Noeleen’s weight loss story is one of unimaginable sadness but through all her suffering, as she says herself, she is on the mend.
Noeleen lost her only son to cancer in 2015. The loss was compounded by the fact that he was fit and active, played sport, didn’t smoke or drink. How could cancer strike her son down? As brave as he was and as incredible a fight that he put up, he eventually succumbed to the disease after a three-year fight.
They were four in a family and it was now down to three. They were devastated. In dealing with the grief, Noeleen turned to food. In Noeleen’s mind food was the lesser of two evils so she consciously chose food over alcohol.
Inevitably the weight piled on. As it so happened Noleen’s daughter was a target member at Motivation and she could both see and understand what was happening to her mother.
The cycle of eating to comfort-fill the void was further compounding the problem as Noeleen was not able to get a good night’s sleep due to sheer volume of food she was eating. Her daughter, from time to time, would gently nudge Noleen to contact Motivation but to no avail. The penny dropped for Noleen one evening when as she was looking at a picture of her son and up popped an ad for Motivation. The realisation of her situation and the emotional turmoil literally poured over her and she broke down and cried.
Fast forward to Noeleen’s first consultation and as she says, “because my weight loss consultant had me so focussed and I felt there’s help for me here and that I wasn’t on my own.”
Noeleen, with the help of Motivation and her own one-to-one weight loss consultant, changed her relationship with food and reached target with a weight loss of 2 1/2 stone / 15.87 kilos.
However, Noeleen then let some of her old habits creep back in and she noticed the weight begin to creep back on. She realised that she not only needed to lose the weight but also needed to understand how to maintain the weight she had lost – Noeleen got back on plan and more importantly, back on target.
Between the jigs and the reels, Noeleen’s job circumstances changed and as it happened, Motivation was looking for a consultant for its Beacon clinic.
Today, Noeleen is a weight loss consultant here at the Beacon. She brings her life’s experiences, empathy, deep understanding of the programme and her very good nature to help Motivation clients unravel their tangled relationships with food and to reach and maintain their target weight.
Noeleen’s weight loss story is one that will continue as life itself does and if there is one key takeaway from this story it is Noeleen’s’ resolve and determination to live a healthier therefore happier life.
For our part here at Motivation, it is somewhat humbling to be both a facilitator for Noeleen’s weight loss journey and in helping her to find comfort during the dark days.
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