Journalist Jess Flaherty wasn’t happy with the weight she started gaining ever since the lockdown in 2020 and, last summer, implemented one easy daily habit which has helped shift some pounds
Like countless women, I’ve grappled with body image issues for most of my life. It really kicked off in my teens – as a child of the 90s, I grew up in the heyday of the ultra-thin craze, bombarded by magazines that would snap unflattering images of celebrities. They’d magnify a completely natural skin fold, then brand it with disdain as “flab”.
There was a time my weight nosedived to a mere five and a half stone. Eventually, I reached a much sounder place both in body and mind, but now at 34 and with my wedding on the horizon next year, I’ve been feeling disheartened and low due to the extra pounds that have slowly accumulated ever since the coronavirus pandemic.
Similar to many office workers, I transitioned to working from home amid the global lockdowns, which signalled the end of my daily 45-minute walk to and from the newsroom each day.
I also moved out of my top-floor flat – in a beautiful but old building devoid of lifts – for a quaint little two up, two down terrace. I never expected to yearn for those taxing five flights of stairs, let me tell you.
I put on around two stone. Reader, I am not an exercise or fitness girly. I do love walking and am partial to swimming, but not much else. An obsession with Buffy the Vampire Slayer led to me getting my blackbelt in Karate at 13 but I haven’t found any local classes nearby to take that up again.
A lifelong insomniac, I will never be someone who sets my alarm at 5am to go for a run. Shudder.
I’m certainly not going to fall back into the dark headspace of my teenage years but I do want to feel more confident in my body, and lose some of the weight I’ve gained in the last five years.
Getting back to a similar weight that I was in 2020 has, at times, felt like an impossible goal but one daily habit has made a massive difference and impact so far.
So, what is it? It’s simple: walking and, more specifically, aiming to get my 10,000 steps each day. The NHS advises adults to “do at least 150 minutes of moderate intensity activity a week or 75 minutes of vigorous intensity activity a week”, and to “spread exercise evenly over 4 to 5 days a week, or every day”.
My problem was trying to cram everything into the weekend and forgoing enough movement during the busy working week. Now the warmer weather and lighter nights are here, I’ve made it my mission to get 10,000 steps every day and though I still have a fair way to go until I’m happy, I can definitely feel a difference.
There’s countless videos on social media of people documenting the changes to their bodies just by getting their steps in and I can honestly say it’s working for me, too.
I’ll go to the park, I’ll do a few laps around the block on my lunch break; I’m just making more effort to get out of the house and on my feet.
In the Black Friday sales of 2023, I bought a beautiful dress to wear for my friend’s wedding in the summer of 2024. It was only available in the next size up and when it arrived and I tried to try it on, I was horrified that I couldn’t even zip it closed.
Fine, I thought, I’ll send it back. But I forgot. It was banished to the back of my wardrobe and when the wedding rolled around, I pulled it out and, realising it was far too late to get a refund, tried it on. It fit!
The only thing I’d changed about my routine was getting my steps in. It’s a lot harder to do in the winter and I fell out of the habit of it but now summer is back again, it’s part of my daily routine – and it’s working.
It doesn’t feel taxing or strenuous – in fact, it’s a really lovely thing to do each day. On one occasion, my friend joined me and we took our dogs for a walk around the park. We talked one another’s ears off and it didn’t at all feel like we were exercising.
I don’t want to focus on numbers on a scale as I think that can defeat the purpose of exercise which, to me, is about staying healthy and feeling comfortable in your own skin – something I am definitely getting closer to each day.