Of course, I was watching TLC last night and they had several shows that dealt with folks weighing well over 700 lbs. One guy was 749, bedridden for 7 years, the other guy was over 1,000 and bedridden for 10 years (had to rip out a wall to get him out of the house) and there was the queen of obesity at 1,200 lbs.
They pretty much went over much of their daily routines except what everyone wants to know (or at least thinks about) and that is, what sort of routine is in place for these folks to urinate and poop.
Do they just have at it and wait for their loved ones to come clean it up?
Is there some sort of method to retain fecal matter and urine as it exits the folds of skin?
These people, for the most part, just lie in the bed all day naked and eat. No baths, no bathroom trips.
How would the hospital or nursing home keep these people (as patients) from messing themselves?
During the show, I saw no signs of catheters or other such devices that would pre-empt a mess.
I think your first guess was right- they just let nature take its course, and someone comes along to clean it up. Probably the same person who then brings them 6 steaks and 20 potatoes a day. Gotta keep their strength up, ya know.
I have a relative who is over 300 pounds, and she cannot wipe herself in the usual manner when on the toilet. She uses this Toilet Tissue Aid to do the dirty work. She isn’t exactly the lie-around-in-bed-and-eat-all-day sort, but she is pretty fat and it takes this special tool to clean up after each visit.
If they are receiving any type of care at all, the caregiver will try to get them on a bedpan. Urine and/or feces left in folds of skin or even on skin will cause the skin to break down, causing nasty bedsores. This will happen to anyone who is not kept clean, not just the obese.
Right, but these people were soooo large that the folds that the matter would have to clear to see daylight (or a bedpan) were overwhelming. And one of these guys could not roll over and was kind of on his side, sort of. It took a team to get him to roll over. He, in my opinion, could not facilitate positions that would allow useage of a bedpan.
It’s complicated, but the spouses (all three were married) were enablers. They depended on each other. The enablers filled a need (that would make them feel good about themselves) and the recievers (the obese) remained happy and content (to the extent possible).
I feed you and make you happy, you recieve my gifts and remain grateful.
It’s a special set of circumstances that is truly rare.
The obvious answer is a big bed pan!
Take a course to become a nursing assistant or a health care orderly.
You can then get employment and learn first hand all the ins and outs of taking care of the unlovely patients.
If they were receiving any type of care at all, they wouldn’t have an enabler there to perpetuate the situation. I think whatever impulse that drives ‘feeders’ is one of the most twisted psychoses I’ve ever heard of.
bing M.O. must be the worst kind of existance, worse than being in jail. my question; what prevents these people from stopping when they are like 300 lbs? surely they know that they are gravely endangering themselves. Plus, beyond all the health problems is the social isolation that the condition causes. yes, feeding someone in this state is enabling-its like giving crack to a junkie.
Actually that’s a good point. There are probably a lot more people who potentially would be insanely fat and immobile if they could only find cooperative “feeders”.
Probably the same thing that prevents them from stopping at 175 or 200 or 250. You don’t think it’s that bad… you think that eventually someday you’ll buckle down and fix it and then all of the sudden you catch sight of yourself in someones holiday photos and you’re like “MOTHER OF GOD, DO I REALLY LOOK LIKE THAT?!” but by then you’re awfully out of shape and your stomach is awfully used to being fed alot of food leaving you exhausted and hungry all of the time. So you despair a bit and stuff your gullet with comfort food, which just makes things worse.
I’m fat (Not like… immobile and ginormously fat, but definitely not skinny), and I’m pretty certain that the only reason I’m not getting any bigger is that I constantly struggle to control my weight through diet and exercise. Even with that constant emotional/mental struggle, I find that I make some poor choices here and there and that it seems impossible to stop myself.
I can definitely see the appeal of giving up and eating myself into an early grave, which is pretty much what these folks appear to be doing.
The caretakers weren’t what you usually think of when you think of feeders. In the case of the 1000 pound guy, she didn’t seem particularly bright and he was pretty emotionally abusive. Same with the 750 pound guy (who ultimately wound up dying because he refused to make changes). In both cases, the wives were brow beaten and seemed to have spectacularly crappy self-esteem. I don’t feel sorry for either one of them (the obese guys).
