Debbie Kleiboer thought she was going to die.

“I came home from work one Friday night and I wasn’t feeling good. I started throwing up dark blood. And I had black stool,” she recalls. “And the next thing I know I was in the hospital.”

That was six years ago. Doctors determined the Carleton Place woman’s liver was failing, filling her body with deadly toxins. She was put on a transplant waiting list but didn’t think she was going to last long enough to get one.

The cause of Kleiboer’s liver failure was not among any of the usual suspects, hepatitis C, alcohol, or even liver cancer.

She was instead diagnosed with non-alcoholic steatohepatitis, or NASH, a severe type of fatty liver disease directly related to obesity.

As obesity rates continue to rise, so too do the rates of fatty liver disease.

“Fatty liver is now like the new epidemic,” says Dr. Linda Scully, a liver specialist at the Ottawa Hospital. “It’s predicted that there’s going to be way more cirrhosis from fat in the liver than maybe from alcohol and certainly more than hepatitis C.”

The Canadian Liver Foundation says “1 in 4 Canadians may be affected by liver disease due primarily to the rapidly rising prevalence of non-alcoholic fatty liver disease linked to obesity, lack of physical activity and poor eating habits.”

It’s a potentially-deadly consequence of obesity that, so far, very few people are talking about.

“There’s this big stigma. People don’t want to talk about having liver issues because everyone always assumes it’s from alcohol,” says Dr. Scully.

Debbie Kleiboer is talking about it. She wishes she had lived a healthier life and encourages others to do the same.

Fortunately, her brother was a match to donate part of his liver, although even he had to go on a rigorous diet before he could do so.

Six years later she's back in good health. Her recovery, however, has been bittersweet. Last month her father passed away from liver disease.