WTF of the Day: A 91-Year Old Woman Carried a Calcified Fetus in Her Uterus for 60 Years

For more than 60 years, Estela Meléndez though she just had an uncomfortable lump in her abdomen.

That was until the 91-year-old Chilean woman had an x-ray taken after a fall. Then CNN says, doctors discovered that what was actually in her abdomen was a fetus that had died in utero and then calcified over time.

"The doctor said I had a tumor and that they needed to operate on me," Meléndez told CNN. But when a second X-ray was ordered to confirm, doctors couldn't believe their eyes. The mass they were looking at turned out not to be a tumor, but a fetus...

For the elderly woman and her family, the finding has been quite a shock. Meléndez's husband of 74 years, Manuel González, died in January at age 91. González made a living as a fisherman and a boater in the coastal town. One of her few regrets, Meléndez says, is that she and her husband were unable to have children.

Here's what it looks like:

Since the fetus has calcified, the doctors said it poses no risks to Meléndez' health. And considering her advanced age, they said it might cause more harm to remove it.

According to Wikipedia, this is phenomenom is called a lithopedion

Lithopedia may occur from 14 weeks gestation to full term. It is not unusual for a stone baby to remain undiagnosed for decades, and it is often not until a patient is examined for other conditions or a proper examination is conducted that includes an X-ray, that a stone baby is found.

Fewer than 300 cases have been found in the past 400 years of medical documentation.