In 1955, 26-year-old Zahra was pregnant with her first child in a small village outside Casablanca. But after 48 hours of labor pains, the baby was still not born. She was taken to a local hospital, but in the ward, she saw a woman die of dystocia due to excruciating pain. Convinced that she will meet the same fate, Zahra escapes the hospital and returns to her village.
In the following days, Zahra experienced a painful labor, but the baby still did not come. After a few days, the pain stopped and the baby stopped moving. She believes in a local superstition known as the “sleeping baby”, and believes that one day her baby will wake up. Soon, the villagers were chattering and offering their own theories about what had happened to Zahra’s baby.
In order to forget the baby sleeping inside, Zahra adopted three children. Their children grew up and had children of their own. Forty-six years later, her excruciating pain returned. Her adopted son worries about his mother’s declining health. Plagued with pain, she reluctantly made the four-hour drive to the hospital in the Moroccan capital Rabat.
Her stomach was swollen and paralyzed with pain. Doctors thought she had an ovarian tumor and immediately took her for an ultrasound. Doctors were amazed and had the woman undergo more scans to learn more. The radiologist was stunned by what he saw. The 75-year-old woman had a baby in her belly. But what’s even more shocking is that the baby was conceived 46 years ago.
Ectopic means not outside the womb. In a normal pregnancy, a fertilized egg travels down the fallopian tube, implants and grows in the uterus. In an ectopic pregnancy, the egg implants itself in the fallopian tube. In rare cases, such as Zahra, the fetus breaks through the fallopian tubes and develops in the abdominal cavity. Most fetuses here don’t survive beyond three months, but Zahra’s fetus somehow survived to term by attaching the placenta to a vital organ in her stomach, where it remained for another 46 years.
