A 'miserable' mum has told how a birthday girls' holiday convinced her she had to turn her life around and divorce her husband. Stephanie Hanson left the country married to her husband of 10 years - but during the trip made an earth shattering discovery over her true feelings for her partner, the Mirror reports.
Now 41, the mum-of-four, from Liverpool, said during her 10-day trip to Kefalonia, Greece, in May 2022 she had the sudden realisation that she intensely missed her kids but hadn't thought about her spouse at all. She said it also became clear how unhappy she was in herself as she weighed 17st and was in the 'worst shape of her life'.
As soon as she arrived back in the UK, she told her husband their marriage was over and was determined to get healthy and begin a new chapter in her life. Stephanie said: "I remember thinking while I was away about how I really missed the kids, but I didn't miss my husband.
"I was in the worst shape of my life, and it dawned on me, at home, I was miserable - so I did something about it." Stephanie recalls the moment she realised she no longer loved her husband when she was relaxing by the pool and chatting with her friends.
She added: "I was having the best time with the girls, and the thought of going back home to my husband was awful. I had a moment of clarity at the hotel that I I'd been miserable in my marriage for as long as I could remember.
"So when I flew back, I ended it there and then - and I knew I'd made the right decision when I saw his reaction." After getting the pictures developed from her holiday, Stephanie decided that now was the perfect time to change her appearance, as a single woman.
She began doing home workouts with a hula hoop and drastically changed her diet, swapping take-aways and butter-based dishes for lean meat, fish and salad.
After a few months, she started running as well and slowly but surely began to see the pounds dropping off her. Stephanie, who works as a phlebotomist, said: "After leaving my ex-husband, the next thing I needed to do was lose weight.
"The photos from the holiday made me see what horrible shape I was in, so I started working out at home and changed my diet. It was hard at first, but the motivation of being freshly single carried me through."
Stephanie now has a new love for life, having lost five stone in weight and has even met a new man, 43-year-old David Baldwin. After meeting David in July and introducing him to her kids, she says she 'can't wait' for the future.
She said: "In July, I met David on Facebook's dating website and we hit it off straight away. I met him around halfway through my fitness journey, but he didn't care about that, he loved me as I was.
"I now weigh 12 stone, but I'm quite tall, so I think if I lose one more stone, that will be perfect. If I hadn't of gone on that holiday, I'd still be stuck in a marriage with a man I no longer loved, so to be where I am now, I couldn't be happier."
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