I was assigned to cover a children's theater performance Saturday night. the staff photographer helped me figure out how to shoot auditorium photos in low light. One of the things I love about my job is all the new things I learn every day.Last night, between bouts of diarrhea and before I started barfing, I watched a TLS special about a man who weighed in excess of 750 pounds.
Don’t get me wrong, I understand fat. I spend plenty of time with my face in the refrigerator; I know all the varieties of M&M’.s and can tell from three rooms away when I hear them pour into a bowl if they are plain, peanut or filled with almond. Byt the way, have you tried the new white chocolate M&M’s? Yum!
But, I do believe that at some point between eating Ding-Dongs for breakfast and finding yourself unable to turn over in bed because of all the weight, there is a point when you look in the mirror and say, “I really should eat a carrot now and then.”
These stories of the morbidly obese are so sad, but they always make me wonder, “who’s feeding them?”
Seriously, if you can’t clear the front door of your home, if you can’t get out of bed and have been there for six years, there must be someone in your life providing you with food. It’s hard to know who is sicker, the person doing the eating, or the person doing the feeding.
In the case of this story he was being fed by his wife and sister, both of whom could have used a lifetime membership to Curves, themselves. While there are many reasons the man in question was not a good husband, the wife was assured of one thing, as long as she kept feeding him, he would never leave her.
Well, except for death. And he did die, at the age of 39, as the result of a skin infection causing septic shock and shutting all his overworked organs.
The story was tremendously sad, and I am taking it as a morality tale. Maybe it’s time for me to pass the salad and take a walk around the block. Life is too rich and wonderful to spend it locked away, afraid of the world.
3 comments:
Oh no....WOW...but you are right..someone is feeding them!
I always wondered how if you can't get through the door to the fridge how do you get food. If someone I knew asked for food because he was too fat to get it himself he would get celery and water until he could get through the door. I don't even want to think about how the "waste" is taken care of.
Ugh. I unfortunately saw the same show. I say unfortunately because that is the only station we can get in the basement where my computer is. Bah humbug to Dish Network. I agree that a sick relationship is indeed at work when a person is allowed to become part of the couch they are wallowing upon (this really happened), or get up to 600 pounds as in the show last night. It makes all of us fatties look slothful lazy and out of control. While that may sometimes be true, it isn't always, and I resent it when such shows are aired. There I have had my grouchy moment and can go eat my Snickers.
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