Success Story: Jayne

Dieting History

I’ve tried lots of different diets.

The most successful for me, before I found WLR, was Atkins. I’m wheat intolerant so it suited me down to the ground. I never got bad breath, never had headaches, had loads more energy and lost weight. But after a while it became really hard to maintain as it’s so unnatural so I stopped doing it.

I tried Weight Watchers when I was younger as my mother has been doing it for years (with varying degrees of success) but found the points system too complicated so gave up.

I’ve also tried the cabbage soup diet and made one perfect batch of soup that I really enjoyed eating but couldn’t reproduce it and the next few batches were horrible so gave up on that. I even bought a blender for it!

I’ve dabbled with meal replacements but they don’t fill me up so they’ve never lasted long.

Have you Lost Weight Before and Regained the Weight?

I’ve yo-yoed all my adult life.

When I was 16 I weighed about 9 stone, which sounds great now but then I was the biggest girl in my class. I went to dance lessons and looking back at old photos of me in a leotard, I looked like a baby elephant.

When I went to university the weight started to creep on until my final year when a nasty break up led me to lose a lot of weight on a diet of cider and cigarettes (not recommended!!!). Once I’d recovered from the broken heart I was so obsessed with keeping the weight off that my friends started to get really worried about me. On one occasion I hadn’t realised that my housemate had put olive oil on the spaghetti I was about to eat and when I took a mouthful of it and realised, I panicked, spat it out and refused to eat another mouthful. I never got to the throwing up stage but can understand how it can happen.

After that I started working and I’d go up to about 10 and a half stone and then go on a diet and lose it. This happened a few times but I could never maintain the weight loss for long and always put it back on again.

About 3 years ago I was at my heaviest, just over 12 stone and barely fitting into size 16 clothes.

I went to Australia to visit my sister and when I looked at the photos I realised how awful I looked so decided I had to do something about it once and for all.

My mother (who has also dieted for years) suggested the Atkins diet because of my wheat intolerance so I tried it and found it worked really well - probably too well - as I lost 2 and a half stone in about 3 months. I kept the weight off for over a year that time but then I met my current boyfriend and within 6 months I was back to over 11 stone.

That was when I discovered WLR and it has been a revelation.

How Being Overweight has Affected you…

I’ve always been self conscious of my weight and when I was at my biggest I didn’t want to do anything that might draw attention to the fact that I was overweight. It would really depress me and I’d feel that it was so unfair that some people can eat loads and not gain weight when I couldn’t.

I didn’t go on any beach holidays for a couple of years as the thought of putting on a bikini filled me with dread, as would nights out with friends. When I was single I would watch as my slimmer friends got chatted up and if I didn’t, I would think it was because I was too fat.

A few years ago I went for a promotion at work and was told I wouldn’t get it as there was already one big, brash manager and they didn’t want another. I felt utterly humiliated and left the job soon after.

Motivation to Diet

I don’t want to be the big girl anymore.

I want to be able to shop in the same places as my friends and buy nice clothes.

Exercising and being healthy is also more important to me as I get older and I definitely didn’t feel healthy when I was bigger.

Finally, at 32 I now feel ready to have children and I want to give myself the best possible chance to get pregnant.

Discovering Weight Loss Resources

The same as most people. I was looking for an online calorie counter, did the trial and signed up. That was about 18 months ago.

How Weight Loss Resources Helps

I lost a stone after joining WLR and then for some reason stopped and was stuck at just over 10 stone for ages. It took the SURFS challenge to motivate me into losing the last half a stone, which I’ve now just about done.

I find my food diary indispensable now as it’s so easy to find the food I’ve decided to eat that day. If I have a day when I don’t use it I always go over in calories as it’s too easy to forget about the snack or the drink I’ve had. I like that I can input food/recipes etc myself if they’re not there already as that make life easier.

It’s very useful to see my nutrition breakdown for the day/week as I can then choose to eat differently to ensure I have the right amount of fruit/veg etc for me.

I also use the message boards a lot. They’re great for advice and support and just reading other people’s posts makes me feel more motivated, as does reading the success stories.

I read a lot of the tried and tasted, the news stories and anything else that catches my eye.

I’ve found that I think a lot more about what I’m eating now. Before WLR I wouldn’t have thought a lot about the amount of fruit and veg I was eating or what proportion of my food came from protein or fat etc.

It’s also cemented how I feel about exercise. Because I can see a direct link from how much exercise I can do to how much food I can eat it has made me want to do some form of exercise every day.

The Best of Weight Loss Resources

The two main areas I use are my food and exercise diary and the message boards.

The message boards have got me through many a tough day when someone has brought cakes into the office and said to me “go on, one won’t hurt”. When that happens I post a message and wait for the encouraging and motivating responses or I read what’s there and reply myself which takes my mind of the cake sitting 6 feet away from me.

I fill in my food diary every morning when I get to work with what I’m going to eat that day before I get home. Then depending on what exercise I do that day, I fill that in which gives me the remaining amount that I can have in the evening. My boyfriend couldn’t believe I was doing that each day and commented that it was a bit over the top and surely I didn’t need to put in everything (he was talking about the 2 M&S Percy pigs I entered last week) but for me it’s the best way and I know that if I do that I will lose weight or as I am starting to do now, maintain the weight.

Jayne's Dieting Tips

• Always weigh your food as it’s surprising how small a standard serving of something is.
• Input everything you eat and drink into the food diary - it really helps you figure out where you’ve been going wrong.
• Have a look at every part of the site when you can - there’s so much more on there than just the food diary and the forums.
• Fill in your profile and keep updating photos - it’s so motivating to others and to yourself to see the great progress people are making.
• Keep using WLR once you’re at goal weight. It’s so easy once you’re there to think you can relax a bit.