chapter 4

The new doctor was not allowed to touch or examine the queen any more than the first one. He had come from a poor area and his experience taught him that improved nutrition could help a woman conceive. This could of course be true in a population of starving villagers, but in a queen who had eaten small amounts of the best food in the land all her life, it was doubtful whether his treatment would work. Nevertheless, they had to try.
So from that day on, Heneietta's ladies made sure she did not just sample everything on her plate. She had to finish every plate of food she was given.
After a month of 'improved nutrition', she was not pregnant. So asked for more. She had to push herself. She had to do what the doctor said. She was already drinking a bottle of brandy every day. Eating more was her duty.
Her morning would start in her bed chamber, with breakfast on a tray. She would eat eggs, kippers and bacon, washed down with her first glass of brandy.
Lunch would be chicken, fried potatoes and vegetables with more brandy.
Dinner was likely to be a more grand affair, often a banquet to honour a visiting dignitary. Henrietta's plate was piled high. She struggled to get through every meal. She felt so full that her ladies had to loosen her stays halfway through.
In those days clothes did not have formal sewn seams. They were held together with lacing by leather thongs. Henrietta's dressers noticed that she was putting on weight. They praised her. Surely this was a sign of her new pregnancy. Her growing girth was a testament to that. They let out her seams gladly and hopefully.
Her flesh became softer. She developed a double chin. Her breasts grew larger. But there was no sign of a baby inside her.
Henrietta thought she must not be trying hard enough. She demanded to be fed even more food, even when she was already quite full.
She started eating between meals. Cakes and pastries, all kinds of delicacies.
The more she ate, the bigger she became. The bigger she became, the harder it was to go for walks in the garden and take exersise. When she exercised less, she put on even more weight and ate even more.
She was enjoying her new lazy, gluttonous lifestyle. She was eating for king and for country. She became huge!
Her dressers noticed with astonishment as her seam lacings could not hold her in any more. The fabric would no longer meet and her flesh would ooze out in between. They ordered new bigger dresses to be made, but she grew out if those as well.
Henrietta's whole life revolved around food and drink. Every waking moment, if she was not able to eat herself, she was force fed. Her body grew beyond obese. Many courtiers had never seen anyone so huge, yet she still kept eating. She herself was often too drunk to care how much she ate. She didn't care what she looked like any more. It was up to her ladies to prettify her so that she could appear in public. She did not care what the public thought. She drank herself into oblivion every day and ate as much as a small army.
She did not worry about getting pregnant any more. Frederick stopped visiting her at night because he was so repulsed by her fat rolls of indulgence.
He spoke to his advisors. How could he get rid of her, so that he could marry someone else. It was clear Henrietta was barren. She was never going to produce an heir now. He had to find a new wife before he was too old to sire an heir.
Luckily, his sister had married an Austrian duke. She had more than enough children to ensure the succession, without causing political upheaval.
Henrietta was an embarrassment. She had done as the doctor's had said. They had turned her from a beautiful young, elegant bride, into an alcoholic tub of lard. He hated the way her flesh jiggled when he touched it. He hated the way she waddled to court these days with her maids fussing around her, making sure she could reach her brandy and a plate of sweetmeats.
Then came the day she got stuck on the throne. She had become so fat she was too big for it. The court had to be cleared as they thought of some way to extract her.
She never appeared in court again.
She was kept hidden away, she never appeared in public again. Frederick did not want his subjects to see her looking like this. He preferred they remembered the happy young beautiful princess he had married, not the grossly fat alcoholic she had become.
He felt guilty. He had listened to the doctors. Their university degrees were not worth the paper they were written on. They knew nothing about medicine! He had them banished from the kingdom.
Queen Henrietta had been relieved of her duties, but she could not stop eating or drinking now.
She grew absolutely immense. Her breasts could rest on her giant belly, her belly rested on her thighs that were bigger than a grown man's waist.
She died at the age of 35. Her liver finally giving up, unable to cope with the daily onslaught or alcohol and calories.
A state funeral was held for her. A coffin had to be especially made and was carried by ten men. The country mourned the passing of a queen who had done her utmost to duty.