There really isn’t any heartache quite like being unable to have your own children. I was lucky enough to have my son before I experienced secondary infertility brought on by PCOS, but even that reality was — and still is — painful. There isn’t much I wouldn’t trade for the chance to grow my family, and many couples feel the same. My struggle to have a second child is really my body being at war with itself; I can’t imagine if it was the fault of someone or something else. For Florida resident Brandy Buckley, her chance to grow her family was essentially taken from her in the most unlikely way.
Buckley claims she unknowingly swallowed a nail and shards of metal that completely altered her life forever.
The incident happened in September 2018, when she visit Bruster’s Ice Cream Parlor in Palm Bay, Florida, according to LAD Bible. She pulled through the drive-thru window and ordered a butter pecan ice cream cone. She took a large bite and began spooning out some for her son, and that’s when she noticed something was off.
“I noticed there was a metal nail in the cone, almost embedded,” Buckley told WESH-TV. “When I did swallow, I did feel something in my throat that kind of got stuck. I thought it was a pecan because it was a butter pecan ice cream that I had purchased. It was a nail. I had swallowed a nail.”
The mom went to the hospital to get an X-ray to see if her fears were valid.
It turns out, she was right. In addition to the nail that showed up crystal clear on the X-ray, she had swallowed “metal shards.”
The shards “embedded” into her intestine, for which she needed surgery. But the medical horrors didn’t end there. According to the New York Post, the woman suffered injuries to her head, neck, nervous system, and limbs, and endured scarring and disfigurement. She also formed a blood clot, the result of surgical complications, which ultimately rendered her unable to have more children.
In the lawsuit against Malabar Creameries, the company behind the ice cream shop, Buckley accused them of failing to ensure their food was safe for human consumption.
The suit stated that Buckley’s consumption of its product directly led to life-long infertility, a ton of pain and suffering, and a mountain of medical bills.
Although Buckley originally sought $15,000 in damages, per the Post, the jury in Brevard County where the suit was filed, awarded her $14 million. Jurors took the severity of the injuries as well as the psychological damage they inflicted into consideration when making the judgment and felt more compensation was appropriate.
“That was my goal and my dream, to have more kids,” Buckley told WESH-TV. “It was crazy because who expects to get ice cream and find a nail in there?”
