You said that it’s really helped your health generally and your fitness and things. And I mean do you think that it’s important to be healthy?

Yes. Because like everyday tasks like going upstairs and just like going for a walk, taking the dog out, like things like that just seem a lot easier and don’t seem like a chore any more. It just seems like, say if my dad says, Will you just go and get me this from my room? I’ll just say, Yes, whereas before I used to think, Oh, I don’t want to run upstairs. But just everyday things really have just come a lot easier and things like that. And just like, you just like, you just think, in a morning like when I used to wake up I used to think, Oh, I’m tired. I don’t want to get up and go to school. But now I think, now I’m just like up and awake and want to go to school all the time, and it’s just good fun.

So what kind of things did you want to change?

I wanted to be like more active and just lead a healthier life and things like that.

And what do you mean by a healthier life?

To be more ac-, to like join in more exercise and go out on more walks and things like that.

And were you not doing things like that before then?

No. I used, I like, I trampoline. And I go, still go once a week, but I’m thinking it’s not enough. So I like joined clubs after school and they set up programmes before school. So it helped quite a lot.

So what sort of things do you do then?

I cheerlead.

Wow.

Trampoline, basketball, dance, just ordinary things. But like if you keep them going like every week, you benefit from it.

How do you benefit?

You just feel better in yourself. Like you feel like you can do more things. Like before, getting to the top of the school by the stairs used to be like a st-, well, not a struggle, but I used to feel, Oh, I’m out of breath. But now you just think, I just think, Oh, I’m, it’s fine. I can get up to the top of the stairs. And just ordinary like daily life things have become a lot easier.

Like I said before there is so much more plus sides to it then, then if you think of before I mean a really big plus side for me is I’m more energetic. And movement…

[Laughs] Movement has just become so much, more I mean like now, I, when I go out, a typical day for me now is like I get up go to college, from college I’ll be running up and down stairs, well walking up and down stairs should I say. And we do that so many times like there’s me and these two mates of mine, my mate she is a big lass, so I feel like I fit in. And we go out, we go on buses, we go up to Tesco, walk about supermarket, we, you just generally having a laugh and then we walked it up to Tesco the other day and that were like about a twenty five minute walk. Now for me to do that were just, it were weird but you’ve got so much more energy you think, well for my size you should Ireally be able to do this? And sometimes I can walk as fast as my sister. Well she can walk, and it’s just really, really weird. And like clothes, I got, well from [my friend], her mother knows someone who had gastric bypass done, now so I didn’t have to buy any clothes she gave me absolutely loads, so that really, really helps me and like this, this coat that I actually have on, wouldn’t even go to there on me. And now it fastens, but it’s tight, but it’s, you know, it’s just amazing to see how in fourteen weeks how it can just put so much in, good impact on someone’s life. But I mean it’s not like that for everybody else. Well might be like that for some but not for everybody, but it has made one big difference for me.

I feel really happy because, you know, I know that my risks of getting things like diabetes and heart problems has gone way down to what it would’ve been if I’d carried on.I think I was in something like category four, for diabetes when I started, and I’m now in something like category 2 or 3, something like that.

So it’s gone right down. So, so it’s less likely for me to get things like that now so that’s, I’m really happy about that.

And I’m quite happy with the way I look as well.

And when you were having the problems with your weight, I mean did you have any worries about your health?

I had, I did have asthma. Yeah, I did have asthma quite bad.

But, I did grow out of it when like I started looking at my weight and things, I grew out of it.

So was that connected to your weight then?

I don’t know. I don’t know what it were connected to, but I did, when I started losing weight, I grew out of it, so it probably will have been connected to my weight yeah.

And did that used to, did the asthma used to cause you any problems?

I used to struggle with quite a lot of things, yeah. ‘Cos of theasthma.

You were saying you also have asthma?

It’s, because, I think it’s because more exercise and things. And because I’ve lost the weight, it’s made my asthma better. And like at school in PE we do like health and fitness. And like before I used to, like the bleep test, I used to get like 4s and things like that.

What’s that sorry?

That’s the bleep test. And it’s like, you have a room and it’s measured out and you have to run from one wall to another before the beep. And then it ge-, the beep gets quicker, so you have to run quicker. And it, there’s like ten beeps in a level, and so like I used to get to like level 4. So that’s like forty times. But now I’m like, we did one last week and I got up to level 7, like level 7, so.

Wow.

It’s like improved my health as, a lot. And like I don’t, need my inhaler like. I used to have to take it everywhere because I thought, if I’m walking or anything. But now I don’t really need it that much. Because I just think, No, I’m all right. I don’t need it.

That’s good.

So that’s helped a lot.

And do you think it’s important to be healthy?

Very important. Very important. If you don’t have your health it’s very hard to have anything else, or appreciate anything else so to speak. If you’re ill it doesn’t really matter how much money you’ve got because you won’t appreciate it because you’re ill. [Um], you know a typical example is the sort of Fresher’s Flu which nearly Uni student will get, once you have it, it’s horrible and you can’t really learn that much because you just feel like crap. That’s pretty much an example of how being ill will affect your life. So by being healthy you can really avoid a lot of the consequences, and when I used to do a lot of voluntary work in say hospices or mental health care homes, you realise that diet is, I don’t want to be a reductionist and say it’s responsible for everything, but by having a healthy diet you really, really do reduce your chances of a lot of diseases to very, very, very small numbers, so that’s why it’s a very important thing I think.

Fat just causes you problems, it like blocks your arteries, and it, and it can cause diabetes, it can cause heart problems which can make you live not as long as you would as if you were healthy. So if you’re healthy it’s better. Because you live longer, you’re happier and you can do, you can like run around if you want to, and so I, and I’ve found it, I can now get to the top floor of my, of my school building with only being a little bit out of breath, which most people are anyway [laughs].

The health problems that you mentioned that could happen, is that something that you were worried about at all?

Well because that that was what was what was mentioned in the letter that I got as well, so I was worried and I mean I was quite surprised that I hadn’t had any of them already because I’d been, not been eating very healthily probably for all of my life.

So I was quite surprised at, I knew that you could get health problems because we’d been taught in science and in school and stuff.

But I was just quite shocked that I hadn’t had any, and I’m lucky as well ‘cos if you live the way that I’ve lived then [laughs].

So what kind of things did you use to eat before?

Oh I used to have things like chips, and like chicken nuggets, and I used to, we used to have like fish and chips every night, and stuff like that. I would eat things like pasta because I like pasta, rice and all that anyway, but I just wouldn’t have it with a meal if you know what I mean?

Like I could just eat rice on its own, because I wouldn’t like any other sauce or anything.

But I would mainly have things like chips and things that are like deep fat fried and [eugh], I can’t even make my brother chips anymore without making me feel ill.

Really, so you don’t have anything like that?

I don’t have anything like that; I’ve not had it for months.

And do you think it’s important to lose weight, to be thin?

It’s not to be thin because you could be like, you could gain weight but it would be muscle instead of fat, ‘cos fat just causes you problems, it like blocks your arteries, and it, and it can cause diabetes, it can cause heart problems which can make you live not as long as you would as if you were healthy. So if you’re healthy it’s better. Because you live longer, you’re happier and you can do, you can like run around if you want to, and so I, and I’ve found it, I can now get to the top floor of my, of my school building with only being a little bit out of breath, which most people are anyway [laughs].

Do you think it’s possible to be bigger or heavier and also to be fit?

Well, yeah you could, ‘cos you could be like really, you could have a different build, like you could have like a really muscley build and you could weigh more than like 12 stone or something like that, but you could still be healthy on the inside.

So yeah, but it is possible for you to be big, but if, if you don’t do exercise and you, you know, if you know that it’s, you’re overweight you kind of got to just take action really.

Do you think it’s important to be thin?

I don’t think it’s very important. But I think it’s quite a big, it’s got a bit of importance to it.

Why?

Because when you’re overweight, the fat around your organs is quite, quite serious because it can restrict your breathing. And it can get your arteries clogged and stuff like that.

Do you worry about things like that?

Well, I do worry about it. But I don’t think I’m as bad as a lot of people because a lot of people are load-, really a lot bigger than me. And I’m more worried for them than I am for me because I’m not as big as people think I am.

Why is that important?

Because well it’s the fat thing again, because without the fat, then you’d be able to like do stuff that you’d never think you’d be able to do. And it’d just be a lot healthier for you. And you’d be able to live your life without faults and yeah.

And what kind of thing would you be able to do? What kinds of things do you mean?

Run faster. Run distances without getting too out of breath. Doing exercises without getting too out of breath. Probably, I don’t know. I’d say go out in a skirt without leggings.

That’s what I would say [laughs].