5st 4lbs in 9 months and still going strong.

[Tizer]

In May last year the wife's sister came to stay with us for the weekend, it had been quite a while since we had seen her and she looked great, you could see she had lost a lot of weight and she said she had been following the slimfast plan.

Her weightloss inspired me to sort myself out, in my late thirties and very overweight and always had been as long as I could remember. After she went back home, we bought some digital scales and to my horror I came in at over 17st with a BMI of 37.6.

A trip to the supermarket followed and we bought powder shakes, snacks and meal replacement bars and after a week I had lost 7lbs, the guys at work gave me some stick as I expected them to but this just pushed me on.

By August I was down to 14st 7lbs and for the first time ever I was out swimming with the kids on holiday, that felt so special, my old clothes were starting to look far too big for me and I was looking at "normal" sized clothes, which seemed so strange.

Christmas came and I weighed 12st 9lbs, this was my toughest test, being off work for 10 days and with all the nice Christmas food, drink and treats in the house but in the new year to my surprise, my weight had stayed the same.

My 11st 5lbs target was now well and truly in sight and here we are coming to the end of January and at today's weigh-in I am 11st 12lbs, so I have 7lbs to go and hopefully in 3 weeks time I will be there.

My 42 inch waist is now down to a 34 and I can't ever remember being a 34 inch waist before, even as a child, chest is down from 48 to 40 and I feel great.

I will update again when I reach the target weight!

[Hidden]

Very well done.

I wonder if you're wondering why you didn't do it years earlier? I know I keep thinking I should have done something my weight and my eating years ago!

And if you don't deal with it, then that extra weight just sneaks up on you, doesn't it?

[Tizer]

To be honest, I have tried before, losing 2 stone each time but never sticking at it for longer than 3 months and of course it just creeps back on but this time I have stuck with it and its a change for life, actually thinking about what I am going to eat before I eat it and always reading what's in it.

You can't just diet, you have to change yourself and I suppose the difficult job starts again once you reach the target weight and maintain it.

[ilovedogs]

Brilliant! Have you exercised too?

[Tizer]

I cycle to and from work 5 days a week which is only 3 miles per day, I do an active manual job and occasionally go swimming at the weekends, other than that no.

I intend to start gym soon though, just plucking up courage!

[Hidden]

I do agree.

It's really more about re-educating / re-training yourself about food. Losing the weight, getting to a sensible BMI and losing the body fat are like consequential rewards of that re-training process.

I've actually discovered a lot about food - even in just a couple of weeks - and I think I would find it hard to go back to the way I was, whether I get to my target or not.

I bet you are so chuffed at the 34 in waist. (I know I would be!)

[eeshaqua]

So what did you do exactly to lose so much of weight?? even i am looking to lose a lot of weight but have been only able to lose around 20 lbs in the last 5 months with moderate exercise and occasional dieting. my marriage is round the corner, so need to lose a lot of weight before it.. please advise!!

[Tizer]

I just followed the slimfast plan and sort of modified it to suit with other products.

I preferred the ultra slim shakes to slimfast, so used that, 200 cal breakfast shake, 200 calorie meal replacement bar for lunch, upto 3 x 100 calorie snacks through the day, then an evening meal of no more than 600 cals - Total 1300 cals per day.

Drink plenty of water, flavoured if you hav to and be strict on the old alcohol, I like a drop so limited myself to just a very little on one day only.

Good luck!