OnePhatMan
Last year, I wrote about Gayle Laverne Grinds, a 480-pound woman who stayed on her couch so long her skin grafted to it. Her story was a sad one, truly horrific, and became the basis for the first episode of this season on Nip/Tuck. Gayle was one of the forgotten, people so large they don’t leave their homes any more because they’re not able.
I never thought I’d read another story that touched me the way hers did.
Until yesterday.
ST. JOSEPH, Mo. - A fire destroyed a mobile home, killing a 600-pound, homebound man who could not be moved out in time despite the efforts of neighbors and firefighters.
Timothy Lee Morris, 45, called 911 from his home when it caught fire Saturday afternoon but couldn’t get out by himself, fire officials said. His daughters, ages 8 and 13, summoned neighbors, but they were unable to move him.
“He was in the front room. We tried and tried to yank him out,” said neighbor Clinton Turner. “He kept saying, ‘Help,’ but we couldn’t get him out.”
Words escape me. I’m having trouble just wrapping my mind around the horror of this whole tragic situation.
Put yourself in the shoes of some of the people in this story for a moment.
Imagine being Tim Morris, and watching a fire in your home, crawling towards you and devouring everything in its path. You call desperately for help, but there isn’t any. You send your two little girls to get the neighbors to help you, and neighbors come.
They try to move you but you’re trapped, held in place by a body that at some point ceased being a friend and became an enemy.
You wait for the firemen, watching the spreading fire with wide eyes. Maybe you’re trying to keep your daughters calm, reassuring them with words of faith and hope. You struggle to move yourself away from the flames, but you can’t.
Because you’re too big.
What must have been going through his mind then? None of us knows what his thoughts were, though we may suspect we do. Did he have any regrets? I don’t know. Would I, if I were in his situation? Yes.
But I’m not him.
Invariably, there are people reading this right now who’re thinking serves him right, the pig or he shouldn’t have been so damn big, but you know what? Until you’ve walked a mile in someone’s shoes, you don’t know anything about them, so feel free to find a place up your ass for that attitude. You’re not helping anyone.
Think for a moment about being one of his daughters.
How must it be to stand next to someone you love more than anyone else, helpless, while death dances like a dervish just across the room? Can you even imagine what that must have been like? I can’t even begin to fathom what it would be like to watch my father die while he cried out for help that wasn’t able to save him. The only thing that could have made this story worse is if he’d actually burned to death in front of everyone, instead of dying from smoke inhalation.
What about being a firefighter, duty-bound to save lives but impotent in the face of this crisis? You struggle and you fight to save a man, to the point that you end up at the hospital being treated for smoke inhalation and heat exhaustion, and you’re still not able to get him out in time. How must that feel?
This is a terrible story all around, and while I don’t know the circumstances of how Tim Morris ended up at 600 pounds, I know that his weight was an impedence at a time when his life was literally in the balance. If he wanted a second chance at the end—and again, I can’t speak for him—it was too late.
As always, though, there’s good news. While there’s always a point of no return with regards to your health, the chances are good that if you’re reading this, you haven’t gotten there yet. If you’re still alive, you have the chance to change.
And if you’re dead, email me because I know how we can make a lot of money.
There’s but one question: what will you do with the time you have left? Make your decision, because one day your life may depend on it.
If you want to get notified when I write an update, this link will do the trick.
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Total Votes : 978
Vote
Hey Fred, Any follow-up on Gayle Laverne Grinds??
Laura,
There was a flurry of interest when Nip/Tuck came on, but no new stories that I found or any new information.
i remember the first story and all the horrid remarks etc that were made on web pages and chat rooms. hopefully this story has some compassion in people nd they can remember those he has left behind and there hearts are breaking already without listening to nasty things being said. Thanks Fred for posting this a reminder to us all to live a healthy life as best we can.
Fred,
All the words you have written so far are feeding my mind. We all know what a big part our mind plays in weight loss and dealing with ourselves.
My body has become my enemy. I still am healthy but miserable. I want to escape this body that does not allow me to do all the things I want to do. I have a vision. After you wrote about having a vision and a goal I gave alot of thought to that. I want to roller skate, do a forward roll and kayak!!!! I WILL DO THOSE THINGS AGAIN!!
Please keep writing because this is as motivated as I have been in awhile and as much thought and as deeply as I have thought about it in along time. I was just kind of waddling through life making fat jokes figuring this is it.
I am going to try to change this body for myself and so I can have a better quality of life!!!
Kathy
I can imagine somewhat of the emotions. My husband at 42 had a stroke on the tenth of September this year. Yes, he’s obese and along with that he’s diabetic, high cholesterol, high BP, high triglycerides, high stress job and family history both sides. One cannot image the terror of seeing a loved one in this situation. My heart goes out to his family, friends, neghbors and firefighters who tried so hard to save his life.
I’ll be brave (stupid?) and admit that part of me wonders how and why he would let himself get so obese. That does NOT, however, mean that I think he (or anyone) in any way deserves such a terrible fate. I can’t imagine what he and his children went through (or the firefighters who tried to rescue him, as you pointed out).
Wow, pretty heavy stuff, Fred. I have 3 daughters and I can’t imagine the terror that must have filled these two little girls.
Whitters -
It starts with one bite (of anything) at a time and one moment sitting on the couch watching tv or playing video games that could have been spent in activity. People who are morbidly obese are not born that way - they make themselves that way through lack of exercise and uncontrolled diet. Most people who were naturally thin get obese by way of an accident or surgery that entails days or weeks of inactivity and subsequent recovery. Others become obese due to inability to cope with the mental effects of abuse and/or neglect and use food as a soothing agent for hurts and inadequacies. Some women allow childbirth to be an excuse to eat anything at any time in any quantity and not worry about the weight that they’re putting on. Gaining weight leads to depression, insecurity and anxiety in many people. Being overweight is a pain in the ass - literally. I gained nearly 50 lbs when my son was born. I was thin in high school (5′1″ and a size 3 - 108 lbs). By the time I got pregnant, I had gained about 2-5 lbs a year since then but I was still a somewhat trim size 7 and 125 lbs (I had a bit of muscle mass from exercising in high school). By the time I gave birth I had gone to a size who the hell knows and 172 lbs the day I went in for surgery (C-Section). I have since then lost weight (got down to 150 once in the mid 90s when I was starving myself all the time but gained it all back when I went back to eating food again) and gained weight to the tune of 2-3 lbs a year and it’s been 17 years since he was born. I am tired all the time, I get winded walking up stairs, I can’t run because of the stress and pain in my knees from the jarring of nearly 200 lbs on my joints. I know that if I don’t change my life NOW - I could face a heart attack at 40 or diabetes (which runs in my family as does heart disease) and die. Stories like this scare the hell out of me but until reading what you’ve written - I guess I never thought about that whole “that could be me!” thing. But if i kept gaining 2-3 lbs a year - and had a major accident - that could very well BE me if I don’t die first of some kind of heart condition! Thanks for scaring the hell out of me. I think I’ll go for a walk! (That may have sounded sarcastic but it’s really not - seriously - thanks.)
Please. Obesity is due to addiction, ignorance, laziness, or in rare cases, medical conditions like pituitary imbalance. Nobody starts out fat in life. Putting food in your mouth is ultimately up to you. Even if your parents turn you into a porker, as an adult you have MANY options. You don’t see overweight animals in the wild because if they do get fat the fit animals kill them, or outcompete them for food and/or mates. This is how nature works. It gets rid of members that are not healthy. Why should people be any different? Only humans and domesticated animals routinely become overweight. I’ve heard every excuse in the book for why people are fat, and do you know what my answer is… “I’ve never seen a fat long distance runner.”
If you want to stay thin, you have to MOVE. If you want to eat a lot and stay thin, you have to move A LOT. It’s a simple formula that goes against most peoples favorite pastime… lying on the couch with the remote. I have no remorse, pity or compassion for someone who cared so little about the gift of life that he threw it away. You want to cry… go visit a children’s cancer hospital, where the kids would do ANYTHING just to have a healthy body for a few more months, and this guy traded his in for McDonalds and Baskin Robbins. Boo hoo.