diff --git a/src/backend/access/heap/heapam.c b/src/backend/access/heap/heapam.c
index fbe7c222f73..1bd22f9e996 100644
--- a/src/backend/access/heap/heapam.c
+++ b/src/backend/access/heap/heapam.c
@@ -5806,6 +5806,10 @@ heap_abort_speculative(Relation relation, ItemPointer tid)
  *
  * tuple is an in-memory tuple structure containing the data to be written
  * over the target tuple.  Also, tuple->t_self identifies the target tuple.
+ *
+ * Note that the tuple updated here had better not come directly from the
+ * syscache if the relation has a toast relation as this tuple could
+ * include toast values that have been expanded, causing a failure here.
  */
 void
 heap_inplace_update(Relation relation, HeapTuple tuple)
diff --git a/src/backend/commands/vacuum.c b/src/backend/commands/vacuum.c
index 5ef6698790c..8010a7cd470 100644
--- a/src/backend/commands/vacuum.c
+++ b/src/backend/commands/vacuum.c
@@ -31,6 +31,7 @@
 #include "access/tableam.h"
 #include "access/transam.h"
 #include "access/xact.h"
+#include "catalog/indexing.h"
 #include "catalog/namespace.h"
 #include "catalog/pg_database.h"
 #include "catalog/pg_inherits.h"
@@ -1343,6 +1344,7 @@ vac_update_datfrozenxid(void)
 	MultiXactId lastSaneMinMulti;
 	bool		bogus = false;
 	bool		dirty = false;
+	ScanKeyData key[1];
 
 	/*
 	 * Restrict this task to one backend per database.  This avoids race
@@ -1460,10 +1462,25 @@ vac_update_datfrozenxid(void)
 	/* Now fetch the pg_database tuple we need to update. */
 	relation = table_open(DatabaseRelationId, RowExclusiveLock);
 
-	/* Fetch a copy of the tuple to scribble on */
-	tuple = SearchSysCacheCopy1(DATABASEOID, ObjectIdGetDatum(MyDatabaseId));
+	/*
+	 * Get the pg_database tuple to scribble on.  Note that this does not
+	 * directly rely on the syscache to avoid issues with flattened toast
+	 * values for the in-place update.
+	 */
+	ScanKeyInit(&key[0],
+				Anum_pg_database_oid,
+				BTEqualStrategyNumber, F_OIDEQ,
+				ObjectIdGetDatum(MyDatabaseId));
+
+	scan = systable_beginscan(relation, DatabaseOidIndexId, true,
+							  NULL, 1, key);
+	tuple = systable_getnext(scan);
+	tuple = heap_copytuple(tuple);
+	systable_endscan(scan);
+
 	if (!HeapTupleIsValid(tuple))
 		elog(ERROR, "could not find tuple for database %u", MyDatabaseId);
+
 	dbform = (Form_pg_database) GETSTRUCT(tuple);
 
 	/*