When I found
out, I cried, and
my doctor cried
too!What happened?
I got a real shock in
late 2016 when my
doctor said I had to take
insulin and that if I didn’t get
my blood sugar under control, I’d
lose my licence. It was really
confronting. I had a little cry and
thought ‘I’ve severely stuffed up
here.’ But even that didn’t get me
motivated. I spent another year
with my weight out of control,
feeling tired and lazy. I hated
exercising. I was exhausted,
because when you’re overweight,
you don’t even sleep well. The
more people told me to lose
weight, the less I wanted to do it.
I wasted so much time being
stupid and thinking ‘the insulin
will help, so I don’t have to worry
about eating healthy.’ By this
stage I was 150kg and a size 26.
Then Brittany’s health started
deteriorating faster than
expected. I realised one day I was
going to need to lift her, so I
needed to be fit and healthy to
do that. I was disgusted with
myself for being lazy and not
thinking about what could
happen. It was reckless. If I died,
who was going to look after my
daughter? So, in January 2018,
I saw an ad for Weight Watchers
on the telly and made my mind
up. I was going to lose weight and
kick diabetes in the butt!What did you do?
I joined Weight Watchers and
they sent me a little distance
tracker. I followed the diet online.
I had no junk food. And I started
getting up at 5am every day to go
for a walk. I’d wake up and go “Oh
my God! I don’t want to do this!”
But I walked for 25 minutes
every day, even in the rain. For
the first couple of weeks it was
hard. I had to push myself. But it
was amazing; the weight started
dropping off. I lost about 7kg in
that first month.
I was so excited I thought I’d
do a big walk around my area. So
off I went, with the best of
intentions, but 40 minutes later
I was home and nearly dying.
My body wasn’t ready, so I went
back to just 25 minutes. The
weight kept dropping off and
then I found I could walk
further. Within a couple of
months, I could do 2.5km.