If you'd lived 200 years ago, would you still be alive?

[J]

I had minor childhood asthma, nothing that required oxygen, ER visits or anything like that so I should be ok. I suffered a broken arm in my teens but it was a fairly clean break which could easily be treated with 19th century medicine though it would likely take a bit longer to heal and I'm not sure if my arm would be ever be 100% again. I don't know how good they were at setting bones & so forth so I'm guessing I might lose some range of motion or end up with a nagging low grade pain for the rest of my life.

[aerius]

Dead before the age of 5 from asthma & allergies. Without oxygen, I.V. lines and modern drugs I'm a goner. If I somehow make it to age 8 or 9 I would be fine other than being pretty darn shortsighted, they had eyeglasses back then so I'm covered. I'm not sure how well they could match my prescription back then so I'll probably have to deal with slightly fuzzy vision & headaches from glasses which don't quite correct my vision properly.

[Duckie]

Pneumonic at least thrice as an adolescent, full blown Influenza at least twice, plus other medical issues which would kill me by my current age even if I survived that. I also fell and cracked my head open hard enough to leave a scar and require a lot of stitches, but I dunno if it'd be fatal in 1809 medical technology. If I survived all of said things due to a bunch of middle ear infections I believe I would also have a minor chance of being deaf or hard of hearing, and I'd have poor eyesight and an inability to percieve 3 dimensional space like I do now.


I am deaaaad

[Crossroads Inc.]

I would probably be locked in some Abby or church on account of the "Demons" possessing me... IE I have Acute Pedimal Seizures, and without regular medication I would most likely be having full blow fall on the floor shaking seizures about once a week. So I would probably be bound for regular exorcisms till bad things happened...

That and Im gay, so im even more bonned.

[Temjin]

I'd probably be alive but I don't think I'd be living a happy life.

I'm not too sure of the specifics of it, since my mother can't remember the details or even the name of the condition, but as a baby I had to have surgery done to reopen a part of my skull that closed to early. From googling, it sounds like Craniosynostosis. I don't know if that was what I actually had, or how severe it was but the scar it leaves sounds remarkably similar to mine.

So depending on how severe it was, I'd now be living with a deformed skull and maybe some brain damage and various disabilities, instead of just having to live my life with just a stutter. Good times!

[Bluewolf]

No real medical problems that would doom me. I have some stress related breathing problems but those are not deadly really and would be more of a annoyance that something that would kill me. I am overweight but depending on where I am in such a time period, that could change quite fast. I have never really had any life threatening injury or broken any bones either (something I hope to keep up until my death).

[Bedlam]

Maybe dead at birth, I was born a bit early and rather jaundiced but I dont know if my kidneys could have kick started by themselves. If I survived that then I'd probably still be alive I havn't had any diseases requiring hospital admission or even serious drugs. I have had an abciss which required a few teeth removed by that could have been done 200 years ago although much less plesently.

[phred]

I would be alive, but a lot more miserable. I get terrible hay fever that even claritin can't keep up with all the time. I might have lost part of a finger in an accident a few years ago. And there was that time when I was 13 where I smashed my face into a retaining wall causing damage to most of my front teeth.

I'm actually fortunate to not have ever been seriously ill or broken a bone however.

[Pick]

I've had pneumonia once, so it's possible I might have died from that, although I seem to recall getting a little better before I actually ended up at the doctor's office. I also sliced open one of my fingers, which might have gotten infected all those years back and resulted in death, but this strikes me as highly unlikely.

[The Duchess of Zeon]

I don't know, because I've had serious infections which can be survived without medicine, but might not be, on two occasions. I was young and healthy so it is likelier that I'd survive them if I had the luxury of months of convalescence and support, and my family is certainly well off enough to put me in that category back then, but even then it's still something that I can't give a definite answer on.

[Bounty]

I would probably be locked in some Abby or church on account of the "Demons" possessing me

200 years ago? In 1809? In an abbey due to seizures? I knew historical awareness has been slipping but I didn't know it was this bad.

In fact, I'm pretty sure most of the people whining about having been dead would have been fine - 200 years ago, medical technology was far from what it is today, but these people weren't completely clueless. Breach births and tangled umbilical cords have existed for centuries and midwives did learn to deal with them.

---

I'd be alive. Went through some illnesses but nothing a child of the era wouldn't live through. I have a few conditions that may have made me grow up different - I've needed minor dental surgery and had to have a non-lethal birth defect corrected - but nothing that would stop me from growing up healthy.

[Oni Koneko Damien]

One dead child here. Before the age of six I already had four surgeries, three for hernias. A really bad case of cranial meningitis, chicken pox, a load of nasty ear infections and migraines. Age twelve I had to have major chest surgery to remove a lump of cartilage before it grew around my lungs and throttled me. Granted, right now I'm at the peak of physical fitness, but back then I would have been dead ten times over before getting here.

[[R_H]]

My mother would have died during my birth, and I would have likely died too. In my childhood I had pneumonia, and quite a few earaches, had stitches and a mild concussion due to falling down a flight of stairs, and needed glasses.

In the recent past I had four sports related injury, one which required stitches in my face, and two went untreated until my third back injury (physio cleared that up). I had my wisedom teeth removed.

[Losonti Tokash]

Well, assuming my childhood epilepsy didn't kill me, I'd probably still be alive unless my untreated depression led me to commit suicide.

[Knobbyboy88]

I was either born with or developed an inguinal hernia as a young infant, so I probably would've died due to the possible complications of this unless some old fashioned remedy exists for the condition that I'm not aware of. I also had quite a few inner ear infections as a young child due to my allergies (I went through two sets of tubes by the time I was six), so its likely that I would have been rather hard of hearing as well if I didn't simply succumb to illness outright.

I also need glasses, but I can get by without them even if it tends to be a bit of a pain.

Apart from that, however; I've been pretty healthy overall.

[Adrian Laguna]

Note that birth by cesarean is not a death sentence if there happened to be a surgeon at hand. It wou ld highly increase the chances of the mother dying but you could still be around. The procedure has been performed successfully since time immemorial. It has been speculated, for example, the the Caesar branch of Iulius family got its name because its founder was born by c-section. Alternatively, he was just very hairy.

Me, because of the cesarean thing it's iffy.

[Lonestar]

Alive. Very much so. Might be a little* deaf, but alive.


*Mostly.

[Tiriol]

Alive. Although I'd probably have some eyesight problems, given that I have glasses and all.

[Alyrium Denryle]

I would still be alive. I have never had anything worse than chicken pox. The only problem is that I would be functionally blind (but glasses were available if I was wealthy), because between my myopia and my astigmatism my eyesight is in the realm of 20/300 or so... it is not fully correctable now, let alone 200 years ago

[Darth Raptor]

I can't think of anything that's happened to me that would have been fatal in 1809.

[Mayabird]

Unless my medical history was vastly different (like getting a really bad case of smallpox in this scenario, or getting run over by a horse I didn't see) I'd still be alive, as I've never had any major illnesses or medical problems or even a broken bone. Wouldn't be able to see a thing unless my family could afford glasses, but I'd be alive.

[starslayer]

I'm not quite sure if I'd be dead or not. Probably, but maybe not. When I was a newborn I got a really bad case of chicken pox, resulting in a 105 Fahrenheit fever and a lengthy hospital stay. They actually put me in an ice-water bath to cool me the fuck down. If I make it through that, and avoid the usual childhood diseases, I should be relatively OK, though if my family wasn't rich, I wouldn't be able see very well (vision similar to Alyrium's).

[Korvan]

Was a cesarean baby so possible death there. I did have complication due to an allergy to the general anesthetic used but it wouldn't have existed 200 years ago.

Really bad case of pneumonia at age 5, possible death there. No tetracycline back then so if I survived at least my teeth would be in better shape.

Age 10, dead by drowning. In a case of the stupids while playing pearl diver, I ended up 20 feet under water with a large rock tied to my waist. I screwed up the release knot and the wet rope expanded making undoing the knot impossible. I was saved when a vision of Neil Armstrong's moonwalk inspired me to pick up the rock and walk to shore where I barely made it time. 200 years ago I would have drowned and likely someone in my family would've been accused of murder.

[Frank Hipper]

Dead at 31; Type 1 Diabetes.

[Wyrm]

Dead at 18 (I think) from tension pneumothorax, if I wasn't a year before from severe vomiting and diarrhea. Treatment of tension pneumothorax requires drilling into the pleural wall and sucking the air out, which represents great risk of sepsis even if treatment was tried.