700-lb Chuck Turner of Beaumont, Texas lost just about everything before losing the thing that caused most all the other losses. The "My 600-lb Life" alumnus has found new life after losing darn near two-thirds of himself. And as wow-worthy as his 433-lb weight lossis, the haunting reasons behind his massive weight gain are what will stick with you. Chuck's descent into morbid obesityunderscores the role food can play in coping with grief.
What "comfort food" really means
Turner, at 46, weighed 693 pounds, but obviously, he wasn't always so big. He worked up to obesity in an effort to ward off horrific grief.
Chuck's first wife was murdered and it plunged her spouse into unfathomable depths of sorrow. That sounds dramatic because it is--to lose a loved one to natural causes is hard enough, but to lose them to another's violent cruelty is unthinkable. So Turner turned to a reliable source of comfort--food. Normally when you think of comfort food, you think of sweets or salty snacks--junk food. For stress eaters, food itself becomes the comfort. And because death leaves such a black hole, it takes an endless amount of food to fill it. Chuck literally tried to eat himself happy again.
Pounds gained lost wife, son, sex, job, society
The more weight Chuck Turner gained the more he lost. His second wife Nissa married him because she felt ashamed of her own obesity and wanted to show sympathy for another obese person.
She got more than she bargained for in Chuck. At 500 pounds overweight, with a huge lymphedema (that trademark water-filled sack) hanging off one leg, Turner was almost as disabled as a quadriplegic. He couldn't help with care for his son. His wife Nissa did everything for him. Nissa said it was not a husband and wife relationship but caregiver and patient.
Sex was physically impossible--they couldn't even share a bed.
New life, old memories
All Chuck could do was lie in his bed, eat, and watch TV. Using a phone or computer was even difficult as that meant having to reach across an acre of stomach. He couldn't reach things that fell. He needed help bathing andusing the bathroom.
He couldn't support the family because there was no work he could do.Then, one day, Nissa got sick of caregiving, took the boy, and left.Chuck has since lost pounds and is now ready to date again. But the sorrow over what was irretrievably lost will remain with him always. Here's more on Chuck's story from "My 600-lb Life."
