A mortician has shed light on the phenomenon known as a coffin birth, and the details are truly heartrending.
Following death, whether the deceased was pregnant or not, the body undergoes a natural decomposition process. In some instances, this can result in a rare occurrence known as a coffin birth.
Lauren the Mortician, as she is referred to online, has dedicated years to educating her audience about the unsettling realities of postmortem changes, aiming to satisfy the common curiosity about death and help alleviate fears surrounding it.
Death is a natural process with its own sequence of events, and it happens to all living beings.
In the case of pregnant individuals, decomposition follows the same overall process, but specific differences arise due to the softer and more swollen state of the abdominal area where the fetus resides.
In very rare cases, this can lead to what is termed a ‘coffin birth’.
Lauren defines it as an occurrence where ‘a pregnant person dies and their decomposing body actually expels the fetus from the womb postmortem’.
While it might appear improbable, and despite Lauren never having witnessed it herself nor heard of a fellow mortician encountering it, historical records do document a few instances of coffin births.
She explained: “Coffin births are actually one of the most common questions I get asked about, right up there with ‘do bodies sit up in the coffin’?”
“So, what the hell is a coffin birth? I’m so glad you asked,” she elaborated in a video on her YouTube channel.
Lauren clarified that a coffin birth, or more formally, postmortem fetal extrusion, occurs when ‘a pregnant person dies and the gases from decomposition build up inside the abdomen’.
She stated: “That pressure continues to rise until, in very rare cases, it pushes the fetus out of the uterus and through the vaginal canal.”
This process can take place between 48 to 72 hours after death, but only if the body has not been embalmed, autopsied, or refrigerated during that period.
In these rare cases, Lauren observed that the fetus is typically deceased, a result of the decomposition process.
She explained that decomposition begins with autolysis, where body cells break down through self-digestion.
Subsequently, putrification occurs as gut bacteria produce gases like ‘methane, hydrogen sulfide, and carbon dioxide’.
These gases cause the body to swell, and in a pregnant body, the already enlarged and softened uterus becomes a factor.
With the buildup of gas pressure, ‘the vaginal canal becomes the path of least resistance, and when the pressure has nowhere else to escape, it pushes outward’.
Lauren noted: “So, the fetus is expelled, usually in silence, sometimes partially, sometimes fully, always heartbreakingly.”
A few modern examples include Shannan Watts, who was tragically killed by her husband Chris Watts at 15 weeks’ gestation, where a partial expulsion was noted.
Laci Peterson was eight months pregnant when she was murdered by her husband in 2002. Upon recovery, her unborn son, Connor, was found a mile away, having been expelled.