ProTourist

At the end of the day, I think, Sean was mentally ill and needed more intensive psychiatric care than he could get from an occasional counseling session with Dr. Paradise.

I think anyone who truly believes Sean could have just changed his eating habits on his own is unrealistic. And an occasional session with Dr. Paradise would not relieve him of his physical addiction to and/or psychological dependence on food. Sean's only chance might have been a psychiatric care facility.

I'm sure suicide in illegal in Texas. When Dr. Now realized that Sean was trying to eat himself to death, he absolutely should have requested a psych eval for Sean. He has done it before, such as for Lisa. Maybe that was the type of 'care facility' that Sean needed -- where he could find his way to better mental health.

He's got to be doing it on purpose, to kill himself. He must believe he has no better option.

Sounds like he needs a bottle of Neutrogena T/Sal.

I've thought at times what kind of job Sean might have been able to do given his physical limitations. He could have worked in a call center, but not with that kind of voice. Maybe if he had had some speech therapy first.

Sounds like it would be an Act II of what he had with his mother.

Good evening, pounders. I probably won't see this episode until at least 3am, when it is released on Amazon, but I'm here for the chat. My eating habit today has not occurred yet. I'm hungry but can't decide what I want. Am leaning toward a breakfast-type meal, such as french toast. Please let us all know what's happening with Sean. Thank you.

Thanks to Miss Schenee's YouTube channel, I've become familiar with the term "mukbang," but not until today did I look into what it means. Man, there are a lot of mukbangers on YouTube. Watching some of them, it's easy to tell how addiction to fast food can get started. Here's a sample, which I'm sure would infuriate Dr. Now:

Is this the program? Hmmm, perhaps this explains the pee pads on the floor of Steven Assanti's Houston apartment, which we saw during the recent update. He might have a 'Sun King' complex. 😉 Seriously though, it looks like an interesting show; I'm going to try to find it online. Thanks!

There are a few fruits and vegetables I don't like, but not many. Mostly ones that are bitter or highly acidic or too hard to bite into/chew when raw. Star fruit is pretty, but it burns my mouth it has so much acid! Stay away! Grapefruit is bitter! Oranges are better! Radishes are often bitter, and are too hard for me to bite into and chew unless they are sliced thin. I am not crazy about green/string beans. I will eat them, but without pleasure. I am picky about my pears: anjou is soft and juicy -- perfect! bosc is too hard and dry! I am picky about my apples too: delicious has thick skin, too thick for my aging teeth and I don't want to peel them! royal gala and honey crisp are perfection!

Well, you could always reply to those messages, and use the angry emoji's available in the composition window, such as: 😠 👿 😡 ‼️ [Just joking!]

I'm afraid that's what it will be. Sean just couldn't take care of himself, but even when his mother was alive he was quite resistant to change, and didn't do a lot of what he should have, even when his mother was encouraging him to watch calories and to be more active. He complained and then his mother would give in. She shouldn't have given in, but Sean's lack of progress was his fault too, not only his mother's. I've been re-watching his first three episodes this weekend, as prep for this week's new episode. And I've found that as bad as Sean's mother was, he was pretty bad himself. And his father was awful. His father really bailed on him when he was supposed to be helping him to prepare to relocate to a smaller apartment. While it's true that Sean was making the process difficult by not wanting to throw things away, his father should not have just thrown in the towel and split. He should have had some serious conversations with his son, and try to get him to see the light. But I guess then he would have been a different person.

Chad has been one of the success stories, who just published a book this year. Here is an article about him from Men's Health magazine. He's done very well. 😎

Yes, I agree that Sarah had quite a transformation, which was even more dramatic due to the way she was presented, skipping over a few months between her segments. I too was very glad that she was able to stay on track despite the tragic loss of her baby. Regarding her mother, I have mixed feelings. On one hand I know that the relationship was not healthy for Sarah, but I kind of feel like she used her mother. Her mother didn't want to move to Houston, but did it anyway because Sarah didn't have anyone else after her sister backed out. Then once Sarah reached a point where she could manage on her own, she sent her mother back home. She didn't need her any longer, and preferred that course of action rather than working on their relationship in therapy. Dr. Now said they'd have to do one or the other, and Sarah chose the other. So I do have some sympathy for her mother, in spite of what happened years ago.

I think the two main issues are motivation and addiction. Some of them are much more motivated to change than others, especially the young ones in their 20s and early 30s who would then be able to break free from family and go on to have a good life. The ones who are already middle aged may be more damaged and less hopeful for the future, and so less motivated to make the big changes and do the hard work. Of course, there are exceptions on both sides: we've seen some young people, such as Sean Milliken and Justin Assanti who are already very damaged and struggling with the program, and some middle-aged people like Diana Bunch and Paula Jones who have done very well. And then there is the question of food addiction. I don't think all of these poundticipants are addicted, but the ones who are have a much harder time changing their eating habits long term. Some of them don't really seem to be addicted IMO, but have fallen into bad habits due to sequence of events in their lives that caused them to turn to food. Once they have a structured program and support system, along with the motivation, they are able to change their relationship with food. But the ones who are addicts with more deeply-rooted personality issues that drive them to self-medicate with food, have a much harder time breaking free. Even though they are offered psychotherapy, the type of analysis they would need would take years and is beyond what the program can do.

I've watched this episode twice now -- and after purchasing it on Amazon I discovered it was available unlocked on TCM Go -- as is Janine's recent one. There was so much I disliked about this update, beginning with too much Lee and not enough of anyone else. Besides the fact that I can't stand Lee and find him uninteresting as well, my two big gripes are: Sarah's update made such big jumps forward in time that I barely recognized her from one scene to the next. They cut down her time too much -- and since we lost Rena they should have increased Sarah's time. I mean, we see Sarah still looking rather large, and in the next scene she seems to be nearing her target weight. We see her with a full head of hair, then next scene she is wearing a wig and the voice over says her hair fell out. When did that happen? All of a sudden, when she woke up one morning? Sheesh, I can't recall such lack of continuity in anyone else's story. What the heck happened to Rena? I understand that she broke up with Lee while they were back home for a visit, but it's never explained why she stopped Dr. Now's program when she was all ready for her first skin surgery. Yes, Lee made a brief statement toward the end, in voice over when he was walking in the park, but he's a nasty liar who cannot be believed. The show should have made an official statement explaining her absence from the rest of the episode, either via Dr. Now or with title cards. It makes no sense that she would have been disqualified from continuing for not appearing along with Lee, because then Lee would have had to be disqualified for not appearing along with her. There had to be a good reason, but it just wasn't communicated at all. A few thoughts regarding Lola: I think this is the greatest number of wigs we've seen her wear in one episode. I actually liked the one with bangs, whose two-tone coloring made me think of LaShanta's wig. 😉 Someone above mentioned Lola's eyebrows as being tattooed on, but I always thought they were drawn on with make-up. I've figured that she has no hair, at least not on her head, for some reason, which is why she wears the wigs and draws on the eye brows. [Not sure about eye lashes.] I agree with others who have mentioned that Lola is not skillful at treating people with anger issues -- although this is one of the regular areas of her practice. I remember she was treating Maja for anger management too. I think the behavioral approach she takes would not be as successful long term as would an analytic approach, which would dig out the root cause, and would actually heal the issue rather than find ways to deal with it. As others have said, I think the "adult tantrum" approach for Lee is ludicrous (if it works for anyone) not the least reason being that at his size he could not get down on the floor and then back up -- and then take a walk around the block afterward. Too absurd. <sigh> Well, Sean's swan song next week. 😢

Thank you for those supersized tidbits, Twopper. Some reactions: Her favorite aspect of life in Houston is the sunshine -- I can believe this since she is from Seattle. They don't get much sun up there. favorite meal to cook after meeting Dr Now is enchiladas -- unless she makes them without the tortillas, this would be part of the problem of her slow weight loss. The one thing she couldn't leave behind when she moved was her cat, Prince (Please show us more of Prince and less of Janine) -- okay: Favorite thing about Dr Now is how caring he is (could have fooled me. Do I detect a bit of a crush on the good doctor?) -- the crush may be, but I found Dr. Now to be very caring with Janine. He spent two years doing with her what most successful patients do in one year. I was surprised he kept on working with her for all the time she was making little to no progress -- most others he would dismiss from the program by end of the first year for that much lack of progress. I figure Janine must have had very good health insurance, so it was worth his while. When approved for wls, her first thought was how soon she could get the fam down to Houston -- but they didn't show up, not even her niece Rachel. The only one who went was that long-suffering sister-in-law. [I was surprised that neither of her brothers was there.] Fav meal post op is creamy soup ( Beware the creamy soup---I forgot the name of the man who started gaining weight during the liquid diet part of his recovery because of creamy soups which seem to be as dangerous as grapes and oranges.) -- that was Aaron, who ate creamy soup while on the post-op liquid diet. He strained it first. Regarding the berries, they are so low in sugar I don't understand why they can't be on the diet. Berries and melons are so low in sugar that they should be the few permissible fruits.

Also from the live chat: I've not seen the episode as yet, but if it's both together or nothing, then Lee should not have appeared solo either. Seems like an unfair bias against Rena as it was handled -- and she was the better of the two patients.

How many people still care about grammar? Fewer and fewer, especially as compared to 30-40 years ago. When people use expressions like "the feels" I disconnect immediately -- I don't even care how or why that expression started. I would say that I'm showing my age, but I was a prescriptivist as a teenager. 😇

That was this season, Tiffany -- episode 9. The odd thing is that there is a style of Tiffany lamps that has a grapes-patterned shade, such as this:

Someone posted Kassandra had had a baby, which was why she wasn't seen for a while. So she may be pregnant here.

I don't like Tater Tots either, but when I was a kid there was something called Tiny Taters that I used to like. My grandparents' dog liked them too. Similar to the tots, I guess. I remember Sarah's casserole now, but at first I only remembered her baby carrots dipped in almond butter. [She was already losing weight by then.]

I did my homework and re-watched Sarah's original episode a few days ago. She was the one whose sister was supposed to relocate to Houston with her, but then the sister backed out because she thought Sarah wasn't making enough progress, so then Sarah's mother had to move with her, but the passenger-side door on her mother's car was out of order, and Sarah could not slide over the seat, so she insisted that she drive them down to Houston. She and her mother didn't get along too well.

Good evening, pounders. My eating habit today has been a turkey sandwich, fried zucchini, and because the temperature topped eighty degrees today, a dish of ice cream.