Stefanie: ‘I cut sugar and shed 11st in 18 months’
WRITER Stefanie Preissner, the creator of Can’t Cope Won’t Cope, has revealed how she lost 11 stone in 18 months.
Appearing on last Friday night’s The Late Late Show, Stefanie shared photos from before her dramatic weight loss and described how she decided to make a change when she caught sight of her reflection in a shopfront window.
“I was walking down Grafton Street one day... and I was inspired by Victoria’s Secret. The shopfront was being built and it was covered in that black contact so it was kind of warped and I saw this person in the reflection. I thought, ‘That’s a large person’ but then I got closer and realised it was me.
“Obviously I had seen mirrors before but it was like a rare opportunity to see yourself as other people see you,” she said.
It was a turning point. She asked her friend if she thought she could lose six stone in a year. She replied, without batting an eyelid, “[you] can do anything you want to do”.
“I made my decision in that moment and did it.”
Stefanie explained the one rule she followed.
“I need a rule, a very black and white thing. I had to make it simple by making a rule,” she said. “I made one simple rule: I don’t eat sugar. I don’t eat sugar of any description. I also started kickboxing twice a week because as a writer it’s easy to be sedentary.”
Stefanie said she lost 11 stone in a year and a half but explained that even though the weight loss has made people treat her differently, she’s the same person inside.
When host Ryan Tubridy asked her to tell him about that “different Stefanie”, she said: “She was the same as me, same thoughts, same ideas, she just looked different. But I grew up like that so that it is what I knew. And I had never tried to lose weight... I was just always overweight and I just thought that was who I was.”
For full interview, see today’s ‘Life Magazine’.