Steven: The Most Chaotic Patient Dr. Now Ever Faced #My600lbLife #StevenAssanti

Added: 2026-05-26

[00:00:00]We need to stop soon. I am hungry. Sure, you're going to wait, buddy. I don't know when we're going to get there. I'm weak.

[00:00:08]And if something happens to me, Welcome to the real Steven.

[00:00:15]I've never [music] seen any patient like Steven.

[00:00:20]Welcome to Obesity Files.

[00:00:23]Today, we are looking back at one of the most talked about, most uncomfortable, and most controversial stories in my 600-lb life history. The story of Steven Assanti. When Steven appeared on the show with his brother Justin, viewers quickly realized this was not going to be a normal weight loss journey. Steven came into Dr. Now's program weighing close to 800 lb, but the number on the scale was only part of the problem. What made his story so hard to watch was the chaos around him. The way he treated people, the way he pushed limits, the way his father kept getting pulled back into helping him, and the way Dr. Now had to deal with a patient who seemed to fight the program at every turn. So, he's [music] going to be a unique case.

[00:01:02]From the outside, it was easy for viewers to get angry and see Steven as simply rude, selfish, or out of control.

[00:01:08]But the more you watch his story, the more it feels like his weight was only one piece of a much bigger mess. Food was clearly a problem, but so was control, so was dependency, so was the way Steven seemed to use his condition, his pain, and even his anger to keep everyone around him reacting to him. And that is what made this case so different. This wasn't just about whether Steven could lose weight. It was about whether he could stop fighting the very people who were trying to save his life. Steven's behavior did not come out of nowhere. To understand why he became the way he was on the show, you have to go all the way back to his childhood.

[00:01:40]Steven was born in 1981, and from what he and Justin described, their early life was filled with instability. Their mother struggled with alcohol, their parents fought constantly, and after the divorce, Steven and Justin went to live with their mother. But instead of finding safety there, things seemed to get worse. Their mother's relationships often came before her children, and the boys were sometimes left alone for long periods of time. Food became one of the only things they could count on, and when a child grows up in that kind of environment, it makes sense that food can stop being just food. It becomes comfort. It becomes control. It becomes the one thing that is always there when the people around you are not. But even then, there were signs that Steven's relationship with food was different.

[00:02:21]Justin later said that when food was left out for both of them, Steven would often eat it before Justin had the chance. And that detail is hard to ignore because it shows something that would follow Steven for years. When Steven wanted something, he took it, even if someone else needed it, too. As a teenager, his weight kept climbing. By 15, he was already over 300 lb. And after his mother left again to start a new life, the boys moved back in with their father. For Steven, that kind of abandonment seemed to hit hard, and instead of slowing down, his eating only got worse. His father tried to step in, but by then, food had already become more than a bad habit. It had become Steven's escape, his weapon, and his way of forcing everyone around him to respond. That is what makes this story so disturbing to watch. You can understand where some of the pain came from, but at the same time, Steven's pain did not stay inside him. It spilled onto everyone around him, especially his father and Justin. Steven's weight loss journey was never just about the scale.

[00:03:15]Yes, he came into Dr. Now's program close to 800 lb, and yes, he did eventually lose a significant amount of weight. But every step of progress seemed to come with another controversy.

[00:03:25]From the beginning, Steven acted like the rules were made for everyone except him. I want this light [music] off.

[00:03:33]He wanted the benefits of the program, but he did not want the discipline that came with it. Even inside the hospital, where he was supposed to be monitored and protected from his old habits, Steven found ways to push back. One of the most infamous moments was when he ordered pizza to his hospital room, almost as if he wanted to prove that nobody could really control him. And that was the pattern viewers kept seeing again and again. Steven would say he wanted help, but then he would fight the people trying to help him. He was belligerent toward nurses, disrespectful toward staff, demanding with his father, and emotionally exhausting for almost everyone around him. At one point, his behavior became so disruptive that Dr. Now kicked him out of the program. And honestly, it felt like one of the few times Steven was finally being forced to face a real problem. You hear me? You're going to hear me now.

[00:04:20]And you're going TO HEAR ME LOUD AND CLEAR.

[00:04:24]OKAY? CLEAN OUT YOUR EARS AND CLEAN THEM OUT GOOD.

[00:04:29]I NEED $150 to fill my treatment medicine. was not the only issue.

[00:04:34]Steven's addiction to pain medication became one of the biggest problems in his journey. Instead of focusing fully on losing weight and getting healthy, so much of his energy seemed to go toward chasing painkillers, arguing about medication, or trying to manipulate the medical system to get what he wanted.

[00:04:49]And that made his case even more serious, because now Dr. Now was not only dealing with a patient who was dangerously overweight, he was dealing with someone whose addiction could destroy him even faster. That is why Steven's story feels so frustrating.

[00:05:02]There were moments where progress was possible. He did lose weight. He did get close enough to qualify for surgery. But the whole time, it felt like his behavior was working against his own survival.

[00:05:12]The conflict with Justin made everything even more uncomfortable. Justin had his own serious weight problem, but he was clearly carrying a different kind of pain. He seemed quieter, more withdrawn, and desperate to keep distance from Steven. The show made it clear that their relationship was deeply damaged, and Steven was often accused of bullying Justin or making his journey harder. One of the worst parts of the story came when Steven was accused of stealing Justin's pain medication while Justin was recovering from surgery. That moment showed how far the damage had gone. It was not just sibling fighting anymore.

[00:05:44]It was addiction, resentment, and years of family dysfunction all crashing into the same room. And for Justin, it probably felt like even when he was finally trying to move forward, Steven still found a way to pull him back into the chaos.

[00:05:57]By the end of his initial episode, Steven had lost around 131 lb, bringing him down to about 677.5 lb. On paper, that was progress. For someone close to 800 lb, losing that much weight is a big deal. But with Steven, the number never told the whole story. Because even when the scale moved down, the behavior did not really seem to change. Later, he claimed he had lost over 300 lb total, though medical staff were not always convinced by his self-reported numbers. And that kind of sums up Steven's entire journey. There was always some progress, but there was always doubt around it. Was he really changing, or was he just saying what people wanted to hear? Was he serious about saving his life, or was he only serious when he was about to lose help, attention, or control? That is what made Steven Assanti one of the most controversial patients in My 600-lb Life history. His weight was dangerous, but the bigger battle was whether he could stop sabotaging every chance he was given. After the show, Steven's life took another turn that surprised a lot of viewers. He eventually married a woman named Stephanie and moved to Iowa, which was not something many people expected after watching how unstable his life had been on the show. For a while, it looked like maybe Steven had found some kind of fresh start outside of the cameras, away from Dr. Now, away from the hospital drama, and away from the constant tension with his family. But even that part of his life did not seem simple. Steven later claimed that the attention from reality TV hurt his relationship, and honestly, that is not hard to believe. When someone becomes famous for being one of the most hated and controversial patients on a show, that kind of attention follows them everywhere. People do not just remember the weight loss, they remember the yelling, the pizza, the fights, the pain pills, the way he treated the nurses, and the way he treated his own family.

[00:07:37]That is a hard image to escape. Over time, Steven mostly disappeared from the public eye. He is not become one of those former patients who constantly updates fans or tries to rebuild their image online. He seems to have stayed in Iowa and kept a much lower profile.

[00:07:51]Justin, on the other hand, went back to Rhode Island and continued building his own life, including running his shop, Hobby Haven. But, the sad part is that the brothers still appear to be estranged, and in some ways that may be the most honest ending to their story.

[00:08:03]Not every family conflict gets fixed just because a TV episode ends. Not every sibling relationship heals because one person gets surgery or loses some weight. The damage between Steven and Justin seemed to go much deeper than food, and by the end, it felt like Justin needed distance from Steven just to protect his own peace. There have also been a lot of rumors online about Steven's health, including repeated death rumors, but family members have confirmed that he was still alive as of 2024, and that detail matters because people online sometimes talk about these reality TV patients like they are characters instead of real people.

[00:08:38]Steven was frustrating to watch. He made a lot of choices that were hard to defend. He hurt people. He pushed people away, and he seemed to sabotage almost every chance he was given. But, he is still a real person who came from a broken childhood, developed dangerous habits, and then became famous at one of the lowest points of his life. And maybe that is why Steven Assanti's story still sticks with people. It does not end with a perfect transformation. It does not end with a clean apology, a healed family, or a dramatic before and after that makes everyone feel good. It ends in a much messier way. Steven got help.

[00:09:11]He lost some weight. He had surgery. He got married, and then he mostly faded from the spotlight. But, the deeper problems, the addiction, the anger, the control, the damage between him and Justin, never seemed fully resolved. His story is a reminder that weight loss surgery can change the size of someone's stomach, but it cannot automatically change the way a person treats people.

[00:09:31]It cannot fix years of family pain overnight, and it cannot save someone who is still fighting against the truth.

[00:09:36]That is what made Steven one of the most unforgettable patients Dr. Now ever faced. Not because he had the biggest transformation, but because his story showed what happens when someone is given chance after chance.