The 6th Finger Story

As some of you may or may not know, I was born with 12 fingers. On each hand, I had an extra finger coming out of my pinky. It was boneless, and pretty much useless so they cut it off, and all I have to show for it is a little stump on my pinkies. That's pretty much all I've ever known about it, until now.

My brothers Isaac and Inocente were also born with 12 fingers, and it's obviously genetic as my newborn nephew, Petr, was also graced with the magical Camargo digits.

This is obviously something that is not often seen in the hospitals in Prague as it turns out the doctors aren't quite sure what to do with it, and my brother Isaac asked my mom and my other brother how things were done with us. And this is the reply that my oldest brother Chente sent today (which prompted the whole 'how many fingers was Fabian born with' emails):

The best strategy that I saw was the one used for Fabian, and for me, as I have been told.

For Ike, it was a disaster, I must say. The doc said when you were born that you could keep them for a while and later, it was a simple operation. What he did, is that he simply, as I was told then, took medical scissors and cut the first one. Blood came instantly from your hand as water from a leaking pipe and then he struggled to stop the bleeding and put some stitches in each one of them. I remember when mom and Herminio came back with Isaac ( you were about a month or two old), their shirts were all stained ...

For Fabian and for me, the doctor tightly tied a simple sawing thread (forgive the spelling), to cut the inflow of blood to the little fingers. The little fingers became blue, then shrinkled and became black over a period of a month. Then, I do not really remember what happened, either they fell or the doctor took them away. They simply fell, I think. This time it was painless.

How do the little fingers of Petr look, Ike ? Either Fabian's or Ike's looked the same: no bones, with a nail as the other fingers. They were exactly the same as the other five fingers in the hand, except at the link of that finger with the hand: it was narrower. I would say this link was like a little pipe of 3 to 4 mm long and 2 mm diameter and then came a normal pinky.

Now isn't that just lovely? How's that for a cute little baby image? Haha. I'm curious to find out how they proceed with Petr. I may even get to witness it as I will see him in a month. All I know is that he's a lucky boy. Little does he know what a great conversation starter this is with the chicks ;)