The Sapir-Whorf hypothesis suggests that people perceive the world differently according to the language they speak: language and the world it exists within reflect back on the perceptions of the speaker. For example, ethnopsychology studies in Nepal have found that cultural idioms and concepts often don’t translate to western terminologies: piDaa is a term that may align to trauma/suffering, but also people who suffer from this are considered paagal (mad) and are subject to negative social stigma, indicating the need for culturally appropriate and carefully tailored support interventions. In summary, different cultures remember past experiences within different linguistic and cultural paradigms. As such, cultural and medical anthropologists have questioned the validity of applying the diagnostic criteria of PTSD cross-culturally, as defined in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-III), and constructed through the Euro-American paradigm of psychology.There remains a dearth of studies into the conceptual frameworks that surround trauma in non-Western cultures. There is little evidence to suggest therapeutic benefit in synthesizing local idioms of distress into a culturally constructed disorder of the post-Vietnam era, a practice anthropologist believe contributes to category fallacy. For many cultures there is no single linguistic corollary to PTSD, psychological trauma being a multi-faceted concept with corresponding variances of expression. Designating the effects of trauma as an affliction of the spirit is common in many non-Western cultures where idioms such as “soul loss” and “weak heart” indicate a preference to confer suffering to a spirit-body or heart-body diametric.
A vanishing twin, also known as twin resorption, is a fetus in a multigestation pregnancy that dies in utero and is then partially or completely reabsorbed. In some instances, the dead twin is compressed into a flattened, parchment-like state known as fetus papyraceus.Vanishing twins occur in up to one of every eight multifetus pregnancies and may not even be known in most cases. "High resorption rates, which cannot be explained on the basis of the expected abortion rate, suggest intense fetal competition for space, nutrition, or other factors during early gestation, with frequent loss or resorption of the other twin(s). "In pregnancies achieved by in vitro fertilization, "it frequently happens that more than one amniotic sac can be seen in early pregnancy, whereas a few weeks later there is only one to be seen and the other has vanished." See also
Chimera (genetics)
Mosaicism
Parasitic twin

References
Further reading
External links

Vanishing twin at eMedicine.com
50 articles about vanishing twin phenomenon in PubMed