A mum who guzzled ten cans of coke a day said she feels "like a different person" after her amazing weight loss.
Clair Jones, 49, began piling on the pounds during her first pregnancy with her son Garyn, scoffing a family-sized bag of crisps for breakfast and chomping on bags of sweets. These unhealthy habits saw her weight balloon to 23st 1lbs, until she was only able to fit into size 30 clothing and was unable to work.
The self-professed "greedy" mum-of-two said she'd accepted she'd always be overweight as the word diet scared her and she hated vegetables. But after completely changing her diet she has now managed to lose a whopping 12 stone and has slimmed down to 11st 1lbs.
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Clair, from Rhondda Valley, South Wales, said: "I honestly thought I was going to be big for the rest of my life. The word 'diet' scared me. I love food, I was quite greedy and I'm still quite greedy.
"I just accepted I would be big forever. I hadn't always been that big but I gained 6st 5lbs when I was having my first child. I thought I was eating for two and it went from there really.
"I was never a small child and was always a bit bigger than my friends. You picture a diet as meals with salad and I don't eat salad or veg."
Clair decided to join Slimming World in 2020 after her two friends joined leaving her feeling "left out", so she decided to sign up too. Clair said: "My very first week when I joined, I ate silly diet food and didn't lose weight so I said 'I'm not doing this'.
"I was a big sweetie and crisp person and I would drink coke until it came out of my ears. I got rid of all that in the first week, I deprived myself of everything. My consultant said I could eat nicer food and lose weight.
"I ate food that I actually like the second week and lost some weight so I thought 'it is working and I'm not just eating salad'."
Clair said her husband Darrel, 60, is "over the moon" with her weight loss. She said: "He was happy with me before, he was happy if I was, but he knows I can do so much more now."
Clair's food diary before her weight loss journey began:
Breakfast: Family sized bag of crisps
Lunch: Three sandwiches, pack of crisps
Dinner: Sausage, bacon, chips, egg, mushrooms, bread and butter
Snacks: 10 cans of coke, couple of bags of sweets
Clair's food diary now:
Breakfast: Fruit and yoghurt or poached eggs
Lunch: Omelette, jacket potato, spaghetti
Dinner: Salmon and rice
Snacks: Pepsi Max, pickled onions, ham
After years of being "too big to exercise" Clair said she followed in the footsteps of cheerleader daughter Ellie, 22, and signed up to the parents' team. Clair added: "I feel like a completely different person.
"I haven't worked for 25 years because I was overweight, my weight stopped me doing everything. I've been a cheer mother for 14 years. We started up a parents' team last year and obviously I was just cheering them on but this year they persuaded me to join because I was small enough.
"I'm 50 this year so I thought I'd give it a go. My daughter cringed a bit at first but she came to watch me in the competition and said I wasn't as bad as she thought. The competition was amazing, it's great fun and I give it my best.
"I would never have been able to do it before, I could barely walk from my car to my house. It was hard work at first. I've got two left feet and no rhythm but we have a laugh, which really helps."
