Saturday, December 11, 2010 Fattest woman: Terri Smith sets world record CLEVELAND, Ohio, USA--Terri Smith, 49, a 700-pound woman is trapped in her bedroom, unable to move, stand or roll over by herself -
setting the new world record for theFattest woman. Photo: Terri Smith, theWorld's Fattest Woman, with her daily meal of salad, is facing a battle to lose weight so she can fit in an MRI machine. (enlarge photo)
She suffers severe headaches and needs an MRI scan to check for a potential brain tumor but is too big to fit in a scanner or through the doors of a hospital.
"My husband is my guardian angel. He's stuck by me through everything. Most men would have left a long time ago, and who could blame them ? but Myron is a living saint," Smith told Daily Mail..
Terry has never been a delicate little girl. At the age of seven, she weighed almost 70 kg. 'My nickname at school was fatso,' she said. 'No one wanted me on their sports team and that didn't help the fat.
The woman explains that her family was poor which didn't allow her parent to buy healthy foods.
By the age of 20 Terri weighed 18 stone (252lbs) but she remained active and held a job as a mental health care worker for 20 years. 'I used to help people wash, feed and dress themselves,' she said. 'Back then I never thought that the tables would turn and someone would be doing all that stuff for me.'
Terri married husband Myron, whom she refers to as her guardian angel, in 1986. Then at the age of 32 she developed severe arthritis in her knees and was unable to walk more than a few steps at a time.
Smith was finally given an electric wheelchair to get around in. The lack of exercise, not changing her eating caused her weight balloon to the point where she could barely stand.
Then about three years ago a change in her medication caused her to gain 91 pounds in 30 days. Those additional pounds forced her to the bed ridden state she has been in ever since.
According to 'The Sun' , Terri relies on loving husband Myron, 44, and oldest daughter Najah, 30, to do everything for her. She must be washed, fed and dressed on the bed.
She faces a race against time to lose weight in a bid to qualify for gastric surgery. Smith, who has been bed-bound for three years, told 'The Sun': "People must think, 'How could you let yourself get like that?'
"It's awful how it creeps up on you. Once you cannot exercise it doesn't matter how healthily you eat, the weight just sticks. You're not burning off a single calorie."
Dr Dariush Saghafi told 'The Sun':"Caring for someone of Terri's size is very difficult. It is very hard to move and transport her.
"Hospitals do not have equipment to hold someone of her girth.We thought that it might be possible for Terri to have an MRI at the Cleveland Zoo in the machine used for the elephants and rhinos but the zoo does not have a license for humans."
Terry's family, consisting of her loving husband and two daughters, the eldest of which is 30 years old, hope that the problem with the equipment will be resolved before it is too late.
The Guinness world record for the greatest distance travelled on a treadmill in 24 hours by a woman is 247.2 km (153.6 miles) by Edit Berces (Hungary) at the Eurocentre shopping mall, Budapest, Hungary.
According to Guinness World Records, Donna Simpson of New Jersey, USA, weighted 532 lb (241 kg; 38 st) when she delivered daughter Jacqueline - seting the world recorrd for the heaviest woman to give birth.
