ABOUT ME

click here for a short video… although 2 Weeks in the Fast Lane is no longer available to purchase, there are some great tips here for assisting weight-loss!

I qualified as a nutritional therapist in 2001 after 4 years of study at the Institute for Optimum Nutrition (ION) - yes it was gruelling, yes I had no idea how much reading, researching, homework and interactive one-to-one consultations I would have to do (and be judged on), yes I sometimes wondered if I was ever going to get through it all whilst working full time and looking after home and family but I made it and have never looked back despite the fact that it was a big decision to get back to studying in my 40s!

I have been devising fat loss diets for newspapers, magazines, websites and my own books for 18 years and trialling every one of them on both myself and other ‘willing victims’ before they have the merest chance of going to print so not only do I appreciate how hard it is to stick to a diet, lose weight and keep it off but also how important it is that any kind of fat loss diet be slotted in to a hectic and often-stressful lifestyle with minimal disruption.

I love food, I love cooking and I love eating but am also willing to confess to being a little vain, like to look good and love being able to climb into a pair of skinny jeans without fear of an uncomfortably-tight waistband so I follow my own advice and most of the time (but certainly not all of the time!) stick to a diet that I now know, after years of trial and error, works for me.

I cheat, I overeat and I indulge my passion for chocolate and chips (not together!) and I often struggle to hit the exercise mat or go out for a run so am regularly forced to delve into my somewhat limited resources of willpower and self-discipline. However, what I have discovered is that after a day or two of indulgence, the sooner I get back on track by dragging myself out of bed and doing some sort of exercise then concentrating on ‘eating light‘ for a couple of days – soup generally predominates – the greater the likelihood that no lasting damage has been done.

I don’t like counting so I don’t pay heed to the number of calories I consume in a day, nor do I laboriously measure portions and rarely bring out the weighing scales unless I am baking (measurements are vital for a light sponge!)

Fortunately, I like getting out in the fresh air even when the weather is depressingly wet, windy and cold so my favourite form of exercise - cycling - is my saviour. A couple of hours on my bike clears all the nonsense out of my head, helps me focus and ensures I generally come back down to earth with a smile.

I read everything I can get my hands on with regard to diets and fat loss and try to keep up to speed with the very latest research so I can not only pass on my thoughts to my readers and followers but also come up with new and exciting strategies to help them reach their fat loss goals.

I like to rant and guarantee I will never hold back when it comes to giving my views on some of the crazy and sometimes dangerous weight loss tactics that are championed by some of the less scrupulous in the weight loss industry.

My next challenge? Everyone knows I LOVE soup so I plan to travel as much as I possibly can throughout the beautiful country of Portugal to sample soups of all kinds (and a few other dishes besides), photograph them in different parts of the country from high-end restaurants to some of the homes of the Avó’s (Portuguese grandmothers who really know their way around a soup pot!) and share them… however… let’s see how I get on with learning the language first!!