At the end of 2020 my GP told me that if I didn’t lose weight I wouldn’t make it out of my 40’s. I knew that she was probably right, but I had no idea where to even start. I weighed 146 kg and I felt absolutely miserable both physically and mentally. My GP referred me to Roland McCallum and I started my journey with the Health Hub team in January this year. I was initially quite sceptical of the program due to how restrictive it was and doubted my ability to stick to it for 12 weeks. I decided I would knuckle down and give it a red hot crack for 4 weeks and if it wasn’t working I’d quit. My first week was completely awful!! I suffered with massive sugar/KFC withdrawals, endured some fierce hunger pangs and a lot of cravings! Then, at the end of my second week a funny thing happened; not only had I lost weight, but I realised I was already starting to feel better!! At this time I started to see my awesome coach Kathy each Wednesday for my weekly weigh in and chat about how I was travelling. These weekly check-ins were vital early on in my journey to help keep me accountable and they continue to be now, 20 weeks and 30kg later.
As I approached the 12 week mark, I started to think about what my post-diet plan would be. So often throughout my life I’ve dieted for x amount of time and achieved fantastic results. Then I’ve had that thought of “Job done, now I can go back to what I was doing before” and gradually blown out to my pre-diet weight or worse. I never had a plan for what to do once I reached my goal weight. This time around I was determined to achieve lifelong change and I wanted to ensure I had a solid plan to pivot away from dieting in a healthy and sustainable way. Kathy recommended that I see Health Hub Psychologist Noelene, to help me improve my mental relationship with food. My sessions with Noelene have helped me identify strategies to help manage my mental health throughout this process; not only whilst dieting, but also as I start to transition into my maintenance phase.
I noticed at around the point where I’d lost 20kg that I was losing fat and muscle at a ratio of 50:50. This was quite disheartening for me, as it was effecting my body composition. Even when I was much heavier, I’d always been strong and had big arms, one of the few physical features I liked in myself. At this point my arms and chest were starting to deflate, which I hated. I decided to start lifting weights at the gym 4 days per week. To begin with it was great, but pretty quickly I was getting drained of energy and I fell in a heap. This happened because I was still only consuming around 1000 calories a day and barely any carbohydrates, which are essential for replenishing muscles post-training. So I started seeing Health Hub Dietitian Hannah. Hannah is currently helping me balance my food intake to ensure that I still remain in a caloric deficit, but have enough energy to undertake resistance training. In the 8 weeks since first seeing Hannah and making her suggested changes, I have consistently undertaken resistance training 5 days per week. I have gained 1kg of lean mass and lost 10kg of fat. I’ve also had a lot more energy, as I’m eating more overall (1500 calories) and have incorporated a better balance between fat, carbs and protein. I continue to see Hannah to help me develop the tools I need to become self-sustaining once my dieting period ends.
My journey hasn’t been all smooth sailing and I’ve got a long way to go, but I have achieved some great results so far. I’ve lost 30kg, I’m no longer pre-diabetic, my reflux is gone, I’m sleeping better, pain free, anxiety free and my blood pressure is normal. The support of the fantastic team of experts at Health Hub has been so vital to my success and I can’t thank them enough for all they do! I can’t wait to see what I can achieve in the next 20 weeks!
