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Everyone says they have an insatiable appetite. But what if that were literally true? For Kate Kane, food is on her mind "all the time."

不少人都说自己的胃口深不可测，但你能想象当这句话成为现实么？对凯特·凯恩来说，食物，是她永远要关心的问题。

Kane, 26, feels so hungry that she begs, steals and even eats out of the garbage to get to food. And if someone didn't stop her, the consequences could be tragic.

为了填饱肚皮，26岁的凯恩尝试过乞讨、偷盗，甚至从垃圾堆找东西吃。如果没人阻止她，后果将不堪设想。

"I could eat until I die, basically," she said. "Or I was -- got really sick."

“我差不多能吃把自己吃死，”她说，“要么就把自己弄得生病。”

For years Kane's condition was a mystery. Ironically, as a baby she wouldn't eat at all.

很多年来，凯恩的身体都是一个谜。奇怪的是，当她还是个婴孩时，竟然不吃任何东西。

"Well, actually at birth the doctors came in and said she had failure to thrive syndrome," said her mother, Kit Kane. "We were very concerned." When Kane gained an appetite her parents were thrilled. But by age 2 she was stealing cupcakes at birthday parties. And by age 3 she weighed 45 pounds, already 50 percent above the average.

“实际上，当她出生的时候，医生告诉我们她可能会死于并发症，”她的母亲基特·凯恩说，“那时我们非常担心。”而当凯特开始吃饭，却把她的父母吓坏了。2岁时，她就在生日宴会上偷杯形饼吃。3岁时，她的体重就到了45磅，正常水平高出50%。

Doctors finally diagnosed her with Prader-Willi syndrome, a genetic disease caused by a chromosomal flaw. It causes learning issues and muscle weakness, but mostly it causes a sense of never being full or satisfied. There is no cure.

医生后来将她确诊为Prader-Willi综合症（PWS），一种由染色体缺陷引起的遗传病。PWS会引发学习障碍和肌肉无力，而更常见的表现则是病人永远没有饱食感。这种病目前无法医治。

Like the estimated 20,000 people with Prader-Willi, Kane will do literally anything for food. She's lost several jobs for pilfering food, and has even resorted to shoplifting.

大约有两万人患有PWS。像他们一样，凯恩基本上活着就是为了吃饭。因为偷吃她已经丢掉了多份工作，甚至还在商店盗窃。

"I have almost got arrested on two occasions," she said, for stealing "candy bars, I think."

她说，为了偷“糖块，有两次我差点给抓住。”

She's also clever. Kane has had food delivered to houses down the block from her family's Maryland home to avoid her parents' watchful eye. And you wouldn't know that the Kane family keeps any food in the house.

为了弄到吃的她想尽办法。住在马里兰的她，为了不让父母发现，要求工作人员把食品投递到她家所在的街区。你没法想象凯恩家里到处都是各种食物的样子。

"It's total lock down," explained her father Jim Kane. "You have to lock the refrigerator, the freezer, cabinets. I mean, you can't turn your back for seconds."

“全都上了锁，”她的父亲吉姆·凯恩解释说。“你必须把冰箱、冷柜和橱子锁起来。就算你只是转个身都不能不锁。”

Still, Kane would try to circumvent her parents' efforts.

有时候，凯恩会想方设法智取。

"I would find the keys where they were hidden and just pick the locks ... take the locks off," she said.

她说：“我能找到他们藏起来的钥匙，然后把锁打开。”