Horror Story in Real Life - Eraserhead-esque

Not sure of where to put this one, and I think you'll see why. Mods move to where you think appropriate after reading.

This sends chills down my spine, and it always has since it happened (in real life).

I used to have a friend a long time ago. He was one of those people who just always seemed to make bad decisions, but he was my friend and that was all that mattered. He came from a poor family, and never seemed to have any money. He wasn't proud of that, nor ashamed of it. Again, it didn't matter, he was my friend.

One day he came to me and told me he got his girlfriend at the time pregnant. His taste in the opposite sex was about the same as his financial situation...poor. This girl was that girl you knew who just never seemed "clean" (not sure how else to describe it), I think many have known a gal like this at some point in their life. (Personally, I thought she was pretty scummy, but that's not the point).

He and this girl decided they were going to have the baby. My friend knew his life would be different afterwards, and it most certainly was. At the time we said we'd still be friends, but I think we all kind of know how things go when two people go in completely opposite directions. Soon enough they had the kid. They didn't have any money, and they didn't even have a decent car. They eventually found a place to live, but it was this seedy old apartment on the "wrong side of the tracks". I saw the kid once shortly after it was born. I thought something seemed "off", but I didn't say anything. After that I rarely heard from my friend anymore, despite repeated attempts to get in touch with him. He seemed to fall off everyone’s radar.

One day, out of the blue, I got a call from him. He wanted me to come over to his place so we could talk. I was apprehensive a bit at first, not knowing what he wanted to “talk” about, but I agreed. They’d apparently inherited some money (not a lot) and were thinking of buying an old (run down) house. I went to visit him at the apartment they were living in. I’d never been there before, and when I got inside I quickly saw this place was a dump. I ignored all of this because he was my friend.

When I stepped inside the building my first reaction was it smelled musty and stunk of natural gas. It was wintertime and it was cold out. The hallways of the building were narrow and non-descript, lined on both sides with white doors with numbers on them. It was not a nice place at all. And, the hallway was about 95 degrees inside making it even worse. The walls in the building were paper thin and I could hear TV’s blaring in several apartments. It was awful, and I just couldn’t imagine living in a place like that.

I found their apartment, knocked on the door and went inside. The place was “okay” but I tried not to look too hard because I could see some pretty nasty stuff just out of view. Tin foil covered the drafty and cracked exterior windows, paint was peeling on the frames. Their furniture was not even thrift store quality, more like something you’d find at the dump. It was a sad picture indeed.
His girlfriend, looking like a zombie on the couch, said Eric was in the kitchen feeding the baby and pointed the way. In the kitchen I found Eric sitting at a 1950’s vintage kitchen table with chipped formica and plastic padded metal chairs, baby in his arms. I expected to see a bottle, but he didn’t have one. He was using this thing which almost looked like a turkey baster to feed the child. Before he started to talk he moved holding the baby from one arm to the other.

Now, what I’m about to tell you next will likely be disturbing. It certainly is for me, even now.

As Eric moved the baby from one arm to the other, I noticed the infant’s head just flopped around like jello. It didn’t make a sound, and it didn’t move. From the angle he held the baby I could see its face. It’s eyes were open but almost completely black. The child’s pupils were just completely dilated. Nervously, I asked how the baby was doing, not knowing what kind of a response I would get. The response was worse than I could have imagined!

It turned out the child had developed a condition known as “Anencephaly” during the pregnancy. The child was born essentially without a brain (or a large portion of the brain). It might live for a year, or maybe a month, or it might not live through the night. It wasn’t brain dead because it didn’t even really have a brain to be dead. It was just living jello. I’ll be honest here…it was terrifying to me! I had no idea of how to respond, none at all. The turkey baster looking thing was actually a medical device to feed the infant without it choking. It wasn’t really eating as much as having food squirted down its esophagus.

It was crushing. And it was horrible.

Eric didn’t want anything, he hadn’t asked me to come there for that. He just needed to talk to someone, anyone, and I guess my name came to his mind. His eyes were lifeless as he so matter-of-factly told me his story. There was no feeling sorry for himself, no excuses, just a monotone statement of a number of facts, each one more crushing than the last. Shortly afterward he put the baby down in a crib and came back downstairs. Afterwards he asked me why I was being so quiet, there was no need to be. The baby didn’t sleep, it didn’t wake, it was just there. It didn’t even blink, so much so they had to put this goop in its eyes to keep them from drying out.

I’ll never forget walking down that dim and stuffy hallway as I left that night. I really honestly wished I had never seen the cult film Eraserhead, because I had just seen a real-life version of it. But, even despite this horribly depressing story, there is a silver lining, if you can believe it.

To Eric, his life was over, and this was his purgatory. He said as much. I saw something a little different though. I couldn’t say it to Eric at the time, but whether it took a day, or a month, or a year, he would soon be set free from his bondage. People talk about being “reborn”, and here was a man who truly would be reborn, in about every sense of the word, if he could just stick it out. And, he did stick it out, and he was reborn.

Today, Eric is a successful business man, married (to a different, much better, woman) with a couple kids he had several years later. He lives in a house with a lawn, and the sun always shines on his side of the street, even in winter.

Sometimes reality can be even more horrific than science fiction, but with a Positive Mental Attitude (PMA) you might be surprised at the outcome.

a reply to: Flyingclaydisk

what a story.
how long did the poor baby live?

Awful, yet well told story...with a positive ending.

I could tell the same story, yet in reverse, about one of my oldest friends.
Yours has a much happier ending.

I enjoyed reading this very much. I didn't even know that could happen, nor have I actually seen eraserhead. I was so relieved to hear that Eric was reborn and that his life had turned around, as I am in the turnaround phase myself!!

a reply to: Flyingclaydisk

Worst movie ever.

originally posted by: oloufo
a reply to: Flyingclaydisk

Not necessary.

edit on 2912021 by Tulpa because: Speeling

a reply to: oloufo

I never asked exactly, but I got the sense later it wasn't very long.

a reply to: KansasGirl

Well, there was an ulterior motive for telling this story.

If we use it as a metaphor for our current political situation, perhaps this is the same fortitude we need to look toward the future with, rather than apathy.

Honestly, the reality of what we're dealing with right now politically is very similar to the trajectory of this story line.

Our current political situation, and politicians, are a baby born without a brain. The inevitability of life will eventually prevail, and then we will have to rebuild our lives.

a reply to: Flyingclaydisk

Very well written and intriguing. I can tell you’re getting functionality back in your hand. 🍻

Curious about why this condition causes the black eyes.

a reply to: KKLOCO

When the pupils fully dilate the eyes look black.

a reply to: Flyingclaydisk
Sir, I salute you.
Eric was very lucky to have a friend in you. Someone he looked up to at his lowest point. Your one visit probably kept Eric from walking away or ending his own life to escape the hell he was in. You may not have known at the time what was going to happen, but obviously that one visit encouraged Eric to stay the course and keep fighting.
Writing this made me tear up...

a reply to: Flyingclaydisk

Yes, I know. Curious what causes the dilation. I should have been more clear.

a reply to: KKLOCO

Same reason people's eyes dilate when they die, or get a traumatic brain injury. At least that's the way I understand it.

Wow ...

The horrors the life hands to some people ... That was ... I don't even know how to describe it.

I'm glad that in the end, it was something he was able to rebuild himself from and go on to something better.

a reply to: KKLOCO

My guess is that the light "signal" entering the eye goes nowhere.
If there's nothing to respond to the signal, the message to contract the pupil to lessen light input does not occur.
They'll just stay in the one position.
I guess open is relaxed and the contraction requires brain response.

Here's that PMA I mentioned to you the other day
Sad, but very inspiring story, thank you.

Rainbows
Jane

a reply to: KansasGirl

BTW...the movie Eraserhead, depressing as it was, was a foretelling of the future.

David Lynch was a strange dude indeed, but this doesn't diminish the foreshadowing of the film.

Incidentally, how I ever even heard of the movie was one time I walked into my video rental store in college and told them I wanted to rent the craziest and most bizarre cult movies ever made. They recommended several movies, some of which I had seen, but two of them I had not. One was the movie 'Reefer Madness' from 1936 and the other was 'Eraserhead'. They had Reefer Madness, but not Eraserhead. In fact, no one had Eraserhead...making me want to see it all the more.

Imagine my shock when I finally got a hold of a copy to watch! It wasn't just bizarre, it was shockingly bizarre, in a twisted way that only Lynch could have come up with. The sound effects alone took months. It was terrifying in a psychological way. It was shocking and bizarre, in a surreal way. And it was, above all else, memorable.

I don't know what it is about that movie, but it will leave an imprint on your mind...forever.

a reply to: Flyingclaydisk

At least you knew what type of film it would be.
First time I saw it, I missed the first five minutes and had no idea what had just come on the TV.
I thought "hmmmmm, looks a bit odd".
So I kept watching. Wow!

a reply to: Flyingclaydisk

What happened with the baby's mother?

a reply to: Atsbhct

Don't know, and don't really care, to be honest.

She revealed to him later that she had secretly done all sorts of drugs, including coc aine, as well as drank pretty heavily during her pregnancy. This, with her 'friends', while he was at work.

I don't have too much good to say about her, so I'll stop there.