Walking to work off the weight

Susan McIntosh

On the number 124 from Haymarket all the way to North Berwick, she recognised every bus stop, every local shop and most of her regular passengers.

So when it came to working out an exercise programme to match her new determination to lose weight, Susan didn't have far to look for inspiration.

For instead of taking the bus, driver Susan - who'd piled on the pounds to tip the scales at 18st 8lbs - decided to walk her routes.

Soon her spare time was spent striding out the entire length of her normal bus routes, including the one that took her from Edinburgh to North Berwick and back.

Today, super slimmer Susan is 8st 4lbs lighter thanks to a combination of sensible eating and her own "bus route" exercise plan.

"I knew the routes that I drive so well, so I knew that if I needed to I could always jump on a bus," she says.

"And I knew where the toilets were and any shops if I needed a break.

"I started slowly and eventually built up to walk the number 44 which goes from Balerno to Wallyford, Tranent, Haddington and Pencaitland, the 129 from Silverknowes to Seton Sands and the 124 to North Berwick.

"One day I walked from my house, along the 124 route to North Berwick and back, then did an extra ten miles to make it 29 miles in one day.

"Before I lost weight, I could hardly walk the length of myself."

Susan, a driver with First Group buses, saw her weight soar thanks to an unhealthy diet of takeaways and junk food which she blamed on working shifts.

"I had takeaways so often that the local shops knew my voice when I phoned in my order," she admits.

"If I wasn't eating a takeaway, I'd be having a Subway. I was making all the wrong choices."

She joined Scottish Slimmers in summer 2009, hoping to lose weight in time for her 40th birthday last April. Within weeks she'd lost two stones.

As the weeks wore on, she gradually clocked up the miles along her routes and the pounds continued to drop off.

By July last year, 5ft 5ins Susan had hit her target weight of 10st 7lbs.

But while she enjoys her new size 10-12 figure, Susan is definitely among the lucky ones, for most of us who resolve to lose weight this year are doomed to fail.

One in five of us has a New Year resolution to get slim, but more than half will have quit the diet by the end of this week.

According to city-based fitness guru Tracey Griffen, we often set ourselves up to fail because we throw ourselves into our new regime with too high expectations and too much self-deprivation.

"People think they must slog it out at the gym or deprive themselves of all their favourite foods," she says. "It's almost a punishment for having enjoyed ourselves over the past few weeks.

"It's not surprising that they can't keep it going; that kind of thing just isn't sustainable."

The personal trainer believes that we often charge straight into a fitness programme without careful thought, opting for the most gruelling workout or diet plan instead of choosing one that we can actually live with.

"It's pointless signing up for a step class if you really don't like step aerobics," she says. "It's much more sensible to think about the kind of exercise you might actually enjoy. You're more likely to stick at it."

The same goes for diet. For depriving ourselves of the foods we enjoy may do more harm than good, she adds.

"You can binge on chocolates and then say 'right, I won't have anything to eat for a day' but your body ends up starving and next time it gets calories it will simply hold on to them," she says.

She works with life coach expert Eilidh Macdonald-Harte running WeightShed, a series of boot camp style sessions.

Eilidh says battling the bulge - and failing - is a recurring theme for many, even those who undergo drastic measures to control their weight.

"I have had so many calls in the last seven days from men and women who are defeated by the idea of trying to lose weight because having tried everything, they just don't know how to start again," she says.

"Most are people who have had gastric surgery, lost the weight and regained it, because their behaviours around food have not changed.

"Can you imagine what it is like for bariatric patients, who were promised this radical surgical fix to all their problems and how tough it is for them to admit that it didn't work?"

But it's not all doom, gloom, hard work, diet milkshakes for dinner and savage workouts. For some people do manage to dramatically tip the scales in their favour, with impressive results.

Like bus driver Susan, school depute headteacher Julia Robertson, 50, has learned to control her eating to shed more than eight stones.

She weighed 19st 12lbs but only she knew her clothes were size 26 because she'd cut off the labels so no-one could find out how large she'd become.

"As if they didn't know," she laughs. "I had these big black nylon trousers which my mum says needed several pegs to hang up on the washing line.

"I tried to cover myself up with all kinds of bling and scarves. I hated being that size."

The weight piled on because she simply ate too much, adds the mum-of-two.

"I'd eat healthily enough, but too much, and I loved sweets. Every time I stopped at the petrol station for fuel, I'd come out with a supply of chocolate. Now I know when to stop."

The depute head at Preston Lodge High School in Prestonpans is now just a few pounds away from her 11 stones target weight, ideal for her 5ft 6ins frame.

So how can the rest of us enjoy the same kind of success?

Susan recommends joining a class or group that can provide support - and always make sure you treat yourself.

"My treat was a bag of Walkers' Square crisps, Jelly Tots or a Curly Wurly, so I didn't feel deprived," she says.

Julia, of Penicuik, also suggests keeping our goals realistic. She says: "Take it in small chunks. Be happy with a slow, gradual weight loss.

"And as you lose weight, throw out all your 'fat' clothes so you're not tempted to go back into them."

Losing weight brings more benefits than simply slipping into nicer clothes, she adds.

"I carried my weight through humour," she adds. "I appeared outwardly confident, but underneath I was fed up and unhappy.

"Now I'm so glad I persevered to get the weight off.

"There have been so many improvements in my life, there's no way I'm going back."

For more information about Tracey Griffen, visit www.getfitandenjoyit.com. For Eilidh Macdonald-Harte, log on to www.weightshedboot camp.com. For more information about Scottish Slimmers, call 0800 36 26 36 or visit www.scottishslimmers.com.

Food for thought

IF counting calories and upping your exercise levels is too tricky, then just get someone to do it for you.

Newbridge-based Diet Chef delivers calorie-counted meals to around 25,000 slimmers across the UK every week, and that's likely to increase on the back of wall-to-wall advertising on satellite television channels.

A similar service is provided by Go Lower, based in Edinburgh, which boasts a consultant cardiologist at the Western General Hospital among its experts.

Meanwhile, restaurants and food outlets in some cities in the United States are facing new regulations which require them to list the calories contained in their products, alongside the recommended daily calorie intake for an average healthy person.

Employers there are also increasingly offering staff "wellness" incentives to help encourage a healthier lifestyle.

The alternative to eating less, and moving more, could come in the form of Contrave, the first slimming pill to gain American Food and Drink Administration approval in more than a decade.

A combination of two existing drugs - one that treats addiction, the other an anti-depressant - it carries worrying risks, with reports that one of the drugs it's made from is linked to heart failure and the other to high blood pressure.