anyone watch TLC on Sunday night- "I ate 33, 000 calories"

It was pretty eye opening and pretty depressing.  They concentrated on 4 people- 2 men and 2 woman- each were morbidly obese-  One of the men has been bed ridden for the last 6 years. He was over 600 pounds and eats over 36, 000- that's THOUSAND calories.  He spends over 14000 dollars just in chocolate alone! He had to refinance his house to pay for all his food. He has access to a phone and so he calls for delivery off fast food.  I just wanted to try to help them all. And let them know that there are people out there who care for them. The other male has so much fat around his organs that they are crushing his lungs so he has to be on oxygen 24/7.  He was amazing though given his size that he can still walk for short distances in the house.  If it is on again it was pretty interesting. And it sure made me not want to do any tv snacking....

36000 calories a day?  A week? A month?

it was 33,000 cals a day.... one day for what an average man ate in 2 weeks.

and like um... it made me hungry and sick at the same time to see all the food they were eating.

and to be honest, i ate while watching it....

but it was horrifying and made me cry and just, a quite well done show I thought.  It was about the disease and the addiction, the word food addiction was used over and over, so it didnt make them seem like they were ridiculous, like "just stop eating."  Its hard to explain, but a very good show.

I saw it, it make me sad and gave me a stomach ache. The guy that would put the bucket outside his window to have the delivery people get the food up to his apartment was SO sad.

They all compared it to being a drug addict, if their family would stop feeding them, they would find a way to get the food.

it was really sad, and gross. and as with any addiction, they have done it/are doing it to themselves. pretty sad. personally, i would think that there would be a point where they would say, wow, i weigh 450 pounds. maybe i should cut back.

anyway, i liked the point the doctor made about the smallest woman's food for the day -- it was all beige! because when you eat unhealthy food, it's beige! no pretty colors from fruits and veggies! something to keep in mind, folks -- eat some color!

oh no i missed it :( anyway i can find it online?

*barf* thats disgusting!! eww thats soo much! im sry if im offending someone, but how do you not notice that you're HUGE??? is there even enuf time to eat all that?!

I would like to see that online maybe, like piffany said.  but then agian maybe not...

i watched it too, so did my 12 year old son, we couldn't believe it, but i think these shows are good because they are very educational! when I used to see moridlly obese peopleI just thought "they're doing it to themselves", but now I understand its like an addict....they dont necessarily want to be eating this way, but simply cant stop.

kikislim, thank you.  i was having this nagging thought but i couldn't put my finger on it! it was the "they're not doing it to themselves" thing.  lol i was thinking and couldn't remember what i was trying to think of :P

TLC showing it back to back w/ "Supersize Me" which i think an interesting juxtapose to the 33000 cal segment.

I agree that these shows are educational and can be an eye opener. 

BUT.... it seems that people are focusing on the obese.  Yes, there is a problem.  Yes, people need to slim down and live better lives.  But with such focus on one side of the scale, I don't see much focus on the other.

DONT BE FAT DONT BE FAT DONT BE FAT... this is what we hear all the time.  Could that be a reason why we see so many people who are already underweight trying to lose even more (as seen here on CC and many other forums).

Not sure which is the bigger problem, but maybe they should stop making freak shows about these people and start using them as examples of what not to do WHILE showing us what to do.  Yes, they are fat.  We can see that.  We can see they eat alot.  36,000?  Wow.  So... what SHOULD we do to make our lives normal? 

for a person living in the UK i enjoy watching Gilian Mckeiths: You Are What You Eat.

the latest series is 2 people move in and live with Gilian for 8 weeks under her regime, they lose so much weight and the show is prety educatrional.

watch it if you can

I think shows like this can be very eye opening. I think they can be educational. Before making any comment, I should also mention that I am a discovery health channel viewer on a regular basis.

HOWEVER, recently I have started to think more and more about our fascination with individuals who live at the extreme of health norms or individuals who have been born or acquired rare medical conditions. I have decided that shows such as this one are our modern society's version of the freak show. I think that the average viewer is watching the show not as an educaitonal warning, or even to gain acceptance for a marginalized population, but instead for their enjoyment because it is interesting.

I am not saying these shows are totally bad. They do spread awareness and hopefully promote acceptance as well. However, I can't help but wonder if there is any exploitation involved at some level.

I really wish we knew how to help them. Just as i wish we knew how to help anorexic people too.

Hear hear ssbuckeye!  You're right on the nose with that one, I think you're absolutely right with these type of shows being the equivalent to the modern-day side show.

Come to think of it, I haven't seen ONE show that explains basically how to eat healthy, what a calorie is, why you need to eat a balanced meal etc.. it's all about what we should NOT be doing.  Even Supersize Me.

yea, i saw that show as well, and i thought to my self "wow" how sad to be confined to a bed for 6 yrs, how sad to be so large that you need oxegyn to help you breath, and dayum that looks sickening to be that large....but I also thought to my self, hey I'm 275 lbs, and to some one of "average weight" I may look the same way to them!! All i can do is pray for them and hope that they can get the hlpe they need before its too late...

we are all in this healthy fight together!!

I wonder if there is some similar physiological components with them and people with anorexia.. they are both eating disorders..

There is FitTV where you get bombarded with all healthy knick-knacks & tips.

Freakshow or not, it's on youtube (quite bad quality, but enough to give you an impression on the whole thing): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JmPU4ph0seI

I find this not really worrying, but more scary. If you've ever been near food addiction (I claim I have, everyone who binge-eats to combat some kind of unhappiness is heading there) it can just grip your heart and make you feel like this is not a good way to go - and glad if you got out of it. People like that are a medical extreme in the same way that not all drug addicts are dysfunctional, but they're all ready to steal and lie for their drugs...human nature gone kaputt.

Maybe I am repeating others above, but I was getting frustrated reading ;P

Does anyone else find it annoying that when you see anorexic's you quite rightly understand they have problems for which they require support and help, but when you see an obese person naturally you ask why they do that to themselves and they should just stop.

Where is the difference in illness that makes you starve yourself to death as opposed to feeding yourself to death?

I don't see one myself.

I suppose they are opposite sides of the same issue. An anorexic person is too controling, and tends to restrict because they can and, in their mind, should. A morbidly obese person simply cannot control themselves-which people don't realize but is a very difficult issue.

Any kind of excess is just bad. Too much control, too little, as usual, what we need is balance.

But i see your point, roj47, and as I said before, they are as deep in trouble as an anorexic. Because HELLO! If it was so easy to control your addictions then the world would be totally different!

I hate to say this, but i suppose it has something to do with appearance: an anorexic probably looks petite, vulnerable, fragile and usually very child-like; whilst a fat person just looks plain ugly. (or at least that's what i think they think).