I was made redundant during the first wave of COVID in 2020.

This shattered my world. My self-worth took a beating and to top it all off the following week South Australia went into COVID lockdown. This meant that I lost all social connections pretty much overnight. So, I started to do what most people do when they are alone and lost and just started to eat.

I am ashamed to say I blossomed to 124kgs. I shut off completely and when we were allowed back out I would not attend any social outings as I was worried about how I looked and what people would think.

Over the past few years, I had tried all sorts of diets, “Ways of Life” and even Duromine and acupuncture and was never able to get below 119kg. Every time I lost weight I would put it straight back on again. My Derby name is Alotta Amazon because I am a whole lot of woman. And now I had ballooned even more. I honestly thought I was never going to be healthy again. That I was past it and just had to put up with it. My doctor even told me that I was fighting genetics and would just have to live with it, even after discovering I was a type 2 diabetic.

Then came the day that I finally opened my ears and listened to the amazing and awesome friend. She had been on a program and lost a very noticeable amount of weight. So, I thought “stuff” genetics, it is all about choices and I made the choice to be healthy.

And as they say, the rest is history. Or should that be, the weight is history.

Over 20kg gone and working on it!!