Morbidly obese woman who weighed 11st by the time she was FIVE loses half her body weight... after hitting 46 STONE By Ruth Styles for MailOnline

By the time she turned five, Amber Rachdi, now 24, from Troutdale in Oregon, weighed 11st - the same as the average adult woman.

19 years later and Ms Rachdi hit rock bottom: virtually housebound and in constant pain, she was ashamed of her enormous 46st (657lb) frame.

But after doctors warned that she would be dead by the age of 30, the 24-year-old plucked up the courage to make a change and has since lost 20st in a year.

Sometimes I think to myself I'm never going to change,' she admitted in the run-up to life-saving bariatric surgery. 'Everything hurts. I am so limited in what I can do and where I can go.

'I feel trapped. I'm miserable. I don't like being this person. I don't like being this size. Sometimes I feel so hopeless, I feel that it's not worth it. That maybe it would be better if I'd never been born.'

'Sometimes my dad would make snide comments about my size and that would hurt me. I wish I could be self-sufficient and successful and show the world I'm made of so much more but as long as I'm big, as long as I'm obese, I will never be able to be that person.'

The turning point came when the Rachdi family relocated to Houston in Texas to be closer to bariatric specialist, Dr Younan Nowzaradan.

Last autumn, Ms Rachdi finally went under the knife for life-saving gastric surgery and has since lost a staggering 20st.

But with another 9st to go, there is still a long way to go before Ms Rachdi becomes the 'successful, independent woman' she wants to be.

Even so, things are finally looking up. 'I'm now able to shop for myself,' beams the 24-year-old who has also learned to drive.

'I have hope. Now the world is open to me. I'm no longer Amber of one room, one house. I'm no longer using food to cope with my anxiety.'

Source:Daily Mail