‘Taunts about my weight made me think I was weak’
Former Liverpool footballer Neil Ruddock spent decades battling the scales. Now, he says it’s time to end the stigma around excess weight
IF anyone knows how unpleasant the stigma surrounding excess weight can be, it’s Neil “Razor” Ruddock. “I’d have 70,000 people chanting about how fat I was,” he recalls of his days as a central defender for England. “But they didn’t know how hard I was working – or how hungry I was all the time.”
Neil was 18 when he first tried to lose weight. “I really struggled with it,” he says. “Before weigh-ins I’d be in the sauna just to shed a few pounds, or the coaches would send me to train with a black sack on. But as soon as I had a drink, I’d put it all back on. I was only losing water. There was no education.”
It was a battle that would continue throughout Neil’s football career. “My teammates could eat twice as much as me and not put on an ounce. People thought I was eating at home or not training hard enough.”
Unhelpful criticism only made things harder. “The advice to ‘get off your backside and do some exercise’ just didn’t work for me,” says Neil. “When I was playing, I was
“I even made up my own diet – the cold food diet! It was miserable”
only ever a few pounds heavier than I should have been, and when you’re always running, it’s a lot not to be able to lose.
“Then, when I stopped playing professionally in 2003, I spent two years eating and drinking whatever I wanted. I thought I deserved it after decades of working so hard, but I put on about 5st.”
Before long, Neil was on a roller coaster of crash diets. “I’ve tried them all,” he says. “Low carb, low fat, milkshakes, juicing… I even made my own up – the cold food diet! It was miserable.
“I shed 40lb on one regime, but put twice as much back on as soon as I started eating normally again. It was unsustainable, but I didn’t want to ask for advice.”
Neil is far from alone. Obesity rates in the UK have almost doubled since 1993, with one in four adults living with a body mass index (BMI) of 30 or over. But men have typically been reluctant to talk about weight and body-image issues.
“My weight was a no-go subject,” says Neil. “I wouldn’t talk to a doctor or friends – it would be a sign of weakness.
I’d buy women’s magazines for the diets because I couldn’t ask for help.”
It was a heart-related health scare that gave Neil the wakeup call he needed in order to do something about his weight. And the Break Free campaign has helped him free himself from any stigma: “The biggest weight off my shoulders was learning it’s not my fault, I wasn’t lazy and I didn’t need to be embarrassed.
“I used to think that I was mentally weak and had no willpower. But there are over 100 factors that can lead people to gain weight and not be able to lose it. The problem isn’t willpower, it’s how the human body has evolved. That’s why it’s so wrong to stigmatise people.
“I learned that because of what was going on in my head, I was programmed to go for the most fattening thing in the fridge. Now my fridge is like a field; it’s full of green!
“There’s help out there – you just have to start talking: to your friends, family, doctor, nurse or pharmacist.
“I’m still learning, but I’m getting there – it’s important that people realise it’s not their fault and they’re not alone.”