Britain’s fattest woman Brenda Flanagan-Davies tips the scales at 40-stone and has got so big, she hasn’t been able to leave the house in four years.
The 9XL 43-year-old from Gateshead, Tyne and Wear, has been crowned the heaviest woman in Britain after the death of her supersized mother Sharon in 2010, who weighed in at 45 stone.
Brenda is eight stone lighter than she was but still struggles to do simple day-to-day tasks like walking around her home or leaving the house.
Brenda can’t even muster the energy to walk to the fridge – so she’s had it moved next to her reinforced bariatric bed.
“I spend my life in bed – that’s not a life. I have tried countless diets but I can’t stop eating. I can’t walk 20 feet to my shower without getting out of breath,” Brenda told The Sun.
Brenda, who lives on a 6,000-calorie diet of junk food and fizzy drinks, has decided to ask doctors for help after being warned to ‘lose weight or die’. She also expressed her sadness at being too fat to have a baby.
“Doctors have warned me my weight could eventually kill me – I’m pushing so much stress on my organs. I want to have children while I still can, but I’m not healthy enough to get pregnant.
“But food is an addiction I can’t fight. I need help,” admits Brenda to the newspaper.
Married Brenda stopped leaving the house after a humiliating visit to the doctors four years ago.
“After years of being called ‘monster’ and ‘lardy’ in the street, I had enough of it," she said.
She now spends her day online, watching TV and satisfying her food addiction.
Despite her worries, Brenda still feasts on calorific fatty treats and manages to get through on average nine chocolate bars, a large pizza, a takeaway and countless bottles of fizzy drinks in one day.
“I get tired so easily, so everyday I drink a litre and a half of diet Coke and the same in diet Irn Bru. I pick diet to save on a few calories,” Debra explains to The Sun.
Brenda’s weight problems began as a child and once she reached her late teens, she weighed 20 stone. “I would eat whenever I was sad, happy, lonely or depressed. And the heavier I got, the sadder I got, so I just continued to eat more.”
After spending her youth hiding away in bedsits and starting and leaving dead-end jobs because of her weight, Brenda met retired labourer Ronnie Davies, 65, six years ago.
In 2010, Ronnie proposed to Brenda and they later tied the knot - in her front room because Brenda was housebound. “Like all women, I used to dream of a white wedding in a church. But at least I can say I have found the man of my dreams.”
Ronnie acts as Brenda’s main carer along with hired workers, where they make their way through four loads of laundry and ‘deep crease clean’ Brenda’s body in her adapted wet room to tackle her bed sores. They also spend £250 a week on food bills.
Although Brenda has already tried weight-loss drugs and slimming clubs, she admits that she "can never stick to a strict diet".
“I don't want to end up like Sharon [her mother]. I've been as heavy as 45 stone - the same as her. I feel ashamed of myself that I'm even in this position.”
Brenda's fattest women titles follows Britain's fattest man, Kevin Martin, who weighs a whopping 58 stone. The heaviest woman on the planet is Pauline Potter from Los Angeles, who weighs 52 stone.
Brenda's battle was screened on Big Body Squad on Channel 5.