After she hit rock bottom over Christmas, mum-of-one Verity Bambury switched up her lifestyle and started a diet which saw her weight drop from over 21st to 12st
A Christmas-loving mum shed a whopping 9st after she became too exhausted to partake in the festive season due to her size.
Verity Bambury, 49, knew she needed to change her ways after she struggled to do her Christmas shopping and put up her decorations. The mum-of-one hit rock bottom back in December 2021 and decided to start a new diet.
After consistently following healthy habits, she saw her weight drop from over 21st down to 12st. Reflecting back, Verity, from Liverpool, said: “I love Christmas, but I’d got so big I could barely move. I dreaded doing something as simple as putting the fairy on the tree.”
Verity was plump as a child and wore a maternity skirt for her school prom, as nothing else would fit her. At 16, she joined a diet club. She says: “I didn’t like being big, but I just accepted it. I tried diets, but they didn’t work. I ate large portions of food, and I had a real weakness for chocolate and chocolate cake.”
She worked as a nursery nurse, and then as a lecturer, but her weight steadily increased. In February 2014, she and her partner, John, had a son, Jarvis. Afterwards, her weight rocketed. By 2020, she weighed 21st 7lbs. “I treated lockdown as a sort of all-inclusive buffet; I just ate and drank all day,” Verity explained.
In December 2020, she felt unwell and was taken into hospital with high blood pressure. “I couldn’t do my Christmas shopping and I had no energy to put up my tree,” she recalled. “I love Christmas, especially with Jarvis, and it’s my birthday on December 20 so it was usually a double celebration. But it was just too much for me.”
Verity told herself it was the last Christmas she would “feel so miserable” and started on the 1:1 diet by Cambridge Weight Plan in January 2021. She lost 11lbs in her first week, and by the next Christmas, she had lost 7st.
“As time went on, I worked out how to cook healthy meals for myself, alongside higher calorie ones for the family,” she said. “I might make homemade burgers, and I’d have mine without the bun. Or I’d cook a curry and have cauliflower rice instead of rice.”
When Christmas 2022 came around, Verity was worried about overindulging, so she made herself a calendar that listed off-plan days. “It worked perfectly,” she said. “Not only that, but I enjoyed Christmas much more now that I was healthier.” Since then, Verity has maintained her weight loss.
She has now lost over 9st and weighs a little over 12st, dropping from a dress size 26 to a size 14. Thanks to her new healthy lifestyle, she has been able to start a new career and has a side hustle. “My job involves helicopter travel, and I need to be fit and active. I could never have done this before,” she said.
“I also work as a 1:1 diet consultant and the income from my new role paid for a family trip to Disney for us all last summer. On previous holidays, I couldn’t run around or swim with Jarvis. He was always waiting for me to catch up because I ran out of breath so easily. But at Disney, I was on the waterslides and in the pool. I feel like a new mum.”
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