The fictional hanahaki disease

No storytelling for today, but I found something rather interesting among my commission requests OwO As a lover of lore and anything aesthetic, I just couldn’t stop myself from dwelling on this idea because it’s the most unusual fictional disease I’ve ever encountered. Also one of the most poetic.

I usually do receive weird commissions when I do, but this one was one of the prettiest kinds of aesthetics I’ve encountered as a commission artist. This one has based on a fictional disease called hanahaki disease, which literally translates to throwing up flower petals (Hana = flower, haki/hakimitsu = throwing up).

This disease was first described in the Japanese manga, hanahaki otome, or the girl who spits out flowers (published in 2009) by Naoko Matsuda sensei. Sadly, there are no available scanlations anywhere (I’ve tried looking;;-;;) so I guess I’ll have to ask for someone in Japan to find this for me one day XD. This manga series has 3 volumes and has 15 chapters all-in-all. The manga is in an old japan setting and covers the romantic genre. In the story, the hanahaki disease was described to be a disease one-sided lovers experience so yes, platonic/friendly love is safe from this disease. 

It was described in the literature how the protagonist started feeling immense pain. From there on, the other symptoms followed: roots growing from the heart and lungs. None of the literature searches I did indicated how to stop the spread (like prolonging or keeping the disease at bay. I don’t think the manga even indicated that either. No prevention was also stated, but I don’t think crushes can be stopped anyways). What I did find though was when it stops spreading. 

To stop or “cure this disease, you would need to get an operation to have the roots removed, but along with the removal of the roots, your love for that person will also be removed. It’s kind of sad because you won’t be able to love that person again. 

Another way to stop get rid of this disease was if the person they loved would love them back in a romantic sense. I honestly wouldn’t mind the later option XD I don’t like getting attached to people that way, I swear, crushes and one-sided love feels like a waste of time. 

If you chose to just leave the disease untreated… well… it’ll be a bitter end for you. You’ll just end up coughing up flower petals and blood until you either die from blood loss or from suffocation (the roots and flowers will block your airways). It’s a kind of beautiful and bitter-sweet death that looks way too aesthetic in my perspective as an artist (as gruesome as the disease symptoms sound).  

Whether this kind of disease had earlier adaptions or versions though, it’s unsure. I don’t think there is since I also can’t find anything but other east Asian countries have adopted this kind of fantasy idea. Like the Korean webtoon “Spring in the heart” by webtoon artist Bboong. Sadly, this webtoon was taken down because there copyright of the idea is strong XD. 

It didn’t stop artists and poets from creating wonderful art from this trope though. That includes me who’s currently still working on my pretty hanahaki boy. Maybe next, I’ll make a boy’s love story about this genre because a number of literature I’ve been seeing that tackles this trope is mostly same-sex romances. It makes a lot of sense because if it came out in 2009 where people were so close-minded to the idea of same-sex romances, then I can imagine this as one of the unique genres to go about.

This is all from me. I still have to finish this piece and add in bloody vines and flowers everywhere XD