Woman sees incredible 10st weight loss after being embarrassed about her size in a picture
A woman left feeling embarrassed by a photo in which she looked like she was stuck in a chair has seen an incredible 10st (64kg) weight loss.
Lisa Childs, 61, from Elland, West Yorkshire, was mortified by the snap her brother took of her as she squeezed into an arm chair after seeing her weight creep up to 19st 8lbs (124kg).
But the feelings the image conjured sparked the sales assistant into action, inspiring her to ditch fast food for nutritious, home-cooked meals.
Now a trim 9st 8lb (61kg), and having dropped eight dress sizes from 24 to a healthier size 12, Childs is happy to pose for pictures in the chair at her mum's house which inspired the change.
"I didn't realise how big I was," the mum-of-one recalls.
"I had started to lose weight but when he [my brother] sent me that picture, it was like 'Oh my god, I've got to carry on because I can't go back to looking like that.'"
"It definitely inspired me to keep going," she adds.
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Childs used to walk her son Max, now 27, to and from school every day, which used to be her daily form of exercise.
But when Max got older and wanted to walk to school with his friends, Childs says she noticed her weight creep up because she wasn't exercising.
"The weight just piled on then because I wasn't taking him to school," Childs, who is married to Stephen, 62, explains.
"It was a good half-an-hour there and back and I would do that in the morning and in the afternoon.
"So I went from doing that to doing nothing," she adds.
As the years went on, she noticed she would often become breathless when walking up the stairs and would need to "stop half a dozen times" when walking back from the bus stop.
"My breathing was affected because I was carrying so much weight basically," she adds.
Her knees also started to hurt to the extent that it would sometimes became painful to walk.
As well as no longer exercising, Childs says her diet included a fair amount of convenience food such as a Chinese takeaway or a frozen pizza, which she'd have two or three times a week.
The turning point came in 2017, when, after joining Slimming World, she made a number of simple swaps to her eating habits, switching a thick white loaf for wholemeal bread and snacking on fruit rather than chocolate bars.
She now cooks almost all her meals from scratch and follows low-calorie recipe versions of her favourite foods, such as Spaghetti Bolognese.
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As well as losing over half her body weight, Childs says it has made a huge difference to her life, particularly as she can now go for daily walks with her Poochon Phoebe without getting breathless or being in pain.
"When I first started, I couldn't really do any exercise and I started losing weight just through Slimming World," Childs explains.
"But we got a dog so I had to walk her for around five minutes and then build it up.
"Now I go out with my friend and walk from Elland to Brighouse, have a coffee and walk back without having to stop."
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Childs has also taken on a charity walk of 13 miles to raise money for a local hospice.
"I'm quite proud of it because I never walked before anyway unless I had to," she adds.
"When I think about it, I never would have dreamed of walking that distance, or any distance really."
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Diet before:
Breakfast: Nothing
Lunch: Beans on toast with white bread and scrambled eggs
Tea: Either a Chinese, fish and chips or a full frozen pizza
Snacks: Chocolate puddings
Diet after:
Breakfast: Fresh fruit with Greek-style, fat-free yoghurt
Lunch: Beans on toast but with wholemeal bread
Tea: A Slimming World ready meal or a fat-free spaghetti bolognese
Snacks: Fruit
Additional reporting SWNS.
