Lord Beetus marks His next victim This is a story told to me by my friend and former colleague. I've changed the names for privacy, and also to hopefully make the story easier to read. I met my friend Leslie for lunch today. We both used to work at the same company, but in different departments. I left about 2 years ago, and she left about 1 year ago. This is the first time I've seen her in about a year. We're sitting in a cafe chatting when Leslie asks me, "do you remember Jane Smith? From the finance department?" I told her I think so, and added, "was she the quiet, mousey one?" Leslie nods. I don't really remember Jane all that well; I remember being introduced to her a few times and seeing her in passing, but we never really talked. She was a little shorter than me, probably about 20 years older, and fairly thin. Leslie was in the HR department, so she knew practically all the employees in the company. I guess she kept in touch with Jane, who is still employed there. She tells me, "Jane had to take a leave of absence from work to take care of her husband. I guess about 6 months ago, he got flesh eating disease and ended up in the hospital for a while. It was pretty serious." "Oh, I'm sorry to hear that," I said. "Is he doing better now?" "Not at all," says Leslie. "He's really, really sick. He is probably going to die soon." "What?!" I asked, shocked. "From the flesh-eating?" "No," she says. "Shortly after he was released from the hospital for that, he had a massive heart attack. They had to do open-heart surgery, and his heart stopped on the table." "Holy shit," I said. "Yeah, he was in the hospital for a while. Then when he got out, he started having trouble with his vision." Without thinking, I blurted out, "did he have diabetes?" Leslie looked down at her coffee, and sighed. "I'm getting to that," she said. "So apparently with all these things happening, he was sent to one of the top endocrinologists in Canada, and was told that he had type 2 diabetes." I cut her off. "Is he a big guy?" (I'm not wanting to be overly shitlordy, as Leslie is more of an acquaintance and as a former colleague, I might need her as a reference in the future. Also I've never met Jane's husband.) "Yeah, he's very large," she says. I'm taking this as Leslie's politically correct way of saying that Jane's husband is obese. "So what happened?" I asked. "How could you not know that you have diabetes? It's supposed to make you incredibly thirsty, and you have to pee like every 5 minutes." "Well, that's the thing," she says. "He's had those symptoms for a while, but he doesn't like doctors so he refused to get checked out. His blood sugar has been out of control for so long that his organ systems are shutting down. Jane says he is completely blind, and completely dependent on her. She has to do everything for him - get him up, get him showered and dressed, prepare his meals... she says she feels more like his nurse than his wife. That's why she's had to take time off work, because she couldn't work full-time and care for her dying husband." Leslie went on to tell me that Jane has admitted she is just going through the motions until her husband passes away. She knows it will be soon - apparently he's in kidney failure, and the doctors say the prognosis isn't good. I tried asking Leslie a few more questions about the situation, but she said that's all she knew. Let this be a lesson to all you HAES advocates. I don't know if Jane's husband was a part of that group or not, but regardless, he is dying from complications due to type 2 diabetes because he is obese and was too fucking stubborn to go to the doctor. Leslie says he was having symptoms for "a long time" but refused to do anything about it. Now he's on death's doorstep. The crazy part is that he is only in his early 50's. His wife is now his nurse, and soon will be his widow. Thank god they don't have any children. This case is a perfect example of how obesity kills... because sooner or later, Lord Beetus will come to collect his dues.