The Feed My Health Podcast
Welcome to the Feed My Health Podcast, where we redefine what it means to thrive as a midlife woman.
This is your space to explore sustainable health, balanced nutrition, mindset shifts, and habits that actually fit into real life—kids, careers, and all.
Hosted by Rosalind Tapper, a high-level coach and mentor for women ready to take the lead in their own lives, each episode is packed with expert insights, practical strategies, and inspiring stories to help you feel unstoppable💫
Whether you're navigating perimenopause, balancing family and work, or simply trying to find you again, this podcast will empower you to:
✨ Build a body and mindset you’re proud of
✨ Break free from yo-yo dieting and quick fixes
✨ Balance health with the joys of life, guilt-free
It's time to make yourself a priority without sacrificing what you love. Let's do this together. 💪
🎧 New episodes every Monday. Tune in and take that first step to becoming the leading lady in your life!💫
The Feed My Health Podcast
Why Accountability Changes Everything with Jane Riley
What happens when someone who's never dieted before decides to transform their health at age 56? Jane Riley's journey with Feed My Health breaks every stereotype about midlife weight loss and proves it's never too late to change your relationship with food.
After losing her husband to a sudden brain tumor, Jane faced her own mortality and decided it was time for a change. Four and a half years later, she's lost nearly six stone and found a level of energy she never thought possible. "I do not feel like a nearly 61-year-old woman," she shares, describing how she now outpaces colleagues decades younger.
Unlike many weight loss stories that begin with a history of yo-yo dieting, Jane had never attempted to lose weight before joining Feed My Health. Her transformation wasn't just about dropping sizes but discovering a sustainable approach to healthy living. The accountability of weekly check-ins and food logging became her anchor, helping the self-described "everything eater" make consistent choices that led to lasting results.
Perhaps most revealing is Jane's perspective on meals out and treats. Rather than viewing her program as restrictive, she's learned to plan around special occasions and enjoy life's pleasures without derailing her progress. "This is how I live my life now," she explains. "I almost don't have to think about it." This shift from diet mentality to lifestyle change marks the difference between temporary results and sustainable transformation.
Jane's only regret? Not starting sooner. Her story serves as powerful inspiration for anyone who believes they're too set in their ways or too old to change. The physical transformation is impressive, but it's the newfound confidence and energy that truly showcase what's possible when you commit to feeding your health.
Ready to write your own transformation story? Book a free success call with Rosalind and discover how sustainable weight loss is possible at any age.
👉 We don’t just help you lose weight - we help you keep it off for good. If you’re serious about breaking free from quick fixes, my team and I will transform your daily habits so your results last a lifetime.
JOIN Feed My Health Today!
✨ Not ready to dive all the way in yet? That’s okay.
If you know something has to change but you’re not quite ready for the full programme, I’ve created two simple ways to step into my world and start building momentum:
🌸 The Confidence Kickstart (FREE Telegram Group)
This is your safe space to get inspired, learn bite-sized mindset strategies, and start feeling more in control of your health and body again. It’s where you’ll get practical tools, motivation, and a taste of what’s possible for you when you stop putting yourself last.
🔥 The Body Confidence Club (£22 right now)
If you’re ready to do more than just watch from the sidelines and want to start implementing real changes, this is your next step. Inside you’ll get structured guidance, simple actions to follow, and the accountability to finally follow through. (The price will be increasing soon, so now is the best time to jump in!)
Welcome back everybody to another episode of the Feed my Health podcast with your host, rosalind Tapper. I am the owner and founder of Feed my Health Online Coaching, which is sustainable weight loss and lifestyle coaching for midlife women who feel stuck and want to look great in everything that they wear whilst living an effortlessly healthy life. In today's episode, we have a very special guest and I'm so excited to bring her on. She has been with Feed my Health for an incredibly long time and is one of our longest serving clients. Her transformation is absolutely out of this world.
Speaker 1:And here's the strange thing, here's the crazy thing. She is one of the few women that I've ever met, ever spoken to, who, before Feed my Health, had ever embarked on a diet before Now. The reason why I want to bring her on is because not only is she one of my favorite people in the entire world, but her transformation is an absolutely incredible story. The reason why she joined and the fact that she has maintained an incredible, sustainable weight loss throughout her time and continues, week on, week out, to look better and better and better and to feel better and better and better is just absolutely awe inspiring. So sit back, relax, grab a cup of tea or if you're heading out on a walk, grab your walking boots, grab your walking shoes and your airpods and your earpods and all the rest of the pods, and I hope you enjoy this episode. Jane, hello, thank you for joining me. I don't know how it's taking you this long to join me on this podcast.
Speaker 1:I feel like you've got away with it for long enough now I have I've always got something very important to do whenever anybody asks me to do anything so yeah, so tell the listeners a little bit about yourself, who you are, where you come from or the rest okay so, um, you might get joined by a kitten.
Speaker 2:Um, so I am jane riley. I am nearly 61, um, in less than two months I'll be 61. I, um, I'm a librarian. Don't judge, um, I live alone. I'm a widow, um, except for three cats. Uh, if I can persuade one to come in view, there you go. There's one of them. Oh, that's baby girl. Um, yeah, so I live on my own. I work full time. Um, yeah, um, I've been on this journey with roz and the team gosh. Um four and a half years, maybe, something like that a long time a long time, which leads me beautifully into my first question.
Speaker 1:Right at what moment did you decide to reach out and to ask for some help?
Speaker 2:well, um, I mean, I've always been a big girl. I mean I'm about five, eight, five, eight and a half, maybe I don't know, I haven't been measured for ages. Um, I've always been a big girl. I lost, I sort of started to gain weight. I was a fat baby and then, when I was about and I was in a fat of toddler and then when I got to be about 11, I grew in height and went skinny for about two weeks and then, and then, gradually, the weight just sort of piled on and I married a man who was an enormous foodie and I got to the stage where I was eating the same amount as him, um, and getting little or no exercise.
Speaker 2:Um, so when I met my husband, kevin, I worked for the civil service, so I had an office job, so I was sat down all day and, um, when we went out, we went in the car and, um, the weight just gradually piled on, um, until my poor mum fell ill and I ended up looking after her and I actually lost weight because I was literally a bag of nerves. So it was an unhealthy weight loss in a sense, and I remember getting down to about 12 and a half stone and feeling quite good, but my husband was, was worried about me because it wasn't a healthy weight loss. I literally was sort of not eating properly and that didn't last that long. Excuse me, I'm not a comfort eater, but I sort of lost my appetite a bit because I was quite worried about it for a while. And then the weight just gradually piled on, and piled on, and piled on until probably about five years ago when I was probably at my heaviest. Probably about five years ago when I was probably at my heaviest. And I always joke that I suffered I don't know if I still do, I suffered from the opposite of anorexia and that when I thought about myself I knew I was a big girl, but I always thought that I was thinner than I was until I saw photographs, and then I'd be absolutely mortified that I was thinner than I was until I saw photographs and then I'd be absolutely mortified. Um, and anyway, I think I would have carried on, perhaps not getting bigger and bigger, but I was pretty stable, weight wise, I didn't.
Speaker 2:It didn't alter that much and I think the problem is my husband never said anything. He was, he'd, quite like big girls. I mean, there are big girls and big girls, you know. But he wasn't judgmental and I think I would have just sort of stuck as I was. And then, unfortunately, he, um, he fell ill, he, he was diagnosed with a terminal brain tumor, um, and was dead terminal brain tumour, and was dead literally within a couple of months. And he was a big guy but he could carry it better in a sense. He was taller and broader and he wasn't flabby, you know, he was just a big. I mean, his hands were like shovels. He was a big guy.
Speaker 2:And when he died, at the age of 60, I think he was 60 or 61, I can't remember. Now it brought me up short, I thought crikey, because he'd never smoked, which I had. He didn't drink that much, which I do, um, he, um, on the face of it was he had a bit of arthritis but otherwise was completely healthy and I I just thought, gosh, if he I mean it wasn't lifestyle related, his illness and death, but it does make you think about your mortality, you know, and I thought enough's enough. And I think, probably the spur again, because when I'm anxious which I don't suffer from unless something catastrophic happens I wasn't eating that well, I was quite worried about him for that short period before he died and I had lost a little bit of weight. And then when he died, I thought, right, okay, I was never. I never felt like I wanted my life to end. You know, I felt completely bereft. I mean, anybody who met Kevin would have felt bereft. He was the most amazing man, but I actually felt I owed it to him to carry on. Um, so that was the spur for me really to start looking at my lifestyle. The weight loss I've had has been brilliant.
Speaker 2:You know, I can't, I can't say enough about that and the support I've got from Feed my Health. I wouldn't have done it without Feed my Health. I wouldn't have done it without Feed my Health. I wouldn't have done it on my own. My, my willpower is pretty strong, but you need somebody at the back of you and um, and that was it.
Speaker 2:That's why I decided to join and I've been here ever since and I've never felt um, because people have said to me I'm waffling a bit, but people have said to me who know me, you know what to do why are you staying now? You know, why don't you just say thanks very much and walk away? And I've said there's a simple reason I'm accountable. I have to account for everything that passes through my lips. I have to. I am accountable. I have to account for everything that passes through my lips. I am accountable. I have to check in every week. I have to log my food and drink and my steps and my weight. And if I didn't do that, it's very easy to slip, especially if you are a perennial overeater like I was yeah, yeah, yeah, you're absolutely right there.
Speaker 1:Um. Would you say that at the point when you joined? This sounds this sounds very, very morbid of a question to ask, but do you feel like maybe that was one of the lowest points that you've experienced?
Speaker 2:um funnily enough, not really. I mean, I think when I thought about joining, it was a very positive thing to do because, as I say, that was four and a half years ago. So I would have been what? 56, something like that, and I never dieted, never.
Speaker 2:I think that was the problem. That was the problem, in a sense, with my husband is that he enabled me to feel I mean it's a lovely thing. He enabled me to feel so secure and I am a confident woman. I'm very shy nobody thinks I am. I am shy, but I also have a lot of confidence, and I have to in the job I do because I'm the only one in confidence.
Speaker 2:But I just I did feel that that was the catalyst losing Kevin. I don't honestly think I would have done it, because I think and this sounds a horrible thing to say it's much easier to cook just for one than try and put two of you on a regime, because if you're in a partnership, I would have had to persuade kevin that it was the best thing for him. Otherwise we're cooking two meals. So it's much easier when you're on your own because you, you make the choices yourself and they only affect you and you don't have to sit next to somebody who's eaten a tub of Haagen-Dazs which would be torture, let's face it or, even worse, ben and Jerry's. I mean good God, you know that to me would be just like no.
Speaker 1:Do you know? What's really interesting about that, though, jane, is that I'm going to hopefully make you sound very special, in that your situation is incredibly unique. Most of our clients do have families. They do have partners.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:And as somebody myself who lives with a very slim, tall human being.
Speaker 2:Yes, I know your husband. He's skinny as anything, skinny as anything.
Speaker 1:And he can just sit and that was our reality. I would feel I was an emotional eater for sure, and he would come home and he could eat whatever he wanted. Even now he can eat whatever he wants and you would never know. He could eat the entire sofa and you wouldn't. You know it wouldn't, wouldn't show, would it?
Speaker 1:you wouldn't you wouldn't be able to see a thing. He'd still be a size, bloody medium. And the problem is the the issue wasn't, for me at that point, the fact that I felt that I should have to eat separately from him from a, um, practical standpoint. It was a mental standpoint, it was a mindset thing. Yeah, and so I'm pretty certain that if, if kev was here and the situation had been different and you'd still decided to have done it, you'd have had that conversation and you probably would find that you're eating exactly the same things. You're just eating different quantities of it.
Speaker 2:Yes, I mean that is very true, because I always had I used to. I mean, I think I said to you when I joined you that Kev and I, yes, we did like you know bar of chocolate, tub of ice cream, all the rest of it, but our evening meals were pretty healthy. It was just the size of the portions you know, um. So, for example, one of my favorite things is jersey new potatoes. Love jersey new potato. I mean, I love most books, but jersey new potatoes love them, and I haven't bought them in five years, and the reason being I can't resist them.
Speaker 2:So I would boil them up and I'd put butter in the pan and, you know, shake them all up, leave the skins on, and I would serve six or seven that sort of size to us for tea, and then the rest would stay in the pan, because the idea was that I'd either freeze them or take them for lunch and I would eat the rest of them out of the pan, and that that was the problem. It was portion control I didn't have. I mean, I've been at somebody's house when there's four of us this is my brother and his wife and son and they served a dessert and shared as as an ice cream, a tub of Haagen-Dazs. I would eat a whole tub of Haagen-Dazs. I wouldn't have thought I wouldn't bat an eyelid. I mean, ironically, I didn't even feel full, because it's rubbish really, isn't it?
Speaker 2:I mean, it's rubbish calories, you know, but I would eat a tub of agandaz very regularly If it was on offer at the supermarket you know, I'd get a couple of them. You know, and that was my issue, it wasn't what I was eating, it's the amount I was eating and not getting any exercise.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:So what have been your biggest wins in all of this time?
Speaker 2:in all honesty, my biggest win and I'm saying this, having said that, I am a confident person is and I, I, I'm, I'm not, I must be in as the next person, but I am not constantly like looking at myself in mirrors and stuff. What, if I look in the mirror, is to see that I haven't got a big splodge of muck on my face, or I have, you know, my knickers, my skirt tucked into my knickers, or you know something like that.
Speaker 2:But I'll walk past shop windows when I get off the bus and I'm like check me out, and I would never have done that. I would have avoided that. So that's that's really. That's really positive. But I think the best thing is the energy I've got. I've just got this incredible amount of energy, um, and I wake up early I mean ridiculously early. Actually, a lot of that is to do with having three cats that wake me up, but I've got lots of energy and I feel great. I mean, I feel absolutely. I do not feel like a nearly 61-year-old woman. I mean, I'm the second oldest at my place of work, but the energy I've got in comparison with colleagues who are 20 or more years younger is insane and I have to put it down to losing the weight and honestly, once you get yourself in that situation and it's not even just about weight loss.
Speaker 1:Actually, it's about doing it in the correct way, because I've lost weight in the past on all kinds of ridiculous regimes Boiled egg diet I did If only that would have been one of the healthier ones I didn't feel that great. I actually felt like I could just lie down on the floor most of the time.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I think you have to do it in the right way, but honestly, it's sometimes you look back and you think I don't even know how I was in that situation before no, it's very easy and I mean the problem is because I know that your background, you know you, you were, you were there, were you two with two small kids, initially, skin and unfortunately, junky kind of food is much cheaper and you've got to think about I mean that's. The other thing I'm quite lucky about is that I can afford because there's only me I can afford to buy good quality fruit and veg. You know I can afford to buy good quality fruit and veg. You know I can afford to buy nice pieces of chicken. I'm not buying like chicken dippers or you know what I mean, and that does make a difference because not everybody can do that. And yeah, I mean I enjoyed my food and I still enjoy my food, I still go out to eat.
Speaker 2:You know I love to eat out, it's one of my favourite things, but I realise now that I can't. You can do it every night, but you're not going to lose the weight or you're not going to maintain the weight. Let's say you're not going to lose the weight or you're not going to maintain the weight. Let's say um, and I think that's. You've just got to be sensible, you know, if you want, like last week, I had two meals out, um, but I ate around them, if you know what I mean. So I had a lighter breakfast, um. One was a. Were they birth lunches? I can't remember. There must have been so memorable. One was a. One was a carvery, which I really enjoyed, um, and I can't remember what the other one was, but um, but I was.
Speaker 2:I realized that they were coming up and I adjusted over the week accordingly. I didn't starve, but I, I was, I, I was more sensible, if you like. I was thinking well, I want to enjoy that carvery, oh, I know what it was. I went to the pub to meet a colleague who's been off sick for two months, um, and we had a meal in the pub, but, and I wanted to enjoy them both those meals out. So I was sensible on those days. So I didn't have a massive lunch on the evening I went out and I didn't have a massive dinner on the lunch that I went out. You know I was. I mean, I use this phrase all the time and I can't think of a better one. It's not rocket science, just think about it.
Speaker 1:It's about intentionality and planning, because if you were anything like me, I would just eat like on the fly, on the go. Yes, I would just pick whatever was easiest. If toast was an easy option, that day, I'd have toast. Um lunch was maybe. If I was out with the kids, I'd go and grab like something awful at the drive through, like it was very. There was no. There was no thought. Everything that I ever did was as a result of how I felt.
Speaker 1:Yes, In that moment, if I felt lonely, if I felt sad, if I felt like I had no energy, the food choices would speak for themselves. Oh yeah, if you're an emotional eater, that's bang on, yeah, yeah yeah, and I think, when it comes to eating out and, you know, going on holidays and things like that, yes, you want to enjoy the foods and I and I am a firm believer and I don't think that people should go out for meals, particularly if it's not something they do regularly.
Speaker 1:I don't think people should go out for meals and think right, what's the best thing I can have on the menu? Because then you're just feeling like a little bit miffed and a little bit like you're missing out. If you really want the pie, have the pie. You should have the pie, but yes you should learn the strategy around having that pie and be intentional like you were.
Speaker 2:I think that's the the thing that I've told people um, because, as I say, I work in a public facing job, um, and then just lately I have I, I'm at my lowest weight now, for gosh, I I don't even know. I mean I I think probably eight when I was 18 or something, really literally. Um, and I actually saw a woman today that I haven't seen since. Oh gosh, I mean, you forget, we locked down. That's five years ago, isn't it probably um eight years. I haven't seen this woman for eight years. And she said oh, my god, you've lost so much weight. And she said are you all right? Though it's not, you wanted to lose it, didn't you?
Speaker 2:Because that's the thing that people always say I haven't seen you for a while. They immediately think is she ill or is she? You know, and I have to say it slightly annoys me Because I think do I look ill? Then why are you saying that? Do I look so bad that you're having to say that? But obviously you know it's an understandable reaction. But yeah, I mean, I'm lucky because I'm not an emotional eater, but then I'm unlucky because I'm an everything eater, any excuse to eat. And the other thing that people have said. You know to me, you know they've commented on my weight loss, particularly in the last sort of month and a half.
Speaker 2:And I'm not an emotional eater, but I'm very much influenced by the weather and the time of year. I hate being cold and when it's been this lovely weather, even though we're in drought, I feel better. I'm more active, I feel better, I feel I look better. You show more flesh not always a good thing at my age, but anyway, um, or you know, you might be showing my flesh. I've got a nice holiday coming up in to less than two months. You know, I've got that in the back of my mind. I'm going somewhere hot and and you do, and it makes you feel more. I feel more positive when it's nice weather, when it's light nights and light mornings, and it makes it easier to eat healthier in winter. I want to eat stodge. I want to eat, like you said, pies, mash gravy. You know, is it bad that I want to?
Speaker 2:eat that year out I would, um, but the other thing it's like we're saying about you pick your battles. So, for example, um, my, my friend, her husband, has issues with his gallbladder and he's waiting for an operation to have it removed and he's on a very restricted diet. And we're talking about food because we always talk about food. Everybody I know talks, talks about food. Everybody I know loves food. And she was saying about tuna. She said I'm sick of tuna Because she's going with, she's doing it with him. Because she said I can't sit there eating scones with loads of potty cream and butter and jam and so it's not fair. And she said you must be sick of tuna.
Speaker 2:You have that like three lunches a week. And I said actually no, because to me my breakfast and my lunch are fuel, because I've got a busy job and I look at them as fuel so that I eat healthily and I eat what is going to keep me full till I get home from work. So I always have salad and tuna or salad and chicken. You know something like. I don't have sandwiches anymore.
Speaker 2:Salad, I find it seems more substantial because I'll have a big bowl of that with some protein. And breakfast is porridge if it's cold Yogurt, you know, a bit of protein powder, some fruit, that kind of thing. They're a means to an end to me, so I have them because they will keep me full until I leave work, and then my dinner can be something more adventurous, something. My dinner can be something more adventurous, something, not not the same thing every day. I can then experiment a bit more and have something a bit more flavorful, but still within the calorie count. But I've I've started to look at it like that and actually it helps. Instead of looking at everybody in these gorgeous Max and Spencer's cream cheese and this, that and the other sandwich and thinking why can't I have that? I'm thinking, well, you know what I could have it for my dinner? I don't, but I could. So that's the thing. It's a compromise, isn't it?
Speaker 1:it is, and I think it would be nice to think you can eat whatever you want whenever you want and still lose weight, but the reality is you can't. But when you do it in the right way, you actually become more aware of the choices that you make. And I think about you know some of the stuff that we used to eat, and it was all lovely food, but it was very overindulgent, yeah.
Speaker 1:You know, me and Mark would share like a fajita kit for four between the two of us yeah, like nobody, we do that nobody needs that much food, and well, and I think as well we. We're in a world where everybody oh sorry, other soft drinks are available. We're in a world where food is so readily available, there's so much choice, and we're just so over indulged all the time.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we are, we are yeah, I mean I yeah. I mean the weird thing is I, because I think I got like this last year before my holiday, because I'm keen to be at my best when I go away, because I'm going away with this very beautiful, glamorous, slim woman.
Speaker 2:I hate her and she's years younger than me. Sorry, the cats have decided to have a fight in the background. Oh hell, pack it in. They don't pay attention to me. I don't know why I'm doing that, and because I've got in my mind that this holiday isn't that far off. When I knew that I was going out for this carvery and meeting my old colleague, I was a bit annoyed Because I'm like well, I love a carvery, I love a roast dinner, absolutely love it. It's up there with fish and chips for me, love it, love it, love it. Excuse me, but part of me was a bit cheesed off because I was thinking if I wasn't having that calvary, I wasn't going out for that pub dinner, I'd have more weight loss this week and then I realized that that actually isn't healthy.
Speaker 2:Because I enjoyed both those meals. I wasn't overly indulgent, but I did indulge and I enjoyed them and actually because I'd adjusted before and after. There was a tiny blip on the scales, but it had gone in a day, in a bit you know and and then that's the thing you've got. That's what's great about feed my health that you don't have any. You shouldn't have any sense of guilt if you fall off the ladder. Is it ladder? That's a library term.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think you've been in your job too long. Fall off the ladder.
Speaker 2:Wagon, nothing's really ladders.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we don't do wagons.
Speaker 2:But the other thing I think that's the thing, and what I would say to women is at my biggest I looked awful but I didn't realise how awful, because you get used to looking at yourself but I never got any sense of. I wasn't made to feel ashamed, I wasn't made to feel, you know, I know a lot of weight loss programs, my friends being on them and and you get this. Oh well, you know, this kind of you should have come to us six months ago. You know, that kind of mentality. There was never a sense of that there's. It's very much a family this kind's really call it but very much a family and everybody supports everybody and everybody has been in the same position. That's why we're with feed my health. It's not. We're not with feed my health because we're all size eight, for god's sake. I mean, I am, but that's my shoe. Um, that's the nearest. I'll get Bum, bum, and I think that's the thing. I didn't want to go somewhere where I would feel chastised or guilty or made to feel like a slob or anything like that, I mean.
Speaker 2:One other thing to maybe point out is, as I say, I'm absolutely full of energy, not as much as these three lunatics, but then they are only a year old, um, um, when I was big, I was never inactive. I was, I was, you know, I could keep up at work. I wasn't um, I wasn't breathless, I wasn't um, the only sort of thing I think I could say. I felt I got warm very quickly, because big girls get warm very quickly, so I would always feel quite warm in warm weather. Um, but otherwise I actually felt quite fit and active and I think in a way that worked against me because, because I did, there wasn't the impetus to do the do, to join. I mean, I didn't know about it so I couldn't join anyway. But but what I mean is I thought, well, I'm actually all right because I'm not out of breath climbing up that hill and I'm not, you know, but it. I thought that until I lost the weight. And then I thought now I know how it feels to be full of energy.
Speaker 1:That's the thing, isn't it you?
Speaker 2:don't realise, you don't realise.
Speaker 1:No, I was actually saying yesterday on Instagram that I used to profess to not be a morning person and I would wake up every single day like I hadn't had any sleep and I needed coffee and don't speak to me until I've had my coffee and you know I was a horrible person and I thought that was normal and that was me giving myself that label of not a morning person, but actually my lifestyle was completely back to front.
Speaker 2:Yes, oh yeah, I mean, when Kev was alive, we would. If I wasn't working on the Saturday, we would stay in bed till half 10, 11 o'clock in the morning quite regularly. Same on a Sunday. I mean I'm up on a weekend the same as I am through the week, if not earlier sometimes, because I've usually got a list of jobs I want to do. Um, I wish I had the energy of these three nutters though. Um but um, but yeah, I mean, and I I don't know how much of that is getting older, you need slightly less sleep. Possibly, I don't know, or it's a lie earlier, but I'm raring to go. I very rarely get up early to go to the loo and then get back in bed. I usually just stay up, whereas years ago I'd have gone back in bed for another three hours or something. And it's amazing, it really is. I can't praise the I don't want to say regime because that makes it sound.
Speaker 1:Regimented? Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2:I can't praise the scheme or the product, the programme Enough, because I went from a place of. I was quite complacent. You know I was quite complacent. You know I was quite complacent. My husband loves me. Nobody's judging me. I'm strong enough to stand up to anybody who might make some nasty comment. I was confident and in a way to come, you know to do that. I mean I've estimated I've lost At my. When I started with you I weighed 105 kilos, but bear in mind I had lost a bit. So I've lost nearly six stone in weight. I mean that's like an eight-year-old kid. I've lost an eight-year-old child somewhere.
Speaker 1:I'd say in our house that's a 13-year-old child, they're all skinny that's why.
Speaker 2:But it is insane. I mean it's funny because when people have asked me about it and people are really interested to know my motivation, how I've done it, how difficult I found it, where I've gone to get the advice, you know all that. But the one thing nobody ever asks me is do you regret how you were before? And I don't really. I was thinking about this when I knew we were going to do this podcast. My one regret is I didn't do it 20 years ago. Absolutely, you know, and that's not a cliche. I absolutely regret that because, although I've probably lengthened my time on this earth by doing it now, if I'd have done it 20 years ago, you know who knows, and I think that is my only regret. That you know, because I you can't tell from looking at me now, but I love clothes and I got to the stage where, although shops are much better now at catering for bigger ladies and bigger guys, at the time when I in my 30s and 40s, when I wanted to wear, you know, fashionable clothes, you couldn't. You know fashionable clothes, you couldn't H&M.
Speaker 2:I used to go in H&M and they had a BIB Biggest, beautiful range and you know the range in H&M is enormous. All I had was things like linen shirts in solid colours. There was nothing. I'm just using H&M as an example of a of a clothes company that has a massive range, and yet the bib bit would be tiny in a corner and the range would be like navy, blue, black, a fawn beige. You know that nothing, nothing. You know that great, and I did struggle to find clothes that I really liked, um, and now, of course, don't have that problem which is brilliant.
Speaker 1:In fact. You know what? I was looking around um Belfast airport uh, what day was it? What day? Why were you in Belfast airport? Oh, I was away with work, so I got back on Thursday I thought you'd been departed again on Thursday. I was looking around the airport and a lot of the women were wearing very similar clothes. Yes, and it made me think how many of these women are wearing clothes that they really wanted to wear, versus were the only options for them, or were the best of a bad bunch, or were clothes that they were using to kind of hide how they felt. And obviously this doesn't come from any judgment from me, because that was, that was me. Um, but it is. It just. It was just a thought. Um, yeah, and I think you're right. Actually, when you are in your 30s and 40s, you don't really realize it at the time, do you?
Speaker 1:but that's the time when you're sort of wanting to have fun and a social life and all the rest of it and you want to look when you look back.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean I, I, as I say I'm going away, um, to spain soon and, um, I mean it's interesting what you said about the women in the airport, because I still suffer from that big girl syndrome in a sense. Um, I mean I, yesterday I went in a pair of trousers that were two sizes too big, a blouse that was, a top that was three or four sizes too big, a bra that was too big, a pair of shoes that were too big. I look like a bloody clown. And my colleague who's just started back with this said everything you're wearing is stupid. And I said, I know, but I can't throw anything out because I'm tight, I'm from yorkshire and that that's the thing.
Speaker 2:I I've got to start dressing for my new size. Um, and and I think I do do this I mean I think you've said this to me in the past that I've still got that big Jane in my head. So I think that's the thing I've got to get used to. This is the new, improved Jane. And I think the other thing is, with the age I am now, I have to think about dressing appropriately.
Speaker 1:No such thing.
Speaker 2:Well yeah, you probably I mean, I'm in quite a staid profession as well, you know so. But yeah, I bought my first mini dress for my holidays. I'm going to say mini, I mean it's not, you know, it's to my knees Something. I wouldn't I would have bought that but worn it with trousers, yeah, and it's that kind of thing and and just having that sort of confidence, um yeah, I mean it is, it is, it's, it's, it's so empowering, it's incredibly empowering. Um, what have you?
Speaker 1:I'm just I stride out on a morning full of confidence, yeah oh, that's really good and that's what it's all about, really, isn't it? At the end of the day, yeah, confidence is everything. What have you loved the most about the experience?
Speaker 2:as I say, I think, the network of support, um, which is why I'm still with you, um, because, in all honesty, I do know what to do now. I do know what to do, um, but I do feel I need some to know that somebody's got my back, because I live alone. There's nobody to say, oh jane, don't have that box of flakes. Or box of flakes, did this come in boxes? They probably do from the warehouse, um, you know, don't? You don't need to have that? Or you know, do you know what I mean? But so it's all in my own head.
Speaker 2:I, I've only myself to motivate and only myself to rely on, in a sense, um, so it is nice to feel that you're not the only one. There are all these other women and men. You've got men now that are there going through exactly the same thing and if you need to, you can reach out. And I think, yeah, I mean that's incredibly important, because I do think it's very easy to slip. I mean, I'll give you a very quick example. A few years ago, a couple of christmases ago, I went on holiday with family and my coach said to me because normally christmas and holidays, you sort of agree with your coach.
Speaker 2:How are you going to play it? So, for example, I'm going away at the end of this week to stay with relatives and of course they'll be cooking. So I've already told my coach that it's out of my hands, in a sense, what I'm going to be eating and drinking. You know well, not drinking, but eating, certainly, um, but I'm, you know, I've already flagged that up. So I was going away at Christmas for a week to, uh, new York, where food is incredibly prolific and important, and instead of and I'm the big mistake I made was my coach said to me okay, you've got lots of social events because of my job and various things going out with friends and family and work meals out. Do you want to track as normal every day or do you want to have december off?
Speaker 2:And the biggest mistake I made was say I'll have december off. And that to me was just like go for it, eat everything, everything. I was buying hotel chocolate stuff under the disguise of buying the Neighbours of Oxford chocolates to put in my bin out. Oh, I'll just get myself one.
Speaker 2:And I put on loads of weight in one month, just one month of not sticking to it and it took me ages to get that off, because my body and my mind had gone almost back to how I used to be, because I'd had a whole month of it was a free-for-all and it it taught me an important lesson that you you know like last week I had two meals out. This week I've still lost. You can do that, but you're going to have a hell of a struggle after it and it is simply that it's your choice. You carry on as you are, snacking, takeaways, all that kind of stuff, and you will make little or no progress. Or enjoy your food, have the the meals out, but just adjust around them. Be sensible. Don't do it five nights a week.
Speaker 1:Do it one night out of seven, not five out of seven but here's the interesting thing with that is that listening to that, it would think it would sound like oh my goodness. So there's no way that I can just be right but think about any situation in life where that is ever a thing. No, you can't Think about your finances.
Speaker 2:Yeah if you can't spend all your money in the first week of the month.
Speaker 1:Yeah if you walk past Harvey Nicks every day and every day you decided to go in and buy something. By the end of the month you'd be broke.
Speaker 2:I mean, if you can't do it for your health and your wellbeing, then that's bad. I mean, I'll be honest with you, when I first lost my husband, I drank loads, I was over, overindulging every single night because it numbed the pain and that is not sustainable and it took me a few. I mean, people pointed it out, family and friends pointed it out. I regularly got hammered um, and I'm not saying I don't indulge now, but I only indulge occasionally, over indulge um, and I realized that, that I realized that I'd I had an issue when I fell down the stairs at work and cracked my head open and that and I was with a colleague and bless him, he, he helped me. I was so drunk I hadn't realized how badly I'd done it and I was on the bus home and I went like that and my hand came away covered in blood and I thought Jesus Christ, and that really shocked me and after that I sought myself out.
Speaker 2:Now, that is an extreme, but that's the thing. It applies to everything in your life, you know, and that was the thing with it's, it's, it applies to everything in your life, you know, and and that was the thing, I, what I my equivalent of that over drinking was my overeating and, like you say, you can't overspend, you can't overeat, you can't over drink, you can't have sex with too many weird people, or even normal people, and not expect some consequences of that. I don't know why I brought sex into it, but it's true, you can't overindulge in anything without there being repercussions in some way 100%.
Speaker 1:And I had that exact same conversation with Harrison yesterday when he was trying to convince us how much he needed to have the Xbox. And I said look, I appreciate that you're. You know you're wanting to do this, whatever for a job and all the rest of it, but you can have too much of a good thing.
Speaker 2:Yes, I'm not saying the.
Speaker 1:Xbox is a good thing from my perspective. Yes, you can have too much of a good thing. I can give you an avocado every day and you can have too many avocados. You know? Yes, exactly, exactly.
Speaker 2:So it is a thing.
Speaker 1:Who would you recommend Feed my Health to, and why?
Speaker 2:Well, I mean, to be honest, I think anybody who I mean I wasn't a cereal dieter, so I'm probably in the minority with your clients I would have thought I would thought most of them had gone through. You know all the diets and weight watches and slimming world and all that, and I wasn't. So I think I am in the minority. But I would say, anybody who's been through all that, this yo-yo dieting, um, I mean my, my late mother-in-law was like that. She would slim every year for holiday. And I know I'm saying this and with a touch of irony, because I've been saying I've got my holiday in my mind, but I'm not only doing it for my holiday. I'd like to look good on my holiday, but so that's a little goal I've set myself, but I want to look good in the middle of winter as well.
Speaker 2:Um, so anybody who has yo-yo dieted has tried all the quick fixes because they are nonsense, they do not work. I know they don't work. I've seen friends and family who've done this. But I think anybody, anybody, and I think, just give it a go, give it a go. You know I I wasn't, I wasn't cynical because, in all honesty, I thought the failing would be on my part, not yours.
Speaker 2:I thought I wouldn't stick with it. I didn't think you'd let me down. I thought I wouldn't stick with it. I didn't think you'd let me down. I thought I'd let me down. But it is quite addictive, not in a bad sense, but once that weight starts to come off and especially when you add as much as I had to lose it comes off pretty quickly. You get such a buzz out of it. So I would say anybody who feels that they've tried everything and are just desperate or just think you know this isn't going to work because I've tried everything, give it a go. I am living proof. You're living proof. All the women and men you coach are living proof that this works.
Speaker 1:What if you're lacking belief in yourself?
Speaker 2:Sorry, say that first bit again. Sorry, what if you're lacking belief in yourself? Sorry, say that first bit again.
Speaker 1:What if you're lacking belief in yourself?
Speaker 2:Well, you don't need to have belief in yourself, because that's what you're there for. The kind of coaching that you offer you and the other coaches is not judgmental, it's not critical. It's not um critical. It's not um telling you off. It's it's guiding you and offering advice and offering solutions and and helping people through the first part of the journey and all the way through.
Speaker 2:I mean, I still check in every week on the day I'm supposed to. I get my feedback the following day. I follow what my coach says. You know they. All you get is support. There's no recriminations, there's no um. You know you don't get told off if you have a bad week, because hormones, emotions, family problems, work, stress all that will have an effect and all of us will have weeks when we are struggling. But there's no, as I say, there's no sort of added pressure from the coaches other than support. It's a support and it really helps to know that they're there at the end of the phone or you know you can speak to them or you can message them and they'll answer you. Um, I think anybody who has tried everything and is desperate, or not even desperate, just somebody who thinks, well, where do I go from here?
Speaker 1:yeah, wants to make a healthy change yeah, I think that's.
Speaker 2:That's the thing. It's. It's the health the food thing is is. It is important, but it's it. I can't emphasize enough, gaspy, I can't emphasize enough the health aspects of it. You know, I I hope I've lengthened my life by 10 years. That would be incredible. So I've got about two weeks to live. No, um, um, will's in the, will's in the, in a box in the kitchen. No, but I do, I. It is the health side of it, because you can't get out of bed at the time I do and get yourself ready for work with a smile on your face. If you don't feel healthy and I wasn't a morning person, clearly, but I was I was just a bone idol, yeah. So I would recommend it to anybody. Give it a go. You've nothing to lose, absolutely nothing. Well, you have. You've got loads of weight to lose go. You've nothing to lose, absolutely not. Well, you have. You've got loads of weight to lose and you've got loads of hang-ups to lose. But yeah, I really think, give it a go yeah, fantastic.
Speaker 1:Well, you've answered all my questions. Sorry, I've unwaffled, no no it's been lovely to hear experience. And for you then, final question really is what does feeding your health mean to you?
Speaker 2:well it's. It's like having a big sister which I haven't got. I've only got two brothers, but it's like having a big sister, or or, or you know, or somebody. It's having a crutch, somebody, somebody, a team you can rely on and it's a nice team and all everybody's in the same boat I'm sorry, what are they doing? Come here. I want to see if they'll come up here and show you it's. One of my cats has just walked downstairs with the cotton bud in his mouth like a dumbbell Nutter.
Speaker 1:I don't want it, so he's like I'm on the programme?
Speaker 2:Absolutely, he's got his own little ways. Here you go, go over there with it. Yeah, I mean it is incredibly important. It's incredibly important. I can't ever imagine not being with you. You know it's become important. I can't ever imagine not being with you. You know it's it's become a routine. Now it's not. This is how I live my life. Now I almost don't have to think about it.
Speaker 1:You know it's become part of my, my daily routine yeah, and I think for me, that's, that's everything about it, because when I was trying to lose weight with all the fad diets, there was never a moment where I sat and thought, oh, I could absolutely do this every single day for the rest of my life. Yeah, there was never a moment, and in that moment, you know that what I'm about to do is not going to last. Yes, and that's the thing is so, and that is why I created Feed my Health, because I wanted a situation from a nutrition standpoint, an exercise standpoint, lifestyle habit standpoint, mindset that could build you could build upon it as you were going through, but it was something that was just becoming part of a healthy lifestyle that, yes, all of the family could, yes, do together, do it together?
Speaker 2:yes, absolutely, and that's the thing it's not. It's not a diet plan, it's not even an exercise plan. It's a change of lifestyle plan. It's everything, it's all. You look at our sleep, ask how much exercise we're getting, how we're eating, how much we're drinking, but not in a bad way, just just. Yeah, you think about what you're doing, but I mean, I, I've been doing it so long now that I know what not to do and I know what to do, but I still would stick with it. Yeah, it's incredibly important. Yeah, I can't emphasise that enough.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I don't wake up in the morning and go, oh, I've got to do this. No, it's part of your life, yeah.
Speaker 2:It's like going to work or going in the shower or anything.
Speaker 1:That is what I do now yeah yeah and when it's when it becomes like that and everything that you do, your routines, fit into your life and you realize how much better you feel because of them. You look forward to them every day, like yes, today, for example, I have not moved from this desk. It's the first day in a long time where I haven't gone out for a walk.
Speaker 2:Really and I can feel it. I feel flat and a little bit Cabin fever. Yeah, you've got cabin fever, yeah.
Speaker 1:But that was normal for me. Yes, absolutely, and me, and me, and, if I, continue to do that, which so many do you know. In a week's time, I'm going to feel awful, aren't I?
Speaker 2:yeah, it's very easy to slip back if you're not careful, but it's I don't even say it's willpower with me anymore, it is just. This is the way I live my life now.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know and I actually think it's a really fantastic thing that you can see how important it is to have that accountability, because yeah, definitely. I do think that we've seen a lot of clients come back this year because they left feeling that they knew what they were doing and it doesn't. And it's not about the fact that you don't know what you're doing, it's about the fact that you're getting away with not doing it absolutely think of my Christmas, my December of not having to be accountable.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and how easy that was absolutely just to slip back.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I have this conversation all the time actually with clients, because you do get to a point in your journey where you're pretty happy with how you look and you're feeling great and you're wearing clothes. You never thought you get compliments left, right and center, and so it is very easy to start getting a little bit complacent yeah, and getting a little bit like oh, oh, I can have this thing and I can get away with it, but you can only get away with it for so long yeah, you can yeah you can mean I lived like that for 30 years.
Speaker 2:You know I lived like I was eating, like there was no consequences and no tomorrow for 30-odd years. Yeah, and that you know it comes. You know, fortunately, I saw the light Ah, religious comes. You know, fortunately, I saw the light ah, religious, um no, and and and yeah, there comes a time when you think enough's enough yeah, you know.
Speaker 1:Actually, interestingly, when we were away a couple of weeks ago with some of the ladies for their photo shoot and we were talking about it and one of the ladies was saying how much her taste has completely changed, she used to be really into sweet things and she'd crave sweet things all the time and now it just doesn't appeal to her anymore. And the other thing as well we were talking about is how when she goes out to eat now, she's a lot more snobby with what she picks and it feels more of a treat than before, when it was just whatever she wanted to eat an indulgent food she would now she's being more intentional about what she's eating and it feels, yes, she's actually remembering what she's eating, as opposed to just inhaling things just yeah, exactly yeah, yeah, there is something to that.
Speaker 2:I think yeah, because if you do go out for meals like I did last week twice you view them as treats, not as a standard way of being so, by viewing them as treats, which they were. That's why you can do that occasionally, because they are treats. It's not a daily thing. It's not the xbox every day, it's not the box of chocolates every day or the tub of haagen-dazs every day or whatever. And, in a sense, if you view them like that, they don't become the norm, they're the exception, and that's fine, because that's the other thing to point out to anybody who's thinking about coming as a client.
Speaker 2:You can do that. You can go out for a meal, you can have a bar of chocolate. Just be mindful that that isn't something you can carry on doing every single day, because there will be consequences and you won't make any progress. You'll get cheesed off. You know you blame feed my health rather than yourself, because you've got to, you've got to, we've got to meet you halfway. You can make that weight drop off us. We've got to do it ourselves, but we can.
Speaker 1:We can do it with help absolutely, and I think that's the key thing is being brave enough to ask for that help, because I think a lot of women do feel like they should be able to figure out because it should be so simple. And it's actually not. It's not. It isn't simple because if it was, everybody would be walking around with a six-pack yes, exactly, exactly yeah, or a cotton bud, in the case of my thank you so much for this conversation. I've appreciated you.
Speaker 2:I'm sorry if I waited.
Speaker 1:No, not at all, not at all. Thanks very much. All right, love. Thank you all the best. Thank you bye.