In 1693 Elisabeth Charlotte fell ill with life-threatening pox (smallpox). For fear of infection, the King and almost the entire court fled. She defied the instructions and ideas of contemporary doctors and survived the disease, but kept a pockmarked face. She didn't get upset about it, since she had always considered herself ugly anyway (in excessive exaggeration, as earlier portraits by Mignard and Largillière, among others, prove) and had no interest in beauty care or make-up. Possibly as a further consequence of the disease, from 1694 onwards she gained much weight, that it interfered with their walks. Even so, she continued to hunt, but only mounted horses that were big and strong enough to support her weight. The external change in her appearance can also be clearly seen in the surviving portraits, for example, in a painting by Antoine Dieu of the wedding of the Duke of Burgundy to Marie Adélaïde of Savoy on 7 December 1697, where on the right behind Monsieur a fat Liselotte stands, surrounded by ladies-in-waiting and her son.