I was so heavy I broke the bed
Carlene sheds 80lb after food addiction battle
A WOMAN has told how she broke the bed every night due to her weight.
Carlene Booth, 31, from Glasgow, revealed she started piling on the pounds due to a food addiction and binge eating as a child, which helped her cope with her emotions.
The banking associate continued to use the coping mechanism as an adult, eventually reaching 17st 5lbs during Covid lockdowns.
But after spending £10,000 on gastric sleeve surgery, Carlene has lost 80lbs and gone from a size 20 dress to a size 12.
She said: “I was beginning to feel so disgusted in myself that I would sleep in the spare room away from my husband Robert because I was taking up so much room. I was too heavy for our main bed and the slats would fall down every night. I would wake myself up breathless at night from turning in bed.”
After waking up following another restless night in the spare room, Carlene decided to take matters into her own hands.
“It was January 2021 – another new year where I was promising myself I would get fit and healthy.
“One Friday night, I was feeling so depressed and hopeless, I googled ‘help from GP for weight loss’ and realised I could pay privately for weight-loss surgery. I knew there and then that I was going to have a sleeve.” A gastric sleeve is a weight-loss procedure in which the stomach is reduced to about 15 per cent of its original size, by surgical removal of a large portion of the stomach. With the help of Robert, 32, Carlene got the £10,000 needed for the surgery and she headed to Turkey for the op. Since then, she feels much more confident – and she has overcome her binge-eating. Carlene said: “I am learning to love myself again.”