Real-Life Incredible Hulk

Aug. 10, 2006 — -- Here's the case: Larry Hatch, a 57-year-old carpenter from Texas, awoke in the middle of the night drenched in sweat.

"I felt my hair and my body and my pajamas and they were soaking wet. And I looked over at Cheryl sound asleep by my side. I didn't know who she was," Hatch said.

"I thought at first he had just been in a deep sleep, coming out of a dream and maybe a bit confused," said Cheryl Hatch, Larry's wife.

About three or four days later, the same thing happened again.

Cheryl, a nurse, was monitoring her husband's condition. "I just had a suspicion that possibly this was the onset of diabetes."

But before Larry went to the doctor about it, he had another frightening episode while he was visiting his friend, Jack Morgan.

Morgan remembers that visit. "As we were talking, Larry was acting kind of like he was out of it. His ears were kind of red. He looked a little red in the face 'cause he kept rubbing his face."

"The way he was acting, I felt maybe he had a clogged artery or something and he was just gonna fall out on the floor in a heart attack."

Morgan called 911. After he made that phone call, Larry passed out.

"When the paramedics arrived and came in, I still, in the back of my mind, was thinking this may be related to diabetes. So I asked them to check his blood sugar," Cheryl said.

Larry's blood sugar was 31; the average person's blood sugar is around 70.

Larry went to his family doctor who told him that he had low-blood sugar and was hypoglycemic.

But Cheryl was beginning to see other changes in Larry. "I began to notice that Larry's nose was beginning to enlarge. His tongue became thicker, so he was actually speaking with a little bit of a lisp. His hands seemed like they were clubbing and getting thicker."

Weeks later, Cheryl noticed that even more bizarre things were happening to her husband. "Larry's hair was growing so fast that we were giving him a haircut about every two weeks. I cut his fingernails and his toenails about every two weeks. And his face just seemed like it was getting these huge, deep wrinkles."