Calorie Counting Success

Juliette's aim to be a happy and healthy role model to her children has helped her achieve her weight loss goals.

Age: 34
Height: 5' 9"
Start Weight: 11st 3lb
Current Weight: 9st 9lb
Goal Weight: 9st 9lb
Weight Lost: 1st 8lb
Working to Rate of Loss: 1½lb with 1lb weekly expectation and now 1lb a week

Dieting History

Calorie counting with a calorie counting book, never really worked for me unlike the WLR database!

Rosemary Conley’s hip and thigh diet (hard for me to stick to). Carol Vorderman’s detox plan (or at least some of its recipes). I still incorporate some of these into my repertoire.

Have you lost weight before and regained the weight?

I was always very lucky in that I never gained weight in my teens. I was vegetarian and always very tall and slim. My weight generally ranged from 8½ to 9 stone and never went over.

Gradually my lifestyle changed when I met my future husband at age 16, grew to love certain foods that he loved too, cooking them for both of us, and gradually introduced first fish, then sausages, then other meats back into my diet.

We married when I was 19. I had my daughter when I was 21, only to find my weight had crept up to 12 stone after her birth! I didn’t worry at that point as I was breastfeeding her for her first year, I would deal with it after that.

Well I lost about a stone through doing that, but by the time I was 24 I was expecting my son. I used that as an excuse to just eat what I wanted and by the time he was born I was 12 stone once again! I trimmed up a lot with a Pilates class once he had finished being breastfed.

I was amazed at how much muscle tone I was gaining, and realised that my natural shape was still there beneath the excess skin and fat layer. Moreover I realised that I am naturally small framed.

I did manage to lose weight in dribs and drabs but it wasn’t until I found WLR that it really got moving.

How being overweight has affected you…

At my highest weight I would not buy clothes that I desired because it would have meant purchasing a larger size. I refused to believe I was really a 14 as all my life I had been a 10 to 12. I found anything bigger too depressing. I hated the way I looked. I looked out of proportion, my shoulders had become rounded and my head looked too small when I had put on weight.

I didn’t look like ‘Me’. I hated to see myself in photographs. I was fine about having them taken but once I saw the results I was usually always unhappy with them.

I knew I wasn’t obese but slightly overweight. I knew I was meant to be at the lower end of the scale to look ‘right’ as I am small framed.

It has always been really annoying when people tell me I’m ‘meant’ to be heavier as I am taller, my bones ‘must weigh more’ etc. That has never been the case - not all tall people are ‘large framed’ and I refused to settle for something that made me so unhappy. I still struggle with this from well-wishers today, they feel the need to tell me I’m losing too much ‘for my height’ without taking my frame into consideration. Don’t get me wrong, I love being tall and 'slim'!

As a consequence I study a lot so that I can keep a check on my body's requirements.

I've been vegetarian again for the past 3 or so years and I am interested in nutritional therapy and herbalism, and all things natural.

Motivation to Diet

I realised that all the time I am settling for a weight that makes me unhappy, clothing I dislike, etc is time I am wasting, or wasting a part of my life. I would be far happier to get to a weight I am comfortable with and maintain it, giving myself a few pounds fluctuation room to cover those special occasions, water retention etc so that I am not so hard on myself. I decided 9st 12 as my maximum never-to-exceed-again weight.

For me, to keep my body healthy is so important. I am a role model for my children and if I am not healthy and happy then I cannot be ‘Me’ around them all the time. They could end up missing out on something because I am either unfit or holding myself back because I was not happy with my body. This is not fair on them or me, and it is a bad example to show them.

Discovering Weight Loss Resources

I heard about WLR through a friend on another forum. I joined under a different username (Jet), and not long after I joined, the magazine I read monthly had a 'diets on test' article which I followed with relish as one of the participants was using WLR! She did brilliantly I remember, and I was so pleased to see WLR getting good feedback so publicly.

I tell everyone I know about the website and a few people have joined as a result. Still working on my mum though - she needs a bit of help in the computer literacy department!

How WLR's Calorie Counting Tools Help

First of all, WLR showed me where I was going wrong.

If you enter your typical day’s food and drink intake (without cheating) you can see at a glance over the protein, fat and carbs content as well as the calories just where you are going wrong or right, by using the nutritional profile etc. You can see where you might need to cut back on fat or increase protein.

Also, I could use the food diary as a way to fit in treats that I might miss out on if I was too strict with myself. By eating half a chocolate bar or one biscuit I could savour the flavour and really appreciate the foods I might otherwise miss and then crave, and end up giving up and eat more of a ‘bad’ food than I otherwise would had I just figured it into the food plan in the first place! This might not work for everyone but it has for me.

You just need to know that you are not denied anything, and that goes for my way of thinking too. I had to remind myself that even if the family ate the rest of something when I had only had a little bit, I wasn’t missing out. I had eaten what I really wanted and anything more would only have been excess.

I also find the Recipes section wonderful. I put all my homecooking into it. I can then tweak it here and there to get a healthier balanced version if it is excessive in fat or too little protein. I have input all my basics like ‘basic pasta with sauce’ ‘basic chilli’ and then if I add special things to it I copy the recipe in the recipes section, rename it and add the extras. Wonderful! I don’t know what I would do without the site to be honest.

The Best of Weight Loss Resources

I mostly use the food diary and recipes section. Sometimes I use the new Journal feature to make a few comments about why I ate this or that in case I forget it was someone’s birthday or whatever.

I try to visit the message boards but sometimes there just isn’t the time, but I try to show a bit of support to the other members and keep a tab on my weight loss.

Juliette's Calorie Counting Tips

I think if everyone could understand the roles of protein, fat and carbohydrate, and calories too, and how much or little of each is needed then everyone would be better able to make informed choices in everyday life.

Keeping track on ‘normal’ eating and also seeing patterns in eating that has produced good weight loss results can help individuals to understand how it all works.

The food plan feature is good. I have put my typical day into it so it is easier to fill the food diary in when there are things I will be eating every day, to save time finding them in the favourites section.

Set smaller goals. The sense of achievement you get from each milestone is tremendous!

I don’t often use the exercise diary, unless I have done loads of walking (since I walk everywhere I don’t include walking to the shops or to drop my son at school). I will only add it if I have done so much that I think I need extra calories to get me through the day. If you eat exercise calories try to be careful that you don’t end up using it as an excuse to eat bad things!

This might not seem relevant but I think people with children need to do their weight loss privately, not making a huge deal of it in front of their children. This is especially important if, like me, you don’t outwardly look that much like you need to lose weight. It could reinforce in impressionable girls or boys all the things we slam the media for promoting - crash dieting etc. I haven’t made an issue of it with my kids, I don’t even know if they have noticed I lost any weight, I eat the same as them, I just don’t graze on as much between meals day as they do.