Kochi: For 12 years, Manu SB lived with a pain she could neither explain nor escape. It began after a freak accident while she was seven months pregnant in 2014, but despite repeated visits to doctors and years of treatment, its real cause remained a mystery. What neither Manu nor her family knew was that a sharp piece of glass had been lodged deep inside her back since that day.

The mystery was finally solved on Friday when surgeons at VPS Lakeshore Hospital in Kochi removed the foreign object from her back. What doctors initially expected to be a small fragment turned out to be a sharp, triangular piece of glass about 3 cm long.

For the 44-year-old Taluk Supply Office employee from Karunagappally in Kollam, the surgery has finally provided an answer to 12 years of unexplained suffering.

The accident that changed everything
It was September 15, 2014. Manu was seven months pregnant with her second child when she attended her sister-in-law’s wedding at an auditorium in Karunagappally.

She had suffered low blood pressure the previous day. Feeling faint at the venue, she tried to steady herself against a glass-topped teapoy, but her hand slipped.

Manu was initially falling forward, but her two- or three-year-old son suddenly grabbed her. His hand caught her hair, causing her to turn. She fell backwards onto the glass table.

“If she had fallen the other way, the glass could have pierced her stomach and it would have ended tragically,” her husband Rajeeve recalled while speaking to Onmanorama.

Instead, the shattered glass pierced her back.

Manu was immediately taken to a private hospital in Karunagappally, where doctors cleaned and stitched the wound. She remained there for several days.

But doctors did not realise that a piece of glass had gone deep into her back. Rajeeve said that Manu complained of severe pain at the injury site the next day. However, doctors attributed it to the wound and her pregnancy. Imaging such as an X-ray or any other scan was also avoided because she was pregnant.

“She kept telling the doctors that she had severe pain in that particular area. They thought it could be because of the injury or the pregnancy. They did not know that a glass piece was lodged inside,” Rajeeve said.

Manu delivered her daughter on November 25, 2014. Her wound healed, leaving a long scar of around 20 to 30 cm, but the pain continued.

A 12-year search for answers
After her maternity leave, Manu returned to work and continued her career. But the pain kept returning.

Over the years, the family tried medicines, physiotherapy and ayurvedic therapy, which sometimes provided temporary relief. She was also treated for fibromyalgia and other back-related problems.

Yet nobody specifically examined the area where the glass had entered.

“Whenever we went to different doctors, Manu kept saying, ‘I have pain here. It starts from here.’ But nobody evaluated that particular area until now,” Rajeeve, who works at a private firm in Thrissur, said.

At one point, the family was even told that her symptoms could be psychological. A surgeon in Kayamkulam whom the family consulted reportedly dismissed the possibility of a physical problem and told Manu that she had a mental issue.

The repeated dismissal was devastating. “She became angry at times because the pain was unbearable. When the pain increased, her whole nature would change. She would get angry at everyone, including her children and me. It was because she had reached the limit of what she could endure. Even I felt helpless,” Rajeeve said.

The breakthrough came this month when Manu’s pain became exceptionally severe.

During a consultation at Dr Padmanabha Shenoy’s hospital in Ernakulam, she was being evaluated for what was initially thought to be a trigger point associated with her existing fibromyalgia condition. Pain-management specialist Dr Shamna Salam examined the area using ultrasound before administering an injection. But something did not look right.

“She said, ‘This is not a trigger point.’ She noticed a change in colour around the area and what appeared to be some kind of growth. She firmly said it was not fluid retention or a normal node,” Rajeeve said.

Further imaging raised suspicion of a foreign object. When the radiologist asked whether Manu had suffered an accident in the area, Rajeeve recounted the 2014 incident. A detailed section-wise scan of her back later revealed the glass shard hidden inside her back.

The family then approached Dr Krishnakumar R, Director of the Institute of Spine and Scoliosis Surgery at VPS Lakeshore Hospital. Rajeeve had previously undergone surgery under him.

Dr Krishnakumar reviewed the scans and advised surgery. But a 3D CT scan before surgery revealed that the fragment was much larger than expected.

“Dr Krishnakumar came out and told me, ‘Rajeev, it is not a small piece as we expected. It is a very big piece. It was triangular and around 3 cm,” he said.

The shard was successfully removed on Friday by a team led by Dr Krishnakumar.

For Rajeeve, seeing the glass outside his wife’s body was an emotional moment. He has preserved the fragment and plans to approach the authorities over the lapse that allowed it to remain undetected for 12 years.

“This should not happen to anyone else. A lapse like this should be brought to the attention of the authorities so that others do not suffer in the same way,” he said.

Manu is now recovering at the hospital. Still under the effect of sedation when Rajeeve spoke, she had already managed to speak to her family and was happy that the ordeal was finally over.

“After 12 years of pain, uncertainty and being told that the problem might be in her mind, Manu finally got an explanation for the pain,” Rajeeve said.