Doctors Find Proof of Girl's Habit of Eating Hair, Find Mass Bigger Than a Football in Her Stomach

A furball appearing on the floor of the house is part and parcel of cats being cats. One cleans it up and carries on.

But things are different with people who eat their hair, as one British family can attest.

Melissa Williams, 13, of Liverpool, required surgery to remove a massive knot of hair from her stomach, according to The Mirror, leading her parents to alert others about a condition known as Rapunzel syndrome.

The girl had been having a tough time at school, and when she was anxious over being bullied, she would pull out her hair and eat it, the report said.

Jackie Williams, Melissa’s mother, said it took some time before anyone understood what was going on.

“The first things we noticed were that she was feeling and being sick, had poor appetite and lost about one stone in weight. I thought she had an eating disorder because she wasn’t eating,” Williams said.

“She started getting sent home from school a lot and asking not to go in because she felt sick, but because it was on the same day every week I thought it was a lesson she didn’t like,” she said.

After multiple doctor visits that resolved nothing, Melissa underwent emergency surgery at a local hospital on Oct. 1.

X-rays found what Williams called “a big mass” in her daughter’s stomach but had no idea what it was.