Walking the weight off

At 41, Cheryl Parker was spending a lot of time sitting on the couch, watching reruns of her favourite TV shows. In fact, her life felt a little like a rerun. “It seemed like everybody else was out there living,” she remembers. “I knew I needed to make a change.”

Parker was so tired of her weight that option No. 1 was weight-loss surgery. She chose option No. 2. “I decided I was just going to start walking.”

She bought a fitness tracker, one of the many handy tools that now make it easier to hit 10,000 steps a day. (The average Australian takes just 4,000 steps a day according to a study by CARE Australia.) Then she headed out, blaring her favourite tunes, for a fast one-kilometre walk as soon as she got home from her job as a dental hygienist. The rest of the day she’d get in her steps wherever she could – it quickly made a difference.

The first week she lost almost 1.5 kilos and by week two her energy was back and she was sleeping through the night for the first time in years. When week three rolled around, she knew she’d never go back to her life on the couch. She was

4.5 kilos lighter and felt about 10 years younger.

Soon, Parker was walking four to six kilometres every morning on the tracks near her house and loving it. Now, a year and a half later, it still astonishes her how she transformed her body and her health simply by showing up for her favourite time of the day and eating a little better.

“I don’t even know how to put it into words,” says Parker who lost an astonishing 35 kilos that first year.

“From the start, I just loved being out there I’m just more a part of life, watching the world light up as the sun rises. It makes me feel alive.”