A man in Zamboanga Del Norte, Philippines was one of the oldest living persons, who was born with excess limbs.
At first, one would think that Rudy Santos, who hailed from Pampanga, looked like any usual man who only had an ordinary disability, i.e., his right leg was shorter than his left leg, but there was something else. He showed Jessica Soho, a multi-awarded reporter in the Philippines, what his true predicament was.
He used to work in the carnival as one of the featured people with exotic looks. He then admitted that the story about the Octopus Man was not a myth, and that he and Octopus Man was one and the same person.
He was ashamed to show his true self to other people, but eventually, he showed on national TV what he was hiding. Beneath his pants, he's got 2 extra arms and 1 extra leg. All in all, he's got 4 arms and 3 legs. A doctor had checked up on him and said that Rudy has this condition called "parasitic twin".
Parasitic Twin is a condition also known as an asymmetrical or unequal conjoined twin. It is the result of the processes that produce vanishing twins and conjoined twins, and may represent a continuum between the two. Parasitic twins occur when a twin embryo begins developing in utero, but the pair does not fully separate, and one embryo maintains dominant development at the expense of the other.
When asked by Jessica, if he felt that there was another person inside of him, he answered that he just felt there was just excess limbs on his body.
Photo courtesy of Kapuso Mo, Jessica Soho
Rudy Santos when he was youngerDr. Vince Gomez, an orthopedic surgeon said that Rudy's twin could be operated on, to remove the extra mass of flesh and limbs from his body, and that it won't have any ill impact on him. But Rudy have his own family now and they do not approve of him having his "twin" removed from his body, because they were afraid they could loose him also in the process.
Rudy said that when he was a child and his "twin" would get wounded, Rudy would then suffer severe fever. On the other hand, if any part of his body would get hurt other than his "twin", it didn't have bad effect on it.
"Some people might think that he was weird, but what matters most was that he could continue to live and fight in this circus-like world of ours.", said Jessica Soho.
