MUM’S ‘AMAZING’ WEIGHT LOSS
A TOWNSVILLE mum-oftwo has been given a new lease on life after losing 30 per cent of her body weight.
Ellie Gleeson has been on a yoyo weight loss journey for the past five years but has finally arrived at her ultimate body.
After initially losing 11kg in 2015 to weigh 62kg, Ms Gleeson, 44, slowly piled on 20kg.
“I was overeating and saying, ‘it is only one biscuit’ but then one biscuit turned into four biscuits and I was also self-sabotaging when I trained because I was just going through the motions,” she said. “I knew I was in trouble when I stopped weighing myself and it was a shock when I saw I weighed 82.6kg.”
The early childhood educator said it was the heaviest she had weighed in her life.
“What spiralled for me is I had to videotape myself so I could teach my children some sign language and I saw myself on the video and I couldn’t believe I had let myself go,” she said.
“I had never been that heavy, even when I was pregnant.”
Ms Gleeson now weighs 59kg after committing herself lf t to 5 Star Fitness Townsville’s 12-week challenge last September, placing first in the competition by losing 29.88 per cent of her body weight.
Achieving the body of her dreams has been maintained by eating a vegetarian diet with “lots of salad” and giving her all in the gym.
Ms Gleeson said having “reverse goals” as an indicator of her progress had helped keep her motivated.
“I found it really successful to have goals with my clothes so I measured my progress by how I gained the weight in reverse and how tight my pants were,” she said.
The mother of two teenage daughters said climbing Castle Hill had also been a big part of her transformation, recording a personal best of 24 minutes.
“I love being outdoors and there are so many people (at Castle Hill) so you can be motivated by people going up and down,” she said.
Sustaining her weight for the past six months has helped Ms Gleeson physically and mentally.
“I feel amazing and I feel like I have myself back to the self that I want to be,” she said.
“I have made my daughters proud of their mum.”