Woman crying out crystals instead of real tears unmasked as a crook
A 22-year-old woman from Armenia, who for a long time has claimed with great certainty that she cries razor-sharp crystals instead of real tears, has been exposed by scientists as a swindler. According to doctors who examined Satenik Kazaryan (22), the patient almost certainly has Münchhausen-by-proxy syndrome: a rare disorder in which people invent diseases or injure themselves to attract attention.
Satenik Kazaryan recently made it to the international media with the seemingly sad story that she cries at least fifty glassy tears every day. The small crystals, according to the Armenian, come out of nowhere from her tear glands and cause a lot of pain.
After the news about the crystal crying woman, experts decided to subject her to an investigation. Anna Hovakimyan, a leading ophthalmologist in Armenia, spoke extensively with Kazaryan and put tears under a microscope. “It is almost one hundred percent certain that these are pieces of glass,” said Professor Hovakimyan.
The doctor added to her diagnosis that Kazaryan is not really a swindler but a “pretty pathetic person” who is leading the world astray for nothing but attention. “This woman probably puts pieces of glass in her eyes in the morning, causing her eyes to tear.” The woman herself and her mother have not accepted the diagnosis. The two argue that Kazaryan’s miraculous condition is probably cystinosis: a rare, hereditary disease in which body fluids such as tears can crystallize under certain circumstances.
Cry for attention
To exclude cystinosis, Satenik Kazaryan has been referred to an eye specialist in Moscow. Dmitry Maichuk, the physician in question, ruled that the woman does not have this condition either. The crystals that these patients claim to produce in a short period of time are far too large for cystinosis. The size of the tears that Kazaryan cries would take many months to grow. So it is inevitable that she will put all this in her own eyes. “She is also clear in her diagnosis. This is an extreme cry for attention.”
Satenik Kazaryan, despite being called a cheater, stands firm. She told Russian and Armenian media, crying real tears, that her life is ‘a hell’ due to that strange and irritating condition. “I am not understood by anyone and no one can treat me.”
Although experts characterize the woman’s condition as Münchhausen-by-proxy syndrome, the Armenian Ministry of Health has remarkably enough announced that Kazaryan should be examined again extensively. “This woman claims that she has something rare among the members and we now finally want to know what is the matter with her,” said Minister Oganes Arutyunyan.
