realized this was not a tumor.

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Whatever was in Sanju's stomach had bones, a lot of them. Doctor Madis

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jaw dropped as his hand explored the
object floating in Sanju's stomach. He grabbed

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onto one of the tiny bones and
began to slowly pull it up and out

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of Sonju's stomach. As he lifted
the bizarre object into the air, he

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could hear more gasps from everyone in
the room. Hey, Prime members,

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you can binge the first eight episodes
of Mister Balin's Metal Mysteries right now and

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add free on Amazon Music. Download
the Amazon Music app today,