Vivisecting the Goddess

June 27, 2008 11:45 AM

The operation was a success, but the patient is now a mere mortal. When she was born, her neighbors considered her a gift from God and lined up to receive her blessing. However, her parents, who wanted her to have a normal life (and refusing an offer to sell her to a circus) , found a doctor and a hospital who would operate on Lakshmi for free.

Lakshmi received some parts from her parasitic twin (previously on MeFi). No longer venerated, she will have a chance to walk.

posted by Halloween Jack (15 comments total)

When my 5-year old son came home from day care yesterday, he mentioned that a friend of his had seen an eight-limbed kid on the teve. And today, you pick the same topic for your first post. But all the articles you've linked are from 2007. Are you Aisha's brother, or what's going on here?
posted by effbot at 11:56 AM on June 27, 2008

You joined in 2001 but you only have 118 comments to your name, what's going on here? Are you a Russian spy? btw I once had 4 legs and 4 arms but my dad said I should give them back to the neighbor kids cause they didn't belong to me.
posted by nola at 12:03 PM on June 27, 2008 [1 favorite]

Hey, it's sort of like the Baby of Macon, but with a happy ending!
posted by phooky at 12:06 PM on June 27, 2008

I once had 4 legs and 4 arms but my dad said I should give them back to the neighbor kids

ObTomLehrer: I Hold Your Hand In Mine
posted by effbot at 12:10 PM on June 27, 2008

Just heard about this myself the other day, effbot... OK, I'll 'fess up. I myself had four superfluous limbs removed at a young age, and I'm still bitter that they removed the organic webshooters at the same time.
posted by Halloween Jack at 12:17 PM on June 27, 2008

This has been all over the news lately...I'm surprised the story is that old.
posted by rocket88 at 12:33 PM on June 27, 2008

Vivisection is way the wrong word for this.
posted by TheOnlyCoolTim at 12:36 PM on June 27, 2008 [1 favorite]

Lakshmi Tatma on Wikipedia, with a good description of the surgery.

Photo from Feb 8, 2008 showing Lakshmi with her new baby sister Sarawati.

ABC News Story, also from February of this year, showing her standing up.
posted by anastasiav at 12:38 PM on June 27, 2008

I think it's very nice that she will be able to pursue a normal and hopefully healthy life. Hooray for doctors and modern medicine. No snark, no jokes, just that.
posted by davejay at 2:57 PM on June 27, 2008 [1 favorite]

um, is it wrong that i really just wanted to see better pictures of her before the operation? none of them are a full on frontal body shot, which would really better illustrate the situation.
posted by misanthropicsarah at 3:34 PM on June 27, 2008

This was on the National Geograhic Channel last Sunday. I watched their documentary, and what most impressed me was how much her parents loved her and how many sacrifices and changes they embraced in order to give her a better life.
posted by Robert Angelo at 4:17 PM on June 27, 2008

Awesome. I'm so happy for her parents.
posted by Tehanu at 4:37 PM on June 27, 2008

When she was born the inhabitants of her rural village believed she was a ’gift from God’ and christened her ’Lakshmi’ after the four-armed Hindu goddess of wealth.

Is 'christened' a correct word here, or am I just being niggardly?
posted by swell at 8:33 PM on June 27, 2008 [1 favorite]

There is an x-ray of her skeleton in this article. (I was also confused. Her parasitic twin was actually like a mirror reflection of her).

I am also glad that she is doing well.
posted by jb at 8:59 PM on June 27, 2008

Cute kid.
posted by lostburner at 5:14 PM on June 29, 2008