Do you ever feel like chocolate is talking to you from the cupboard, almost saying “come and eat me”? If a sweet tooth has ruled the show for years, Sharon’s story is going to give you real hope. In just over a year on Slimpod, she’s gone from a size 20 to a size 12, and the chocolate obsession that once ran her evenings has completely faded away.
When the cravings simply switch off
Sharon will happily tell you she was a real chocaholic. A bar of chocolate every single night, and if it was in the house, it wouldn’t last long. Yet within days of starting Slimpod, that pull towards sweetness started to disappear.
These days there’s a box of chocolates that’s been sitting in her cupboard since Christmas, which as she says is completely unheard of for her. She doesn’t even glance at the chocolate aisle in the supermarket anymore. When people offer her one and say “go on, have one”, she can honestly say she just doesn’t want it.
This is what I love to explain to people. So much of what we call food noise, or in Sharon’s words a chocolate obsession, is really a habit your brain has learned. She realised she never truly needed the chocolate. She’d bought it, so she had it, and round it went. Once that wiring starts to change, the wanting fades, and that’s where the freedom is found.
Not a diet, and that's why it stuck
Here’s the part that made all the difference for Sharon. She never once felt she was on a diet. In the past, trying to lose weight meant a running list of everything she couldn’t have. Cake, biscuits, chocolate, all ‘forbidden’, and that “diet head” made it exhausting and impossible to stick to.
With Slimpod there was none of that. She ate what she wanted in moderation, and because she no longer craved the old things, it never felt like willpower. When friends ask how on earth she stuck to a diet for a year, she tells them the truth. She wasn’t on one. If she fancies a slice of cake with a coffee out, she has it and enjoys it, with no guilt at all, because she knows one slice is exactly that, and not the start of a slippery slope.
The bonuses she didn't expect
The weight loss is only part of her journey. Sharon has far more energy now, and she’s lost those slumps that come from a lot of sugary treats. Her eating has naturally settled too, with smaller portions, Greek yoghurt and fruit to start the day, and an apple or a pear if she wants something after dinner.
She’s also started exercising every single day, something she never did before, simply because it makes her feel good. Every night she listens to Trevor, in over a year she thinks she’s missed just twice, one of those being Christmas Day. If a wobbly day creeps in, she pops her earphones in, listens to Trevor or a coaching video, and she’s right back on track.
Perhaps the best thing of all is how she feels in herself. After more than 20 years, Sharon is comfortable in her own body again and no longer feels ashamed of how she looks. She nearly went down the weight-loss injection route, but was refused on medical grounds, and she’s so pleased she didn’t, because she’s done this herself, at her own pace, and it’s hers to keep.
Sharon's one tip for you
When I asked what she’d say to anyone just starting out, her answer was simple: persevere. Some people expect too much too soon and feel despondent, but if you’re in the right mindset and you give it time, it really does work.
If Sharon’s story sounds like the change you’ve been longing for, have a listen to our full chat, you can also find lots more inspiring stories just like Sharon’s on my podcast
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