A chef has shared his weight-loss journey after consuming up to 5,000 calories a day during lockdown.
Matthew Cantrill, 33, from Leeds, picked up bad habits during the pandemic - regularly eating takeaways and junk food, drinking beer every day and barely exercising, and this affected his mental and physical health, reports Leeds Live.
A typical night would see Matthew drink four to eight cans of full-fat beer and consume junk food, including deep-fried chicken, take away pizza or Chinese.
He admitted his beer belly would dig into his belt when he would tie his shoelaces.
It was during the second lockdown that Matthew realised he was not happy with his weight and decided to do something about it.
Although he did not have any gym experience, he signed up to Ultimate Performance Personal Trainers Leeds after walking past the gym one day.
He has gone on to lose 12kg since the start of his fitness journey and achieved his goal of getting a body like Hollywood star Chris Pratt’s in Jurassic Park.
He said: “It was a depressing time for everyone. The second lockdown affected my mental health.
“I wasn’t enjoying my job, my weight wasn’t right. I ended up leaving my job and getting into fitness, things started to get better. It was hard at the time.
“I was struggling to commit to a run by myself then decided it was time to join a gym. Being a tight Yorkshireman I wanted to get my money’s worth.”
Prior to lockdown, Matthew would reach 20,000 steps a day. However, this fell to around 1,000 a day and was mainly from walking his dog.
After joining the gym and having a personal trainer, he was taught how to use the gym equipment properly and would do three one-hour sessions a week, while increasing his steps to 5,000 a day.
After 50 sessions in 19 weeks, he dropped all the weight and stated he “feels a million times better.”
His blood pressure reduced, and now he is much happier as a person and more body confident.
Matthew described what a typical day was like for him before he started his fitness journey
"A day in the life of me, on a workday – say it's Monday; it's wake up, maybe I have some Pop-Tarts, so just sugary carbs, I'd have a coffee, probably three or four coffees in the morning.
"Breakfast, a couple of sausages, just on the fly with some hash browns. Again, just dirty food. That's if I had time to eat it.
"Lunchtime, again, we had a lot of naughty-type food, like deep-fried chicken and things like that, which would be on the menu. So deep-fried chicken, even if I had it as a salad. It's just loads of hot sauce, and I didn't realise the amount of calories in hot sauce – just the worst ones with so much sugar in them.
"Get home, and then for tea, it might be a take-away pizza or Chinese. On average, I'd probably be having anywhere between four to eight cans of full-fat beer a night, not like Bud Light or Budweiser.
"Just every night; Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday were even bigger blowouts. I wouldn't even realise it because, throughout lockdown, it just became a norm to have constant drinks.
"When I came back into work, I was like, "Oh, it's Monday. Yeah, we always have a drink on a Monday". So my mentality was, "Let's have a couple of beers". The next thing you know, I would have about 1,500 calories in beer a day, on top of all the dirty foods.
"I'd be well into the 4,000 or 5,000 calorie mark, and each day it was just increasing and increasing. It affected me mentally and physically."
For more stories from where you live, visit InYourArea.
