“My 600-lb Life” is one of those shows which easily take people’s attention given the usually disheartening and complex stories of the people the show focuses on. Nonetheless, while most of the patients who seek help from Dr. Now weigh around 600 lbs, Julius Clark from season eight stood out from the rest for being one of the heaviest participants in the weight-losing program.
The many challenges JT faced along the way left audiences teary, but his story was also endearing and inspiring for others. Unsurprisingly, those who were touched by his story keep wondering what happened to Julius after the show and whether he was able to overcome all the difficulties on his weight-loss journey in the end.
So what’s up with JT Clark these days? Here’s an update on his whereabouts and what his path has led him to.
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What Happened To Him?
One of the most unforgettable cases ever featured in “My 600-lb Life” was that of JT, whose full name is Julius Clark. His story was included in the show’s eighth season and was disheartening to watch given all the physical and emotional challenges that he faced all along.
Despite being one of the heaviest patients to be featured in the show and the many struggles he dealt with, JT lost lots of weight in the program and finished his episode in a hopeful tone, setting his next goal at losing even more weight to eventually get the lymphedema mass on his leg removed.
Though JT has no official Facebook page for his fans, his public profile on the platform gives us a slight idea of his whereabouts. Though most of the photos shared by JT only show him upwards from the shoulders, the thinness of his face is a massive change from the time we last saw him in the show.
While JT hasn’t revealed the whole extent of his weight loss, in February 2023 he revealed he was getting his lymphedema removed in Houston, though no further details about it were revealed. It’s not out of fashion for JT to keep his most personal matters in secrecy even on social media, but there’s nothing else for us other than to wish he could achieve all his goals and have a healthy life.
How Much Weight Did He Lose?
JT is considered one of the heaviest patients to be featured in “My 600-lb Life” for very good reasons. With a starting weight of 892.2 lbs, JT was the biggest person of his season and the second-heaviest one in the show’s history up to that point.
Besides the dangerous weight he had gained so far, JT’s situation was critical due to the 100 lbs lymphedema mass on his leg which impeded his walking and was a big worry for Dr. Now. According to the then-32-year-old JT, previous doctors hadn’t given him a life expectancy past his 31st birthday, so he was running against time to save his life.
JT’s progress throughout his journey was noticeable, losing enough weight to undergo gastric sleeve surgery. Right at the end of his episode, JT weighed 491 lbs, losing a total of 401 lbs during the program, but he was still far ahead of his final goal. He still needed to go past the 450 lbs mark to get his lymphedema removed, but it’s fair to assume that he eventually achieved that goal given his latest updates about the surgery.
It’s unclear how much JT might be weighing now or whether he has already achieved his desired weight goal, but his journey was inspiring to say the least.
JT Before The Show
The last time we saw JT in “My 600-lb Life” he was hopeful for the future, which was a clear contrast to his situation at the start of the program. As JT recalled during his episode, his obesity was the result of several issues he had been dealing with since his childhood.
Growing up in a financially limited household, JT and his siblings got their eating habits from eating for free at their father’s job in a fast-food restaurant. The situation JT was different from his younger two sisters and brother, as being the oldest added another layer of responsibility in a household where the parents were almost always absent and put more money into their hard drug addiction than on their children, leaving them to fend for themselves.
During his teens, JT dealt with the burden of his unbalanced family by getting several jobs to help himself and his siblings, eventually landing a spot at a pizza restaurant where he used to eat several pizzas a day from the time he was 19 years old. Nonetheless, before that, he had already gained massive weight, hitting the 300 lbs mark by the time he was 13 years old.
JT’s situation got worse by the time he turned 25 years old when his lymphedema and his obesity made him unable to work.
JT’s Journey
By the time JT arrived at Dr. Now’s office, he had been dealing with deep emotional issues and food addiction. According to JT, his depression was a result of his parents abandonment, insolation from people his age, and the stress of dealing with difficult job schedules from an early age, leaving him with no other escape but to embrace food in large quantities.
The situation didn’t improve over the next few years and JT was given a very hopeless life expectancy, but in 2019 he found the will to visit Dr. Now and enroll in his program for a chance to change and save his life. At the time he was 32 years old, didn’t know how much he weighed, and was almost bedridden, but still had lots of dreams of traveling the world and having a family of his own with his then-girlfriend Jessica.
It wasn’t an easy road for JT though, as he was hospitalized for food poisoning and complications with his lymphedema mass. He spent the first months of his treatment in Houston, dealing with back-and-forth progress in his weight loss journey and the emotional distress of his breakup with Jessica.
An emotional talk with Dr. Now served to put his priorities in order and fight back to recover his health, slowly but surely moving him closer than ever to his goal by the end of his episode.
Was JT The Biggest Patient In The Show?
While JT was one of the heaviest patients to be treated by Dr. Now in “My 600-lb Life”, he wasn’t the heaviest one. That spot was for Samantha Mason, who weighed over 940 lbs at the start of her journey and dealt with several other health problems related to it. Despite the hard road she had ahead, Samantha became the person who lost the most weight in the show, finishing her episode with 487 lbs.
The second heaviest patient in “My 600-lb Life” was Sean Milliken, who appeared in the show weighing 919 lbs at 26 years old. The earliest months of his treatment saw him gaining weight instead of losing it, hitting over the 1,000 lbs mark during the first phase. Sean was admitted to a rehab center where he lost hundreds of pounds, yet he still gained more weight when he went back home.
Despite entering therapy alongside his mother, Sean’s journey went back and forth over the next couple of years. By his third year of treatment, he had lost over 450 lbs and had been admitted to the rehab center several times by that point. In early 2019, Sean sadly died at 29 years old from a cardiac arrest, reminding us that, unlike JT’s story, other patients in “My 600-lb Life” had very unfortunate and disheartening endings.
