Ep. 66 | The Nest
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Hey Prime members, you can binge episodes 65 through 72 right now and ad-free on Amazon Music. Download the app today. On a warm California night in the summer of 2005, a mother of two jolted awake from a feverish dream. As she caught her breath and adjusted to the darkness of the bedroom, she gradually realized that she was soaked head to toe in sweat. She tried to wipe her face dry, but her arm felt too heavy to lift.

Eventually, she managed, but the exertion left her dizzy. Lying in bed, the woman tried to stay calm and get her bearings. She remembered feeling a bit fatigued at dinner the night before, but nothing extreme. Yet now, she was delirious, achy, and could barely move. However, the woman did manage to nudge her husband awake and mumbled to him that she needed help. Seconds later, he had put a thermometer in her mouth and was anxiously waiting for it to beep.

And when it did and he saw the number, his eyes went wide and he turned the thermometer around to show her. The woman's heart jumped 104 degrees, any higher than that and her life could be in danger. Then the woman took a slow deep breath and did one more thing. She raised her shirt and saw exactly what she dreaded. Her whole torso was covered in a thick red rash. The woman sank back into the pillows, her mind racing with fear.

But she kept coming back to the same question. Why was this happening again? ♪

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From Ballin Studios and Wondery, I'm Mr. Ballin, and this is Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries, where every week we will explore a new baffling mystery originating from the one place we all can't escape, our own bodies. So if you like today's story, the next time the follow button wraps up their Ironman triathlon race and just wants to take a hot shower, be sure to deplete their entire hot water supply right before. This episode is called The Nest.

Just before Thanksgiving in November of 1987, 37-year-old Beth Sternlieb stopped to steady herself against a water fountain in a hospital hallway. A slim, strong woman with a bob of blonde hair, she was due to give birth to her second son very soon. Surges of pain were excruciating and growing stronger. Beth's husband, Greg, helped her shuffle along the corridor, trying to distract her in conversation. But the spasms she was experiencing were too intense to ignore.

Beth's career as a yoga and meditation teacher at the nearby University of California at Los Angeles had taught her lots of strategies for coping with pain, but childbirth was testing her limits. Greg stroked Beth's hand and suggested she picture a perfect day with their whole family, at a beautiful beach in Malibu or maybe a scenic hike in the hills. Beth relaxed a little while visualizing each scene until one powerful contraction scrambled her thoughts. It was so strong, she knew it could only mean one thing.

Before she even realized what was happening, Beth was being eased into a wheelchair as Greg and a nurse rushed her down the hall. Everything was a blur of fluorescent lights and gleaming hallway floors until they were pushing through swinging doors into a delivery room. Hours later, drenched in sweat and her muscles aching from furious pushing, Beth suddenly heard the most magical sound, her baby crying. When the doctor finally placed the bundled up tiny pink infant onto her chest,

Beth gazed down at his sweet little face and smiled. All the pain and all the effort had been worth it. And now she was just looking forward to getting some rest. But a couple of weeks later, as Beth slumped in a chair in her doctor's office, she somehow felt even worse than right after delivering her baby. After the birth of her first child a few years ago, Beth had experienced typical postpartum aches and pains. But this time was different.

Her primary physician, Dr. Shea Mitchell, listened intently as Beth told him what was going on. For a few days now, her head had throbbed with a dull, deep pain, her muscles ached, and her bowels had been churning. Her entire biological system felt under attack from top to bottom. No matter how many naps she took or how healthy a diet she ate, Beth felt wrecked.

Dr. Mitchell nodded as Beth described what she'd been going through. Afterwards, he reviewed her medical chart and the vitals his nurse had taken when Beth first arrived. Then he took a seat on a stool facing Beth and told her not to worry too much. Her recovery from the pregnancy was actually proceeding at a healthy rate. However, he said that, you know, this winter had been one of the worst flu seasons in Los Angeles that Dr. Mitchell had ever seen. So more than likely, Beth had just caught a bug that was a bit more stubborn than usual.

And so he advised her to rest as much as she could and to drink lots of fluids. This was traditional advice, but hydration and rest would boost her body strength to fight off whatever infection was causing her symptoms. If she stuck to this regimen for a while, Dr. Mitchell felt sure that Beth would soon be on the mend. Back at home, Beth told her husband that according to Dr. Mitchell, she very likely had the flu. Greg thought that made sense and offered to cover as much extra childcare as necessary to help his wife get back on her feet.

Later that day, once the baby was down for a nap, Greg took their toddler out for a walk in the winter sun while Beth retreated to the bedroom, closed the curtains, and crawled under the covers. When she woke up a couple of hours later to the sound of Greg and their toddler laughing in the front yard, she already felt better. Beth felt confident that her body would find its way back to health. It just needed time.

But one afternoon, six months later, after a long shift at the UCLA Meditation Center, Beth felt unusually drained and went to rest in her office. Her postpartum flu-like sickness was long gone, but she had been feeling run down the past couple of days. Around mid-morning, a headache had crept in and never left. By mid-afternoon, her body felt sore and limp, and she couldn't focus.

Sitting in her office chair, Beth rested her head on the desk and rubbed her stomach, trying her best to ease the pain in her gut. As she did, she lifted her shirt and noticed something: a scattering of tiny dots all over her torso. Fortunately, they didn't itch or sting, but they were odd and new, which worried her. Later that night, Beth checked her stomach again before getting into the shower. And to her shock, the dots had multiplied and spread.

Now her entire stomach was a solid block of red, like a really bad sunburn. Beth decided it was definitely time to make another appointment with Dr. Mitchell. A few days later, on a hot summer morning, Greg took the morning off of work to watch the baby while Beth went to the clinic. She felt woozy and bleached out by the sun as she crossed the parking lot and marched up the front steps into the building.

Once inside of Dr. Mitchell's office, Beth raised her shirt to show him the thick red splotch across her stomach. And under the fluorescent lights, they looked even more severe. Dr. Mitchell studied the rash's texture and traced the tendrils to where it had spread the farthest. After a few moments, he stood back and shook his head. He admitted that he wasn't sure what it was, but his guess was some type of hives, which are usually caused by an allergic reaction.

Beth didn't have any specific allergies that she knew of, but Dr. Mitchell told her that allergies can start anytime in a person's life, for all sorts of reasons. Dr. Mitchell also said it was possible that Beth might have an autoimmune disease like psoriasis, which can cause severe rashes. He explained that autoimmune diseases are basically like the body having an allergic reaction to itself.

Dr. Mitchell wrote down the name and number of a colleague who specialized in autoimmune disorders and gave it to Beth. If anybody could find out what was going on with her skin, it would be him. But, unfortunately, it wasn't that simple. Early the next week, Beth made an appointment with the doctor, had blood drawn for multiple tests, then waited several days for a response. But when the call finally came, the doctor had disappointing news. All the tests were inconclusive.

He told Beth that her results suggested the presence of some sort of autoimmune disorder, but there was not enough data to determine anything more specific. Beth felt frustrated and tired of this runaround with her health, but the red rash on her stomach had faded, along with the rest of her symptoms. So Beth shrugged it off and refocused on her work and family. Her baby and toddler were growing up quickly, and she wanted to savor every day of it.

One spring morning, about four years later, Beth's bedroom door burst open as both her kids tumbled onto the bed, hungry for breakfast. Her oldest was in elementary school, and her youngest was almost in kindergarten. Greg Play wrestled with both of them as Beth slipped out of bed and went into the kitchen to start the coffee. But as she did, she noticed her head felt hazy.

Last night, Greg had arranged a dinner party to celebrate Beth's return from a work trip, so they had stayed up late drinking wine and socializing. Now she felt like she was paying for it. As the coffee brewed, Beth rubbed her temples and pictured the long, busy workday ahead of her. Her kids seemed to have more energy every day, so juggling motherhood with a full-time job was not getting any easier. And having a slight hangover made it even worse. After feeding the kids breakfast, Beth got dressed and went to the bathroom to freshen up.

Standing in front of the mirror, something familiar caught her eye: a rash of tiny red dots across her stomach. Beth's heart sank. The rash and the accompanying sickness came back a few times every year. But it had been about six months since the last time, so Beth had hoped that this time it might be gone for good. Later that morning, Beth was in the middle of a meditation class when her stomach lurched. She told her students to continue without her and then she rushed to the bathroom.

That day, all her familiar symptoms returned: the headache, the muscular pains, and the cramps. As she drove home through rush hour traffic after work, Beth felt overwhelmed and defeated. All her life, she had considered herself blessed to be a naturally healthy person, but something had changed after her second pregnancy. She still didn't understand what it was, but it was clear that this sickness, whatever it was, wasn't going away anytime soon.

That night after dinner, Beth discussed the situation with Greg. She admitted that she had been feeling spread thin lately. The kids required so much energy and her work had been tougher this semester. But even so, Beth was confused how stress alone could be responsible for her recurring symptoms. Feeling generally run down was totally normal for any working parent, but pounding headaches and diarrhea and mysterious rashes were not. While Greg washed the dishes, Beth went to their bedroom to meditate.

Sitting in the lotus position on her yoga mat with candles lit, Beth tried to block out stressful thoughts. She focused on breathing evenly, letting her body settle into a sense of calm. But worries kept nagging her, that these symptoms would keep coming back forever, and they would get worse as she got older, and maybe one day she'd be too weak and tired to fight them off. Beth gave up on meditation, opened her eyes, blew out the candles, and climbed into bed. Greg came in later and sat next to her.

He suggested that Beth call in sick tomorrow and spend the day looking for new doctors. There had to be some medical professional out there who could figure out what was going on with her. Beth was grateful to have such a supportive partner and agreed to Greg's suggestion. But the next day started a trend that would go on for years. Calling various clinics, talking to all sorts of doctors, taking tests, and waiting for results. Yet nobody was able to determine what was causing her symptoms. So her symptoms just kept on returning.

Thank you.

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Every five or six months, the illness would return and knock Beth out for a week and then subside. Gradually, Beth learned to coexist with it. She had no other choice. Then came the summer of 2005. One hot day in late August of that year, Beth crouched in the living room surrounded by boxes, helping her son finish packing for college. It felt joyous and surreal, but also sad.

Her youngest was now 18 and leaving the next morning to move into his freshman dorm. Beth had intended to go with him and help him get settled, but she'd woken up with an intense fever a few days ago and still felt too weak to make the drive. Her rash had also returned, this time worse than ever, covering her entire torso and up her neck. But it was the fever that really worried her. It had spiked a few times at 104.

Beth tossed and turned through the nights, drenched in sweat. During the days she felt too sick and exhausted to eat and fought to keep her eyes open. She had not been to work even once this week. Beth did visit her most recent doctor, who ran some tests and discovered that her white blood cell count was high, proving she had an infection of some sort. But, as always, he still had no answers as to what was making her sick.

Once the boxes were all packed and taped, her son left to go meet up with some friends. And as soon as the door closed, Beth felt her body shut down. She always tried to put on a brave face in front of her kids, but inside she was losing it. Beth had been battling this sickness for 18 long years. No matter how much she took care of herself or how proactive she was about seeing doctors, nothing had improved. Every six months it came back like clockwork, and now it had returned with a vengeance.

Her husband tried to stay optimistic, but she could tell he was beaten down by this too. This was not the life they had imagined together years ago when they started a family. Beth went to the bedroom, drew the blinds, and buried herself in the covers. She tried once again to rest and unwind, but she was getting tired of pretending that things would change. At the back of her mind lurked a dark thought. Was she doomed to live like this forever?

Five months later, Beth was lying on her back in a hospital room, waiting to be slid inside the big white donut of a CT scan machine. The past few months had been Beth's worst yet. Her fatigue had intensified to the point that she had to arrange an indefinite leave of absence from work.

Beth's job was her passion, and without it, she fell into a depression, spending entire days in bed or on the couch. She barely ate or left the house. Over a couple of months of this gloomy routine, Beth lost 15 pounds, which only made her weaker. But, despite all this, Beth was still a fighter. She hadn't given up hope of finding someone who could help.

Her latest doctor, Dr. William Bruce, specialized in infectious diseases, and over the past month, he tested Beth for a number of possible causes for her sickness, including malaria, parasitic infections, autoimmune diseases, and even HIV and hepatitis. One by one, they were all ruled out. So now, Dr. Bruce had ordered a CT scan to see if Beth might have some sort of internal injury or intrusive growth.

Once the CT scan machine was prepared, a nurse slid Beth into the center cavity and then left the room. Beth lay there and listened to the mechanical hum, letting her mind wander. She had been through too much at this point to let her hopes rise very high, but a part of her stayed optimistic. About 15 minutes later, the machine powered down and the nurse returned and wheeled Beth out. A few minutes after that, Dr. Bruce entered and told Beth he would call her with the results as soon as they were ready, most likely in a day or two.

The next 48 hours seemed to crawl by until finally, early one afternoon, while Beth sat on the couch under a blanket, her phone rang. It was the hospital. Her CT scan results had come in. Beth listened tensely as a nurse explained that the doctor had discovered eight fibroids in her uterus. Now, by itself, that was not so shocking. Small uterine fibroids are common in women over 40, and they're very rarely cancerous.

But one of Beth's fibroids was abnormally large, which could spell trouble. Fibroids tend to swell when they lose their blood supply and begin to die, which can lead to complications. The hospital gave Beth the phone number of a gynecologist, Dr. Jessica Schneider. They recommended that she call Dr. Schneider first thing in the morning to treat the issue. Beth promised she would, hung up, and went to tell her husband. Beth wasn't sure what to make of all this news yet, but she couldn't help but feel optimistic about the discovery.

Was this really it? Was this the source of 18 years of sickness? Later that week, Dr. Jessica Schneider sat across from Beth in her office and told her she would need surgery. Beth nodded slowly with a look of resignation, like she'd somehow been expecting this. This was Dr. Schneider's third consultation with Beth.

Over the course of their meetings, she had grown fond of her patient. Despite Beth's soft-spoken manner, she was clearly tough and resilient. Even so, this illness had obviously taken a toll. Beth's warm smile looked tired, and her eyes were ringed with dark circles. Dr. Schneider didn't want to add to Beth's struggles, but she knew surgery was a must.

Over her years as a gynecologist, she had encountered fibroids many times and knew what to watch out for. When fibroids die, they often get big very quickly, and there was always a chance that any of Beth's fibroids could be cancerous. Dr. Schneider booked Beth's surgery for a couple weeks away in December and warned Beth that it was possible the fibroids were not the cause of all her sickness. If so, the surgery wouldn't change anything, but it was worth a shot.

After the surgery, once Beth was stitched up and wheeled out of the operating room, Dr. Schneider scooted her stool in front of a stainless steel surgical tray and looked down upon the largest fibroid she had ever seen in her career. It was about the size of a grapefruit, four inches across. Dr. Schneider shook her head in shock as she thought of Beth carrying that enormous thing around inside of her. Hoking it with her surgical ruler, Dr. Schneider was surprised by the fibroid's consistency.

Normally, fibroids are dense, like little balls of muscle. This one was strangely springy and swollen. Dr. Schneider picked up a scalpel from her surgeon's tool kit and gently pressed the blade into the flesh of the fibroid. As soon as the tip pierced the skin, white pus exploded onto her hand. Slicing deeper, Dr. Schneider could not believe what she was seeing. The fibroid was like a rotten dumpling, filled to the brim with infected liquid.

In all her years of study and practice, Dr. Schneider had never seen or heard of a fibroid like this. She quickly placed it in a sterile container and then hurried to have it tested by the lab. Dr. Schneider didn't know for sure, but every medical instinct in her body pointed the same direction. Whatever it was in this giant fibroid had to be the thing that had been making Beth sick.

Days later, Dr. Schneider's phone rang with the report she had been waiting for, and with it, the explanation for Beth's long illness. Beth's fibroid was not cancerous, but it had been incredibly bad for her. The pus inside of Beth's fibroid was absolutely teeming with an unidentified strain of salmonella bacteria. And as far as the lab could tell, this salmonella had been festering inside of Beth for a long time.

possibly as far back as 1987, when Beth gave birth to her second child. For 18 years, Beth had been suffering from a simmering salmonella infection that sometimes boiled over and caused her terrible cramps, rashes, and all the other debilitating symptoms. With the source of the infection removed, Beth's body could finally recover. Now, only one final question remained. How had she contracted the bacteria?

Several months later, Beth was at home when there was a knock at the door. She opened it to find a public health nurse bearing unusual news. The hospital had kept testing the salmonella from Beth's fibroid, searching for a match, until they finally found one. Hers was not the salmonella commonly found in contaminated or undercooked food, but instead was a salmonella strain only found in reptiles.

Beth was blown away. Her kids had never once owned a pet reptile, and as far as she knew, there had never been a reptile in their house before. She had no idea how anyone in her family would have even been around one. Though Beth never got an official explanation for how she caught this reptilian strain of salmonella, her doctors suspected that she contracted it while in the hospital for the birth of her second child.

All it would have taken is one employee or patient with a pet turtle or frog or lizard who didn't properly wash their hands to touch something that Beth later touched as well. A doorknob, a railing, a water fountain. After that, the disease took shelter in a uterine fibroid where it would periodically escape into her bloodstream, causing her repeated bouts of illness. After her surgery, Beth never suffered from another episode of her terrible rash or other symptoms ever again.

She returned to teaching mindfulness and yoga full-time with a deeper appreciation for health than ever before. Hey, Prime members, you can listen to new episodes of Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries early and ad-free on Amazon Music. Download the app today. And also, Wondery Plus subscribers can listen to Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries ad-free. Join Wondery Plus today. Before you go, tell us about yourself by completing a short survey at listenersurvey.com.

From Ballin Studios and Wondery, this is Mr. Ballin's Medical Mysteries, hosted by me, Mr. Ballin. A quick note about our stories. They are all inspired by true events, but we sometimes use pseudonyms to protect the people involved. And a reminder, the content in this episode is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment.

This episode was written by Britt Brown. Our editor is Heather Dundas. Sound design is by Andre Pluss. Our senior managing producer is Nick Ryan. And our coordinating producer is Taylor Sniffen. Our senior producer is Alex Benidon. Our associate producers and researchers are Sarah Vytak and Tasia Palaconda. Fact-checking was done by Sheila Patterson.

For Ballin Studios, our Head of Production is Zach Levitt. Script Editing by Scott Allen and Evan Allen. Our Coordinating Producer is Samantha Collins. Production Support by Avery Siegel. Executive Producers are myself, Mr. Ballin, and also Nick Witters. For Wondery, our Head of Sound is Marcelino Villapando. Senior Producers are Laura Donna Palavoda and Dave Schilling. Senior Managing Producer is Ryan Moore. Our Executive Producers are Aaron O'Flaherty and Marshall Louis for Wondery.

You don't believe in ghosts? I get it. Lots of people don't. I didn't either, until I came face to face with them. Ever since that moment, hauntings, spirits, and the unexplained have consumed my entire life.

I'm Nadine Bailey. I've been a ghost tour guide for the past 20 years. I've taken people along with me into the shadows, uncovering the macabre tales that linger in the darkness, and inside some of the most haunted houses, hospitals, prisons, and more. Join me every week on my podcast, Haunted Canada, as we journey through terrifying and bone-chilling stories of the unexplained.

Search for Haunted Canada on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or wherever you find your favorite podcasts. ♪