14 DAY TRIAL // At 19 years of age, Malissa Jones of Selby, North Yorks, England, sees herself as the unhappiest woman alive, whose future is extremely bleak unless she somehow comes up with £20,000 required to undergo cosmetic surgery. At 16, Malissa, Britain’s fattest teen, underwent gastric bypass after doctors told her she only had months to live, and thus became the first person in the world to undergo the surgery. She is now telling Closer magazine she’d rather be dead than live her life as she is now.
Malissa knows that the surgery saved her life, especially since she had her first suspected heart attack at the tender age of 15. Doctors told her at the time that, although risky and not usually done on under-18s, the procedure was the only hope she had to live longer than a few more months. At the time, Jones was diagnosed with angina, had her internal organs compressed, could not move and breathed at night with the help of an oxygen tank. She weighed 34 stone (215 kg) and ate 15,000 calories a day (with the daily recommended intake being of 2,000).
Now, two years later, Malissa has lost 20 stone (127 kg) and her life expectancy is increased. Still, she is depressed and is on medication because she is constantly so ill she can hardly get out of the bed. She says she’s been left with so much excess skin from her weight loss that she truly wishes she had never had the surgery at all – anything, even death, is better than looking like this. She doesn’t have the money to undergo surgery to remove the saggy skin and the NHS will not pay for it.
“I know it sounds ungrateful, but I preferred my body when I was fat. At least it was firm and curvy, not droopy and saggy. I had nice firm arms – now the skin just hangs and I have to cover them up because they look so awful. The NHS won’t remove the skin and I’ll never manage to save £20,000 to have it done privately. The surgery might have saved my life, but I wish I’d never had it done,” Jones says for Closer.
There is tinge of regret though at not having tried to lose the weight the healthy way, with diet and exercise, and especially at having let her problems become so serious. “Although my heart’s healthier and life expectancy is normal, some days I’m too ill to get out of bed. […] I hope people read this and realize gastric surgery isn’t a miracle cure. I wish I’d lost the weight through exercise and healthy eating. I know this operation was life-saving, but the complications I’m suffering now might still kill me. The truth is I feel I’m no better off than I was before,” she says for the same magazine.