Kansas Pam Babcock Lived on Toilet for 2 Years

One day, 35-year-old Pam Babcock of Ness City in Kansas went to use her boyfriend's toilet. Two long years later, authorities were called to remove Pam (and the toilet seat that her skin had grown around) from the bathroom.

According to this story by Associated Press writer Roxana Hegeman, the boyfriend claimed that he brought Pam clean clothing and food every day. Boyfriend Kory McFarren wasn't concerned about Pam living in the bathroom until she appeared mentally disoriented and groggy.

The boyfriend claimed that Pam would move around in the bathroom, and take showers, but this sounds hard to believe if she was on the toilet seat long enough for her skin to grow around it. Apparently, Pam had been beaten as a child and had decided that the bathroom was a safe place to stay.

Kory, the boyfriend brings up an interesting point-of-view by explaining that Pam was an adult and capable of choosing where she would like to live. He further explained that after a period of time, the situation became a normal part of their relationship, and that the relationship continued in a normal fashion, except that everything happened in the bathroom.

I believe that most people can understand how childhood beatings may lead into strange adult insecurities, but what I don't understand is how any couple can have 2-years worth of normal relationship with one partner sitting on the toilet. Did Kory put the Christmas tree in the bathroom? Or, did he just decorate some garland over the towel bars?

On Valentine's Day, did Kory bring a tiny table into the room to put the roses on? Did Pam spend the next 2-weeks starting at the roses as they slowly decomposed? I am full of questions. How did Kory get the ladder into the bathroom to change an overhead light bulb if this bathroom is like most with the toilet behind the door?

Kansas has 'Wizard Of Oz' storms; did they huddle together in that bathroom, or did that house have two bathrooms? If that house didn't have two bathrooms, where did Kory go to do his thing? And, why didn't anybody anywhere miss Pam? Didn't this "normal" couple have friends?

Then, there's the matter of daily entertainment. After you've counted the tiles, played and mastered all games on your cell-phone, painted your nails, and have read your way through all literature in the room... And, how do you sleep on a toilet? Wouldn't your body naturally try to stretch-out or otherwise change positions during the night?

Since Kory was not forcing Pam in any way to stay in the bathroom, and she was in there by choice, refusing to come out, I suspect that she had every right in the world to be in that room of her home for as long as she wanted to be there. Nobody has rules governing what rooms of our homes to use for what purpose.

Kory's responsibility to Pam would be to get her help if she became a danger to herself or others or if she became ill; and, it seems like this is exactly what Kory did on the day that Pam looked ill. Pam probably wasn't hurting herself in the beginning or anybody else with her overwhelming desire to stay in the bathroom. Kory might not have tried to lift Pam off of her chosen seat to know that her skin had grown attached.

Legally, can you call authorities because somebody is sitting on only one chair in their home every day and night? I don't think so. Pam lived in that house. I believe that if authorities had been called prior to Pam acting sick that she could have just told them that she liked where she was sitting, and they would have had to go away. There's no crime being committed when Pam sat there by choice while her boyfriend was feeding her.

Some people have phobias that make them afraid to do normal activities, like leave a bathroom. While this is a strange place to want to be for years, I just can't think of any legal obligations that Kory wasn't meeting; and, by nature, I would love to pin him as the guilty party.

When the authorities arrived, they had to convince Pam to be checked at a hospital, and could only take her against her will if they saw a situation where they knew that she needed medical help. Her legs were showing some kind of irregularity, and that's how they got her out of there. When Pam arrived at the hospital, she refused all care beyond fixing the seat problem, and clearing up the infection in her legs.

The hospital can probably make some kind of an observation that will allow for Pam to receive a mental check-up, but as long as Pam is happy with her life the way that it is, nobody can force Pam to change her ways if she does not want to change them.

When Pam gets out of the hospital, if her long-time boyfriend Kory still chooses to be involved with her daily care, I suspect that she can walk right back into that bathroom if she would like to go back to her favorite chair. This reality, and the fact that Kory's life has probably been ruined by speculation and gossip makes this a very sad story in the news today.