Morbid obesity tragic to fitness guru
By Jose Lambiet

Sunday, August 15, 2004

STUART — There may be millions of Americans who weigh almost 500 pounds and
never leave their couches.

They are out there, hidden away. Just like Gayle Grinds, the 480-pound
Stuart woman who died early Wednesday morning after firefighters worked for
six hours to extract her from her squalid house.

So says Richard Simmons, the fitness guru who parlayed a successful
exercise and talk show on television in the mid-1980s into a personal
crusade against obesity. In addition to his www.richardsimmons.com Web
site, Simmons still runs exercise classes, diet programs, slim-down
boat-cruises and, at times, one-on-one counseling.

"Hearing about this Florida lady (39-year-old Grinds) makes me very sad,"
Simmons said Thursday from his Los Angeles home. "This is someone I
probably could have saved if I had known about her.

"But what is also sad is that there are literally several million people
like her in this country. How many exactly? Hard to tell. They may be your
neighbors, friends or family members, but most of us don't know they exist.
Obese folks are often too ashamed to seek help or leave their homes."

Simmons is known for his clownish antics and trademark short shorts, but he
turns sullen when he talks about morbid obesity.

"I receive 1,000 e-mails and letters a week from obese people or their
family members," he said. "I try to call more than 100 of them to offer
support and advice. Unfortunately, there is very little help out there for
them."

Sufferers usually go without medical attention until they have an
emergency, Simmons says, because many people who are overweight by 100
pounds or more don't have much money, and treating life-threatening obesity
is expensive.

Grinds, who had not left her couch for six years, had difficulty breathing
about 10 p.m. Tuesday. Family members called 911.

"Hospitals often refuse to treat obesity," he says. "First and foremost,
someone who is obese needs rehab, just like an alcoholic. There are just a
handful of such centers for obese people, where they are re-taught to eat.
They learn about portions, food types, exercise and physical fitness.

"You can contemplate weight-loss surgery only after rehab," Simmons said.

How can someone become so overweight that, like Grinds, she can no longer
get up? How can someone's body become fused to a sofa, as Grinds' was?

Simmons said he has seen many cases like Grinds', or worse. He once acted
as an adviser for a 1,000-pound man, he said, whose T-shirt was so
stretched on his body for so long that his skin attached itself to the
fabric. Firefighters in Stuart could not separate Grinds' back from her
couch for the same reason. She was taken to Martin Memorial Hospital South
and died before surgeons could separate her from the couch.

"Many of these people give up on life," he said.

The origins of obesity are in the mind, said Simmons, who knows the pain
firsthand. When he graduated from high school, the 5-foot-6 Simmons tipped
the scales at nearly 300 pounds. He regained his trademark figure through
exercise and diet.

"Depression is a huge factor," the 56-year-old Simmons said. "It paralyzes.
There is an event, or a series of events, that cause a person to get on a
couch or bed and decide never to get up again. It becomes a vicious circle.
The more you eat, the more you get depressed, the more you eat. Food, the
television and the couch become your only friends."

Family members, Simmons added, unknowingly become "enablers."

"It's hard to say no when someone keeps begging you to get more food," he
said.

In the end, Simmons said, it's the lack of exercise that kills.

"It takes an intake of 3,500 calories a day to add 1 pound of body-weight,"
he said. "And it takes more than 90 minutes of aerobics to burn just 600
calories. I've seen people gaining 150 pounds in one year. Their lives
disintegrate around them. They can't go to work. They can't shower. They
can't cook. They can't clean the house. Believe me, it's not the kind of
life these people set out to have."