Half Ton Man
Weighing the same as five baby elephants and a shade less than a Mini Cooper, Patrick Deuel is one of the heaviest men ever and a medical miracle. His heart and other organs should have collapsed long before he reached his record-breaking weight of 76 stone 8lbs. A wall has to be knocked out of his home so he can be taken to hospital – in a reinforced ambulance – where he is kept on a strict diet and loses a staggering 30 stone. After a gastric bypass operation he is sent home. It is now up to him to decide if he wants to live or carry on eating himself to death.
One of Patrick’s supporters has been Rosalie Bradford, who was once the world’s fattest woman. She was eight feet wide and could not leave the house. It was only when she realized her addiction to food was a response to being abandoned as a child that she lost an incredible 900 pounds.
Through the remarkable stories of Patrick and Rosalie, Body Shock anatomizes the science of extreme weight loss and the bewildering lives of the growing number of people who seem intent on eating themselves to death. Scientists think that years ago some people developed this fat gene to help them survive famine, but with today’s high fat diet and couch potato lifestyle, that helpful gene has become something that can kill us.
Watch the full documentary now
This was a great documentary! It’s saddening how a lot of people around the world are obese! This documentary really nailed Morbid obescity! Thank you
There is no way this man is eating6-8000 calories a day, every day. That SOME people are accusing him of choosing to be fat, at any level, is absolutely disgusting. That those same bigots and fools would mutilate his body, in respose to some sick need of their own, is terrifying. Gastrointestinal mutilation, aka “bypass” IS MURDER. GI mutilation kills and maims and ruiins lives. The death rate for fat people who GI mutilated is 250% HIGHER that of people with the exact same profile who are left unmaimed, and thousands of more are left maimed and permanently disabled. GET EDUCATED. Fatness is primarily genetic, usually harmless, and has nothing to do with gluttony. NO ONE EVER ANYWHERE HAS PROVED THAT FAT PEOPLE EAT MORE OR DIFFERENTLY THAN AVERAGE-WEIGHT PEOPLE, AND “OVERWEIGHT” PEOPLE ARE HEALTHIER THAN AVERAGE WEIGHT PEOPLE, AND THE SICKEST OF ALL ARE THOSE WHO ARE THE THINNEST. GET EDUCATED. GET EDUCATED. GET EDUCATED. Google “The Obesity Myth”, “Big Fat Lies” and the Junk Food Science blog. DON’T BELIEVE THESE DANGEROUS, HATEFUL LIES!!!!!!!
Start here: http://junkfoodscience.blogspot.com/2007/10/jfs-special-latest-research-on-actual.html
This was an amazing documentary and it gave me a lot to think about! I have always been thin, by God’s grace. No one gains weight overnight but it is over a period of time a little extra here and there without excercise or an active lifestyle would just pack in the pounds slowly but surely. Before you realize it, you end up obsese. It has and will always be a question of calories. Whether the reason is emotional eating, greed or whatever, you put on weight by eating too much calories and having too little activity and exercise in your life. I was really shocked and floored to see such frightening obsesity in this documentary. It is interesting to note that God puts greed and drunkardness in the same category which is sin. May God always give me the grace to have self control as it is the fruit of the Spirit!
A well done microscopic view of an immense problem. Viewing this program has no doubt propelled me to move more and eat less, a lot less.
It’s amazing to me how people really don’t notice how big their getting while their getting bigger. Or the reasons they have been confined to a bed for years on end. Richard Simmons has used his celebrity to help people in serious trouble, he must be lauded for doing so. A comment to Kell Brigan. Your comment deserves little respect. You must be morbidly obese and need help. Don’t feel bad. Just take those difficult steps to a new and different life. The only hurtful lie is the one your telling yourself.
Richard, you are correct. Obesity has everthing to do with gluttony and very little to do with genetics. If you accept that obesity is genetic then the proportion of the popoulation that is obese should remain relatively stable. The fact is obesity rates are increasing rapidly. We are consuming more calories and buring less.
Obesity is NOT harmless, it is associated with cardiovascular diseases, type 2 diabetes, osteoarthritis and certain types of cancer etc.
Kell Brigan, you are deluding yourself and you need to get help.
Kell, you are the one who is misinformed. Even if there is a ‘fat gene’ as the documentary points out, it’s effect is that it makes the individual want to eat more. From a biological perspective, there is NO WAY that Patrick Duel could have gained that much weight unless his calorie intake was enormous. He is delusional for telling the documentary crew that he eats average portions. It is irresponsible for anyone to consume that much food and lie about it. It only makes other overweight people rationalize their lazy, sedentary lifestyle. To Mr. Duel and others I would suggest going for a run instead of stuffing yourself with food. There are people dying of hunger everyday, and behavior like overeating is what makes Americans look ignorant and lame.
I agree with Luke. The smoking gun here in this documentary is the part when Mr. Duels wife is making him breakfast and the crew asks her how many calories are in that breakfast, to which she immediatly replies “I have no idea.” Go ahead, put two and two together.
doctors dont know that their diets are wrong, thats why the cravings dont stop.
The answer is: MSG (glutamate) , aspartame and sugar. They put msg in every food and it increases appetite. They drink aspartame and is does the same and sugar increases appetite by increasing insulin. Stop eating food with those 3 ingredients and your cravings disappear in less then a week. Beware that MSG can appear with different names like hydrolyzed protein, corn starch, search in Google for MSG hidden names. Aspartame is a sweetener. I lost a LOT of weight when i found out
That’s good advice. That MSG is just in everything now. It’s so hard to stop eating when you still feel “hungry”. I wonder if it’s in the school cafeteria food? I bet it is. What a depressing thought.
Kell who are you trying to convince…yourself maybe? the proof is as easy as eating over your calories that your body burns and you gain weight. You eat under that number of calories you lose weight. And the smoking gun is when his wife in the documentary says he isn’t on a special diet but is suppose to eat only a certain amount of calories a day and when asked how many are in his breakfast she is making for him and she sais she doesn’t know!! Seriously..OMG
All this is more complicated then it appears. Everyones body is different. Everyone has a different set point weight, every one has different genetics. Then you add the fact there is all the terrible foods that have been manufactured. Then you take into account emotional issues different people have. for some people things just line up that they are far more prone to becoming extremely over weight.
I have a food addiction and it is complete hell. I have been in counseling and now in a rehab group for addictions. I always say that it’s crazy that i am not over weight. I have been suffering with an eating disorder for a very long time. For most of the time I was suffering with bulimia and anorexic tendencies. Then for the last year I have not left my house except to counseling. I was only sitting around sleeping and compulsively over eating uncontrollably.
The highest my weight went up was around 140 and i’m 5f5. It’s insane the amounts I can eat and i can’t control it, even my insides would bleed and i would be in some much pain. my body felt very ill. It was a coping mechanism to numb emotional pain. my eating disorder has shifted back into bulimia and anorexic tendencies now because unless i am under 120 i will not leave my house. I emotionally under stand allot of the hell that compulsive over eaters are faced with even though I have never been very big to societies standards. But i suffer from a food addiction. For a drug addict you can try to get your addiction out of your life but with food you have to have it to survive.
It would be so much easier if i didn’t have to eat and i could just avoid food. It’s easier for me to not eat at all then to try to eat normal amounts of food. By looking at me, people would have no idea the **** I go through. I hate it when friends i would be out with would make fun of someone who was chubby or overweight. As much as i hate to have any fat on my body I can’t stand when anyone insults someone who is bigger.
I have known large people who ate less and healthier then someone who was very thin who ate lots of junk food. I guess what i am trying to say is food addiction affect all kinds of people sadly certain people it shows and they get all this negative mean attention. Where i get compliments all the time about having such a great body and being pretty yet it’s because they don’t know how messed up i am and how Food had taken over my life.It affects my family and anyone close to me. My body has to be fit and thin otherwise i don’t want to be seen at all.
I can’t live with food, but at the same time I wouldn’t be able to live without it. It’s just hell and i wish this madness would stop. I am going to keep going down my the road to recovery but it’s very slow and i know i will still have to deal with aspects of it my whole life. I just have to keep fighting through it if i want to live.
To Heather
I don’t know what to say to that… it’s really a first for me to read someone whose been on both ends. All I can say though is good for you for seeking treatment and fighting this. Also don’t believe in the BMI mythology because each clinic and site has a different number and that can screw your mind (believe me one BMI chart stated I should be 90 ibs), so don’t go by it. Again I’m happy that you’re recovering. It’s no easy task… no matter what one is recovering from.
To Kell Brigan
Though I agree with you on that people need to be educated and not judge/shove people into a single category, as well as to be informed that doctors themselves are puzzled by Obesity and are heavily underfunded in this branch of research, because lets face it breasts are sexier than something as complex as genes, brains and fat… I disagree that Obesity is a myth or that it’s healthy. Obesity is anything but a myth and healthy. It’s not a myth because we see it everyday. Shoot I see it when I walk the hallways of my university. It’s mainly men who have eating disorders… either eating too much or eating too little. It’s disgusting really. I could see why female students rather have a vibrator for a boyfriend. Anyways Obesity is also not healthy. I know this from my experience with my grandmother. She develop diabetes due to her weight and is now losing her sight.
Now with that said… I think you’re heading for a good direction in the sense that people have to stop pointing fingers and say that being overweight (yes there is a difference between overweight and obesity)can be easily solved just by eating less and exercise more. I’ve tried the starvation diet and it doesn’t work. I also tried propositioning my in-take sizes and exercise like a lab rat (3 hrs a day which pissed my mate off). At the end of it all, all I manage to do was to kick start my body in storing more fat and developed schizophrenia, which shocked my doctor btw. He never knew schizophrenia can be triggered by switching diets, but apparently you can. At least there is a pill to control the voices, but not the fat, huh? :D Just a little humor for ya. Anyways being Obese and being overweight are completely different. Overweight is harder to control, whereas Obesity is a life choice. Sorry but it is. Obese people can lose a little bit of weight on their own simply from eating less and excising more… HOWEVER when they do loss the weight and they stay at an overweight range it’ll be harder for them to continue to loss that weight in order to be at a normal weight range… watch the documentary “Fat: What No One Is Telling You” for more info on that.
Again you’re very right that people need to inform themselves a bit more on the topic and not jump into any conclusions or be judgmental.
I want to know why are families letting their love ones get this big? Don’t they love this individual enough to help him before it got worse. Of course I’m going by the notion that this is a long road and not an overnight phenomenon. Clearly this man had let himself (and possible everyone in his life) go.
There is also the reason that maybe no one truly loved or cared for him so he found comfort in food. This is why I tell everyone I meet how nice they look or how beautiful they are. Everyone has beauty in one way or another so f*ck off you pessimists. Some people can’t understand or can’t believe how powerful of a tool a complement is against any addiction. We’re so focus on flaws or commenting others so negatively we forget that for some people (like the man in this documentary) it can trigger that emotion to eat more or become addicted to something else.
I don’t feel bad, pity, resentful or hateful towards this man, because I don’t know him personally. However I do feel that people need to calm down and find in their heart to help/love a fellow human being before it’s too late. I truly believe that the eating habits of people can be easily triggered in both ways due to being alone or unloved… or being with someone or loved. I know before I found my mate I was really heavy I was 150, then after having my mate and being with him I lost most of it. I’m now 130-35 because of him and yes I’m still losing the weight. Due to his love for me, I wanted to lose more weight, so I could be with him longer (diabetes, high cholesterol, cancer and heart disease run wild in both my mother and father side). Love does a lot of good, so the next time you meet your co-worker (who you know is exercising and being healthy)complement him or her and say “Wow you look great.” it’ll change both of your lives.
BTW to the poster of this video, thank you so much for posting this video. Peace be with you.