Slimmer Charlie
by
Charles Walduck

The book follows Charlie Walduck from his lowest point in life, in danger of eating himself into an early grave. Tipping the scales at nearly 45 stones,
a friend contacted ITV's 'This Morning' show to help him lose weight. Two years from that day, Charlie weighed 14 stones, making him a record breaker.
Tackling depression and dealing with despair Charlie Walduck is an inspiration to millions, not just with regards to diet, but for his determination to
battle his demons and his addiction. 

tontobooks
www.tontobooks.co.uk

Published in 2009 by Tonto Books Limited
Copyright © Charles Walduck 2009
All rights reserved
The moral rights of the author have been asserted

To Mum and Dad and my family for their unfailing
support through the dark and difficult times.
ISBN-13:
9780955632686

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in
any form or any means without written permission from
the copyright holder, except by a reviewer who may quote
brief passages in connection with a review for insertion in
a newspaper, magazine, website, or broadcast

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data'-
A catalogue record for this book is available from
the British Library

Cover design & photo section by Elliot at
www.preamptive.com

Printed & bound in Great Britain
by CPI Mackays, Chatham

Tonto Books Ltd
Blaydon-on-Tyne
United Kingdom

Foreword
Charlie Walduck is unlike any man I've ever
known, not just for who he was, but for who
he is now. Until I met him, his life had been
ordinary, except for the vast amounts of food
he ate every day, and his obesity problem - he weighed
forty-four stone! He weighed more in stones than his
age in years and was well on his way to a premature
death.
He ended up as one of the UK's fattest men and had
got to the point where he didn't actually think it was
worth trying to lose weight and reclaim his life, body
and mind. He'd resigned himself to the fact that he was
too fat to bother and was beyond hope. He was addicted
to food.
His closest friend sent a letter to me at ITV's This
Morning show, where I am resident GP, and I agreed
to help Charlie lose weight. We documented his
progress on the show as he subsequently turned his life
around. The rest of the story, as they say, is history.
Charlie lost twenty stones in the first twelve
months, without the help of drugs or surgery - a UK record.
He went on to lose a total of thirty-one stones,
Dr Chris Steele, MBE.

preface

There we were in the hideout of the baddies.
They had the girl in a separate room and I
knew I was running out of time. The clock
was ticking, the sweat trickling down my
brow as I prepared myself for their next onslaught. The
really sadistic one came at me with his fist clenched
and I knew I couldn't take much punishment. I pulled
on the ropes as hard as I could and my hands broke
free. I was up from the chair before he knew what was
going on, kicked him in the groin and floored him with
a knockout punch. The two guards on the door came
forward and I grabbed them and cracked their heads
together. They sunk to the floor unconscious. I
snatched one of their guns, kicked the door open and
went looking for the girl. I knew there were less than
ten seconds to find her and deactivate the missile ...


You always remember the big highs and lows
in your life; where you were when something
important happened in the world and who
you were with. In my thirty-five years there
weren't that many highs to recall, just the lows that
seemed to be there constantly.
New Year's Eve 2002 is one of those times I
remember with great sadness. Rather than being with
people and celebrating, I was alone in my house as
usual; a single man, hardly able to walk, struggling to
get out of bed, go to the toilet and weighing an
incredible forty-five stones, maybe more. I'd stopped
paying attention to the numbers. They didn't mean
anything anymore.
My constant companion on this night was the old
faithful - my fridge - which was crammed full of
unhealthy fattening food; all the kinds of things you
are told not to eat, comfort eating at its very finest.
And there was a carrier bag more of it, stuffed full of
sweets, crisps, cakes, bread and cheese, next to my
chair so I'd just have to reach down for my next fix.
Discarded wrappers from all the rubbish I'd devoured
throughout the day lay strewn across the floor in
typical 'pig-sty' fashion. I'm not a messy person by
nature, but sometimes when it was easier for me just
to sit in my chair rather than heave myself up to bed,
you can imagine that tidying up was never high on my
priority list. There was takeaway packaging on the
carpet ... you name it, I'd had it delivered. Food
deliveries weren't for a special occasion or Saturday
night treats now. It was a regular phone call at any
time of the day, whether actually at home or on my

way home.
My other friend was with me that night - TV. I'd sit
in front of it night after night, a Groundhog Day of
overeating; TV dinners forming my staple calorie
uncontrolled diet in addition to TV breakfasts, TV
elevenses, TV brunches, TV lunches, TV teas, TV
suppers and TV snacks. You get the idea - food and
TV.
Another constant was the pain in my joints, with
my legs covered in weeping sores and agonising ulcers
that never healed. My self-esteem couldn't have got
any lower. I had become one of the fattest men in the
UK. The scene was of one an archetypical slob's living
room in a sitcom, but without the empty cans of beer. It
was a scene from my own show, Man Eating Badly my
bachelor pad in my own situation tragedy. I was
literally eating myself into oblivion day after day, and
if the eating didn't kill me, I could only see one other
choice.

I sat there wishing I was dead.




It's not every day you get the opportunity to write
your autobiography, is it? Where do you start
something like this? I'm quite used to the odd
interview now, but an entire life story is quite
different. Talk about being under pressure! I am well
aware that I am not quite an international superstar
with millions of adoring fans (yet). I mean, I've always
considered myself to be a pretty average bloke really,
but my story is rather unique. That uniqueness is the
reason you just bought this book ... not because I was in a boy band or because I'm a Hollywood actor or
scored goals for England (I'm sure all those will come in time anyway), but because you know who I am and want to know more about how I became so large and how I motivated myself to become Slimmer Charlie.
Hence
As a big comedy fan, I started reading one of Frank
Skinner's books recently and thought it would give me a few pointers on how to write mine. He starts off by saying if he's thinking about buying a book he'll read the first paragraph in the shop, as this gives a fair indication of what the rest of the book will be like.
me getting the girl, killing the baddies and
saving the Planet I thought it would be a bit more of a hook than telling you where and when I was born. He
also mentions that he gives up reading biographies if
he gets to page fifty and the subject of the book is still
at school. I'm like that with books too ... jog on to when
you are famous! Get to the scandal and the sleeping
around with groupies section! I'll make sure to put the
story about when Fern Britton came knocking on my
dressing room door on page forty-nine.
Not many people had such a remarkable childhood
that it is worth dwelling on for three quarters of a
book, but I do think that those early years shape you
into what you are as an adult. To write this, I did a lot
of soul-searching and discovered the above to be true.
Other than trying to purposefully skip over the early
days, I think if we're going to be spending so much time
together then you need to know about my background.
Imagine the reviews ... 'Excellent book, but Walduck
neglected to tell us anything about when he was young,
so no one identified with him.'
So, for the record, I, Charles Ambrose Walduck, was
born on 30 August 1968 at Risedale Maternity Hospital
in Barrow-in-Furness and weighed in at six pounds
and six ounces. The first of three for proud parents
Janet and Clifford, I was named after my two grandfathers,
Charles Cherry and Ambrose Walduck.
I was born by Caesarean section and I've still got a
scar from my birth when the doctor managed to cut my
head. I'm sure that didn't help ease the tension. Mum
had been pregnant before and had lost her first child
during birth and very nearly lost her own life in the
process. It's impossible to imagine the loss and the hurt
- and so, whilst pregnant with me, it was a very
anxious and stressful time for them both. Every day
must have been a mixture of emotion and going into Csection
must have brought all those memories flooding
back to the surface. It must be heart wrenching to have
to deal with such things and it takes strong people to
survive. I'm proud of them for that. My mum must
think about this often and I know in my dark days of
feeling low and suicidal it must really upset her.
My brother Steven joined the clan in November
1970 and my sister Jackie completed the line-up in
December 1971. Steven is married with two children
and now lives in Aberdeen and Jackie has four children
and lives not too far away in Ulverston.
We always got along fine apart from the usual
sibling rivalry, but there were lots of happy memories
of the times we all spent together. Steven was the
sporty one, leaving me as the non-sporty one. I couldn't
even get my head around those video games where you
could play football, tennis and dozens of other sports
(but they all managed to be exactly the same game what
was all that about?). So where Steven was into
anything that involved fitness, with me in tow we were
never going to give the Neville brothers a run for their
money in anything other than a beauty contest. I was
never the type to play out that much and didn't really
have any friends, so most of my playtime was spent
indoors with Steven and Jackie or other family
members. We were very close in that respect. My mum
and dad always made sure we were kept warm and
comfortable, extremely well fed and clothed and were
given lots of love and affection. Although we were by no
means spoiled (Mum and Dad couldn't afford to), I am
conscious that I am so very lucky to have had a normal,
happy childhood.

At the age of five I started at St James' Infant School.
Being born in August, I had only just turned five when
I started school and was always the youngest in the
class. I didn't take to school well at all. Not that there
was anything wrong with the school itself looking back
now, I can see that I was very sensitive to other
peoples' thoughts toward me. It sounds mad, but I'd
stand in the playground on my own with the fear of
rejection making it impossible for me to bond and play
like all the other kids were doing. I thought they would
look at me and say 'What's he doing here?' 'What right
has he to be here?' What if nobody liked me ... what
would I do? I don't know what it was, but I've always
been a worrier. I was just too nervous in that situation.
I've often put this down to the anguish that Mum was
going through when she was carrying me because of
her last experience of pregnancy. It's like I took on
board those feelings she must have had and they
became part of my personality. Once I was on a bus
with my mum and was convinced she hadn't paid my
fare. I felt uncomfortable for the whole journey,
thinking we'd get thrown off, thinking the worst, squirming all the way home. As we were getting off the
bus, I asked the driver if she'd paid, just to make sure.
Of course she had and there'd been no reason to worry.
Try telling me that, though.
It was maybe around this age that I used to wet the
bed. Some of the symptoms for this are said to be worry
and stress, although some would argue that a five year
old shouldn't have any stress or worry in their life. I
agree. It shouldn't have been there, but for whatever
reason, it was. Bedwetting is also a very common thing
in kids and there's always a need to label something or
find a reason when sometimes there isn't one. Sometimes
things just happen 'because' and there is no
other explanation. I used to worry because, I used to
wet the bed because. And that's it. I used to hate
having to lie there waiting for Mum to come and
change the sheets. I still feel embarrassed and guilty
when I think back to those nights of lying in a wet bed
like it was my fault and I'd done wrong and I was
causing upset. If I'd known it was a common thing, I
probably still would have worried.
These feelings of not fitting in and not having a
right to be there stayed with me throughout my life
and still remain with me now. I've always been painfully
shy - it's odd, because some of the things I've done
in my life, you'd expect me to be very extrovert. It's just
how I am. I know people who are great public speakers
and teachers and they'll admit to being shy too. It's an
odd contradiction that people find difficult to believe. I
suppose it's a bit like taking on a role, pretending,
putting on an act and having that role or mask to hide
behind.
Because of my sensitivity, I often felt let down quite
a bit as a youngster too. There was one day I was in the
park with my dad, who'd just bought me a lovely new
kite to fly. In no time at all it got tangled up in some
railings and it was game over for the kite. I was gutted.
I just expected my dad to take me to buy another one,
but it wasn't to be. Whether it was because times were
tough or simply to teach me the value of things, I
learnt the hard way from occasions such as these.
Dad, like so many others in Barrow, worked at the
shipyard and strikes were not unusual. There would
always be ups and downs, especially in great industries like mining and shipbuilding, where management and
unions clashed on a regular basis and the workers
downed tools and walked. We grew up quite used to
struggling to get by from time to time, but no matter
how difficult things were, we never ever went hungry.

The only proper good memory I have from school is
school dinners. I loved them! The dinner ladies would
always give extra to the chubby kids. And being one of
the chubbies, I would always get extra. Result! I also
think they felt a bit sorry for me as I was quite the
Billy-no-mates, and of course, I was never going to
refuse seconds. Or thirds, if they were asking. Thinking
about it now, it was misplaced kindness, but what's
done is done. With their help, I managed to invent
childhood obesity, becoming a chunky child long before
it became popular. In the school's defence, it wasn't
that the food was unhealthy, same with the food I had
at home. It was just that I was starting to eat it all in
such large quantities.
It was common knowledge that any waste from the
school dinners would get piled up and turned into
pigs will - and oh how I envied those pigs. Other than
getting slaughtered and ending up in sandwiches, they
were pretty much sorted.

Mum used to give us ten pence spending money each
week on a Monday and again on a Friday and I would
spend mine on crisps and sweets. Mum never allowed
any of us to have chewing gum, because she said it
would wrap around our throats and kill us. I remember
once picking some chewing gum up off the pavement
and eating it, just to see what it was like and if it was
as dangerous as I'd been led to believe, although, in
this instance, I reckon the germs posed a bigger threat
to my health than the actual chewing gum did. It quite
put me off chewing gum. Up until I dared to try it
again years later, I thought it all tasted like cigarettes
and dirt. It was a nice surprise.
My desire for food of any type became so strong I
would do almost anything to get it. Eating started to
get its claws into me, much like any other addict, but I
was always in check with my morals^ I'd never steal,

take anything without paying and would never eat the
scraps off other people's plates. I remember seeing
someone in the school canteen passing from table to
table finishing off what people had left and I felt
embarrassed for him. For me to be young and this
interested in food wasn't right. I know it is always
encouraging to see kids with a healthy appetite, but
mine went that bit further, crossing the line to become
an unhealthy one. It was really all I thought about.
I had one friend called Mark when I was around ten
years old. I went to his house after school once and his
mum made us crinkle-cut oven chips and burgers for
dinner. It was the first time I'd tasted oven chips and
they were out of this world. We watched Superman on
TV and I couldn't wait to get back home and spread the
word. Mums always ask you what you had when you go
out to tea and my mum was no different. She was
amazed that people bought frozen chips -- in our house
it was always a sack of potatoes, done the traditional
way. Oven chips may have been the latest fad, but
crinkle-cut ones were the future. I knew because I'd
seen it. Who needed to go to the trouble of peeling and
slicing a potato anymore? Sure enough, the next
question to come from me was, 'Can we have crinkle
cut oven chips?' Mum was reluctant to follow the new
ways, but she compromised and bought a crinkle chip
cutter instead. All the kids were singing 'Hope it's
chips, it's chips' in the tune of 'Que Sera, Sera' from the
oven chips TV advert, and Crispy Pancakes were all
the rage. In short, these were good times to have an
oven and a freezer and I didn't want us to get left
behind. Who needs chip pan fires when you just need to rip a bag open and bang them on an oven tray?
When we had guests for dinner or tea, I noticed
their portions would be much bigger than ours. What
was that about, I pondered? It didn't seem fair.
'It's polite,' Mum would say. 'Guests should get the
largest portions.'
Hmm ... Sadly, I soon realised that when I sat down
to dinner at other people's houses and looked down at
my meagre portion, not everyone thought like my
mum. Some people have no manners! When we visited
my nana and granddad (Dad's parents) they always
were polite when it came to dishing out the grub. Nana
would spoil us with all the usual treats that
grandparents have specially tucked away for their
grandchildren. They lived around eight miles away and
we would all go quite regularly to see them. Families
don't seem to spend enough time visiting each other
these days, unless they have to or want to borrow a
lawnmower. Nana Lillian was a fantastic cook and I
have amazing memories of Granddad Ambrose, who
was a really special man - one of those types you look
up to and respect and want to be in their company.
Sometimes we'd visit them at night and would drive
over with us three dressed in our pyjamas. It was a
great adventure. If you've got kids, you'll know how
excited they get if you ever do a mad pyjamas outing ...
we giggled and snuggled all the way there.
Nothing could beat Christmas dinner at their house;
the food was to die for. Unfortunately, Nana was
always busy in the kitchen half the day preparing, so
by the time she was ready to sit down for hers (serving
herself last) we'd be cleaning our plates ready for
seconds. She was great - always making sure everyone
was happy and fed.
Jackie and Steven were never quite as interested in
Christmas, but to me it was sheer magic. I would wake
up and ask 'Has he been?' I always knew it was Mum
and Dad filling the stockings up rather than Santa,
because my Spock-like mind couldn't cope with the
concept of his existence. But what the hell - if he (they)
were going to bring me a bag of chocolate then I was
happy to 'believe'. Our day would start with opening
presents in the morning, then getting ready for our trip
to Nana's, usually after sampling some of my Christmas
goodies first, just as an appetiser.
She was never the tidiest person in the world. Once,
she stood surveying the living room and said, 'Oh dear
the house is a bit untidy.'
'Yes. I can see that,' I replied, and got a clip round
the ear for my trouble! I can laugh about it now, but at
the time I was only agreeing with her. I mean, my
delivery could have been a lot more sarcastic, if that's
what I was going for. I'll not be doing that again in a
hurry, I can tell you. Hell hath no fury like a woman
when you agree that her house is a mess.
During one of our Christmas dinners there, a sprout
flew from Nana's plate when she was eating and Dad
said, 'Don't worry, mother. You'll find it next year
when you clean up.' (This is one of those stories that
my mum and dad always reminisce about fondly. As a
family, humour has always played a big part in our
lives with us all trying to outdo each other - even now.
Dad's jokes are typical dad jokes, and now that I've got
the opportunity to put them in black and white, they
really are terrible.)

Anyway, we would be at bursting point after dinner
and Nana would always ask if we wanted more.
Seriously though, I always did have seconds, and by
the time we'd had pudding, I was lucky if I could move.
It wasn't easy having eyes as big as my belly.
Even though it was Christmas, the alarm bells
should have been ringing by now: there was a bit of a
problem. It was like a compulsion, no plate could be left
until it was empty, no offer of more could be refused.
Maybe it's easier to think of it all as a one off until it
becomes blatantly obvious that it isn't. And that's
usually when the problem is too late.
I used to love the smell of the turkey cooking on
Christmas Day. Just like when Mum used to bake her
own bread, it's one of those aromas that captivate you a
real Bisto Kid moment (for those old enough to
remember). We'd laugh at all those people who'd talk
about turkey lasting for weeks and weeks - if we'd had
any left on Boxing Day it would have been a miracle.

I loved family celebrations. Other people would visit us
too, so there was always some sort of socialising going
on. I liked that we were surrounded by family. It was
never overbearing - we were a family who actually
enjoyed being in each other's company and didn't just
do it because we thought we had to.
Birthday parties were such special occasions for me
as well. I used to get so excited and wound up knowing
there was a party about to start. I loved the build-up:
the busyness in the kitchen, the cooking smells, the
table being set, the party games being prepared ... the
feeling was incredible. All our family and friends would
be invited and Mum would put on an enormous spread
with all sorts of children's party food. It was like
heaven^ cakes, sandwiches, pies, sausage rolls, jellies
and trifle would all be laid out ready for us to tuck in.
It was like being on set of the latest 'Mum's gone to
Iceland' advert. Naturally, I would be the last to leave
the table and I'd still be on savouries when everyone
else was on the cakes and trifle.
After the highs of parties, there always came a big
low for me. I never wanted them to end. I'd always
want to carry on playing games and hated it when the
other children had to leave. I just couldn't let go. At the
end of one birthday party, I was so upset when it was
time for the children to go home, I pleaded for more
games of pass the parcel - even though that meant
wrapping up one of the gifts I had been given that day.
Whatever it took, I'd do it.
My birthdays generally ended the same way: I'd go
to bed and cry myself to sleep, sad that the day had
ended and then I'd be left with a bad memory of it
ending rather than a good one of it having taken place.
It was the same at Christmas. It was difficult to deal
with as no one really seemed to understand the anxiety
and then depression it caused. I felt so frantic when I
knew something was drawing to a close, my brain
going into overdrive to think of ways to prolong it. This
is something else that has followed me throughout my life, whether it was the end of a holiday, the end of a
night out or simply the end of having a nice day. It
didn't matter. It started to feel like there was a
constant low that the festivities lifted for a bit. That's
why I didn't want them to end. No one else seemed to
go through this. Sure, others didn't like parties ending,
but to me it felt a lot more than just a party ending-' the
entire mood would have to come back down to normality,
the whole house transformed back and I found it so
difficult to readjust.

On Tuesdays, my Auntie Carol would come round in
the evening and my dad would go off to watch Barrow
Playing football. With Dad out the house it meant only
one thing - riot time! Like all kids, we'd take full
advantage of the ruling hand being out for a couple of
hours. Mum would use the 'Wait 'til your dad gets
home card and we'd use the 'Make sure to get round
Mum before Dad gets home' card. It was all pure
entertainment, really. With Auntie Carol there and my
dad out, it was just our way of keeping the laughs
going. All kids have a bit of a mess on when they know
they can get away with it. Order was usually restored
by the time he returned from the footy, apart from the
time I came out with, 'Dad's gone. Let's start messing
around!' then legged it downstairs, burst into the living
room ... to find Dad still at home. Then the ruling hand
gave me a smacked arse. I still maintain to this day
that I knew he was there and I was just having a
laugh. Did anyone believe me? No one believed me
when the cat knocked the glass fish off the TV either.
That's adults for you.
My Auntie Elaine (not a real auntie - but sort of
related) would come for lunch on Wednesdays. She was
a big lady with a big heart and I just loved listening to
tales about her life. She'd tell us about buying Easter
eggs and how she would always end up eating them
before giving them as gifts. Same with selection boxes
at Christmas. She'd have to go out and buy them again
and would end up eating the second lot as well. A lady
after my own heart! And embarrassingly, I always told
her that one day I would marry her. I always felt
comfortable in her company and she certainly knows
how to make me squirm ... every time I see her now,
she reminds me of my promise.
Moving swiftly on, Nana and Granddad would also
visit on a Wednesday and Mum would make one of my
favourites - Cheese and Onion Pie and Egg and Bacon
Pie (or quiche to you and me), chips, beans, and
pudding too. And no, not all on the same plate. I may
have liked eating, but I'm not mad.
The big table would go up and I would be in my
element. How I loved Wednesdays - the smell of my
mum's cooking and Granddad's roll ups - happy family
days. We would sit and watch TV in the evening, and
without fail, just before This Is Your Life came on,
Auntie Elaine would say 'Janet, go and get your dress
on!' to Mum. It became a tradition. I would always
sneak off and come back with my hair slicked down,
with a hairbrush for a microphone, and tell my mum
'Tonight, Janet Walduck ... this is your life!' To make it
more authentic I'd taped the theme tune to the show on
one of those cassette recorders where you'd set the
microphone up next to the speaker in complete silence.
I always fancied being a TV presenter or something
like that. I loved performing to an audience. It was
something that brought me out of my shell and I felt
really comfortable doing it.

Saturday was our turn to visit Auntie Carol. My dad
would go to the football match and afterwards we
would all walk home together. Another great thing
about Saturdays was that for tea we always had party
food: sandwiches, cakes (remember when Fondant
Fancies were a proper size and not just gone in a bite
like they are now?), pork pies, trifle, jelly, sausage rolls
... the kind of food that made my whole face light up! It
was the sort of treat I never tired of one single bit - a
party every week. One Saturday we were walking
there when an ambulance went screeching past us and
up the road from where we had just come. Unknown to
us, as we were having a leisurely stroll, Steven had
been knocked off his bike by a car. Someone must have
seen it and phoned for help immediately. It turned out
he was OK, but the consequence was that we had
sausage, mash and gravy because there hadn't been
time to prepare the usual. I wasn't at all happy about
missing out on the weekly treat. For such a dramatic
day in our life and one that was traumatic for us all,
my memory of it is still of the food I missed out on.

I was never that religious, but I used to pray on
Sunday mornings. For rain. You see, our Sundays were
reserved for Dad taking us out for walks and I'd try
almost anything, other than breaking one of my own
legs, to get out of it. It was like having one of The
Proclaimers as a parent (both of them as parents would
have been plain weird). He was never one to do things
by half, my dad - a walk was a loose term for a trek in
his language. To be fair, I did eventually enjoy the
walks and it was great to have the sense of
achievement at the end of it. Back at home, Dad would
get a shoelace out and measure on the map how far we
had walked and I'd be like Roy Scheider in Jaws, giving it, 'Dad, you're gonna need a bigger lace.'
One day we managed to walk twenty miles. See
what I mean about a trek? On New Year's Day we
would always walk over to Granddad's house to let the
New Year in. He'd drive us back though. In those days
it was called exercise and fresh air, but today it would
be child abuse, I'm sure. You can't put kids through
stuff like that these days! It was like trying out for the
army. Somehow, Steven and Jackie used to get out of
going. I can't even remember how, all I know is there
can't be any justice in the world. The walks became
known as the Sunday Club and there were fourteen of
us at one point. You know, with all the camaraderie
that went with trekking round the countryside, it did
give me a great sense of belonging, to be out there and
be a part of something. It was a bond to share that the
others didn't have with my dad.
While all that was going on, Mum would be at home
preparing our meal and the best part of the day was
when we were on the home stretch. There was always a
great sense of security from being out doing the manly
pursuits to coming home to the warmth and a nice,
hearty meal. Mum's Sunday roast dinners were
heavenly and she'd never vandalise it by using instant
gravy either - it was all done the traditional way.
There's nothing worse than doing most of something
well and then spoiling it all at the last hurdle. Like
when you go for a pub meal and have lovely bangers
and onion gravy on a bed of Smash. Makes me shiver
just thinking about it.
Jackie and I used to have to do the washing up afterwards
- yet another chore Steven got out of. He once
'accidentally' broke a plate and wasn't trusted to do the
dishes ever again. Wish I'd thought of that first. We'd
always argue about who would wash and who would
dry. It got to the point where we'd ask weeks in
advance so we could get one over each other by reserving
which we wanted to do.
Sunday evenings would drag and drag on. What was
it with them? It was miserable - the thought of school
the next day and the end of the weekend. Even now I
think Sundays have a strange feel to them. It's like
being in limbo, just waiting for the inevitable Monday
morning. It was bath and hair wash night as well on a
Sunday, just to make things worse. Mum would turn
off the TV and put the wireless on instead, as if to
make the night drag out even further. It wasn't like
she used to have the Sunday Chart Show on either, but
usually something kids found boring. It was a case of
waiting out the boredom until supper time at eight
o clock. There would be a piece of cake or pie and
sandwiches - never crisps though (I'll tell you why
later). It was nice to round the week off with a bit of
sweet 'n' savoury.
I know I used 'abuse' earlier as a tongue-in-cheek
description, but when you're young, anything you don't
want to do feels like torture. Even down to having a
nice, hot bath, something too many of us take for
granted. Sounds mad thinking about it now. It wasn't
that long before my time when it was tin baths in front
of the fire. Now that would have been something to
complain about!

You'll be starting to see the pattern emerging. My life
has always been ruled by food. I can make the odd joke
about it here and there but actually sitting down and
writing about it makes it all the more poignant. People
who used to play out all the time as kids will have
things like the smell of freshly cut grass to remind
them of an endless summer holiday, or the sounds of
running water if they found a river to play by. All I
seem to have is the smell of some food in the oven or
the sound something made as it was cooking. If I'd
been around, I couldn't tell you where I was when
Kennedy got shot, but I'd be able to tell you what food I
was eating in minute detail. Should I have known
there was a problem early on? Should others have
spotted it? Was it anyone's fault? I have no idea. I'd
always perceived people with problems and addictions
later in life as people who probably didn't have the best
upbringing, with a troubled childhood and dysfunctional
family. I had none of that.
But then there are always the little signs ... having
no real friends, no real bonds with other kids my age,
not playing out, being very sensitive, not wanting
things to end and having to compulsively eat to the
point of being sick rather than let something go to
waste. It's almost like food was my friend and the
friendship began to develop from an early age. Most
childhood friendships are on and off with fallings out
over the years. Not this one. It flourished.

When Dad was on night shift we would all sit at the
table for breakfast and have cereal and toast on the
morning. I bet it felt good to come back from doing hard
graft to the warmth of his family and somewhere to
rest his weary bones. Mum would tell him about what
she had watched on TV the night before and would go
into the entire plot of films and programmes to the
point where it was like we'd all watched them. I just
loved listening to everything she had to say. Dad would
then head off to bed and we would get ready for school.
It wouldn't be long before Dad would stomp back
downstairs to tell us to keep the noise down. Even with
the best intentions, it's difficult to get three kids ready
for school in silence. You should have heard the din
when Mum and Steven used to do exercise along with
Mad Lizzy on TV-am. All hope of him getting off to
sleep before we'd left the house was lost.
I looked forward to Friday mornings because we'd
sit down to a cooked breakfast. I mean ... sausages,
bacon, eggs, mushrooms, hash browns, beans, tomatoes
... tea, toast ... there is no finer way to start your day.
Or end it. Being woken up by the smell of it all sizzling
away in a pan beats any alarm clock. Fridays had a
real sense of occasion, like we were celebrating the last
day of a working week, and Mum would lay the table
the night before in preparation.

You always know you are growing up when you get
your own front door key. It was a big deal for me - one
of the perks of being the eldest child, and it gave me a
fantastic sense of trust. It was Mum and Dad
recognising that I was becoming responsible, rather
than arranging for someone to come round. With them
no longer being at home on a Friday when we got home
from school (Dad was at work and Mum used to go
shopping), just like the American sitcom, I was Charles
in Charge for the night.
The television was always on when I opened the
door with my shiny new key on Fridays. It was reassuring
in a way, but a bit eerie in others as I'd always
expect someone to be in. Mum made our tea for us and
left it on plates in the kitchen before they went out, so
there wasn't any faffing on to be done. I may have been
the responsible one, but there was no way I was going
to start making tea when I got home. I wasn't that responsible! I have a particular aversion to anyone
touching my food so there was a bit of trial and error in
respect of the food being left out, until Mum started to
put nametags on our plates (mine was easy to spot
anyway as it was always the largest of the three). We
all felt grown up being left to our own devices. I mean,
we could watch whatever we wanted on TV - but in
those days there were only three channels.

Twice a year we would go to visit my Gran down in
Devon and make a real holiday of it. Two weeks in the
summer in Torquay was something to look forward to, I
can tell you. Granddad Charles died when I was only
three years old and my only memory of him is that he
had a bed downstairs. According to Mum, he was so
proud that I was named after him, and although he
was known as Charlie, my mum hates me being called
Charlie. I take it it's too late to change the title of this
book. Woe betides anyone who'd ring up asking for me
by that name. There was 'no one called Charlie here'.
Mums are always protective of your first name, aren't
they? They never shorten it.
Unfortunately, Gran was not in the same league as
Nana when it came to cooking. It was the downside to
spending two weeks there, but you had to just grin and
bear it. Not that her cooking was terrible, just not as
good as. Foodies recognise these things, you know.
After my granddad passed away it was just Gran and
Auntie Margaret, my mum's sister. Auntie Margaret
had a great sense of silly humour and I always got on
really well with her. She was never ashamed of me
when I became bigger (hate to spoil the rest of the book
for you by dropping that one in). Ever. With just seeing
each other twice a year, she'd probably have noticed
the weight gain more than others, but she never
commented and it never affected our relationship. She
was ace and I know she would have been proud of me
for doing what I've done.
Devon was such a relaxed place to spend summer.
Dad especially loved Gran and Margaret's house
because they had a back garden; something we never
had at home, and I often felt for him, not having one.
He grew all sorts of fruit and vegetables in theirs and
really enjoyed having a part-time hobby. They had
apple and cherry trees, but Dad would warn me:
'Don't go eating all the fruit. It's not like it grows on
trees, you know.'
'If they fall on the ground, then they have to be
eaten,' replied Charlie 'tree shaker' Walduck
innocently.
I'd still munch the fruit, but I was always wondering
if pork pie trees would ever grow.
They moved up to Barrow in 1979, to a council
house on Walney Island. We drove down to Torquay to
collect them to bring them to their new life and I
remember wishing so hard it was us moving to Devon
and not the other way round. It was such a shame to
miss out on those holidays, but at least it meant that
Gran and Auntie Margaret were closer to us, so we
gained in other ways. I would often stay overnight at
their house without Jackie and Steven and they would
spoil me so much with treats galore. Happy days!
With nowhere to go for our summer holidays we
started to go on camping trips. Why does everyone set
off with such a romantic vision of idyllic bliss?
Camping, roughing it, living off the land, the fresh air,
the countryside, the great outdoors ... however you
dress it up, it just means no comfort, no central
heating, wind blowing through the tent and tins of
beans cooked on a camping stove. Fresh air - go on, I'll
give you that one. I'm more of a great indoors type
though. Mum and Dad bought us a big house tent,
which should have had separate rooms, but somehow
we never bothered partitioning it off, so we ended up in
the huge open-plan tent together. I have to admit
(sorry, Mum and Dad) that I hated it. Cornflakes with
warm milk, flies swarming around the food and the
rain dripping in the tent all night, and on top of all
that - no toilet. Maybe I'm not getting my point across
here, but I didn't take to camping at all. Not one bit. I
vividly remember Mum being terrified that a sheep
was going to come into the tent and pounce on her. I
mean, this was her idea, and even she was freaking out
about gangs of delinquent livestock on the loose. We
should have sent Gran and Auntie Margaret a postcard
saying 'Wish you were still in Devon.'
I also hated having to get undressed in front of
everyone. Perhaps even at this stage of my life I was
aware of my body, and I'd started to grow up and enter
puberty. Those days of being a kid and running around
with nothing on without shame were gone. Yes, we're
all the same underneath, but that's no reason to turn
the place into a nudist camp. We would go swimming
loads when we were roughing it and I would hide
behind the bushes to get undressed before hoofing it to
the edge and jumping straight in. Dad used to tell me
to stop worrying about it and to let it all hang out, but
that was not me at all. Some people can do things like
that and not care, but I care, so I can't. It gave me a
sense of vulnerability that I didn't like - whether it
was my immediate family who I was with or not, it
didn't matter. I was always first into the water and last
out. Once I was in, I loved swimming and would spend
hours in the water - lakes, rivers, the sea, anywhere.
The initial hit of cold water then the freedom of being
able to swim and be part of nature ... it's enough to
make it sound like I enjoyed outdoor pursuits, so I'll
not big it up too much. There was the walking and
picnics through the day that were nice too, but still ... it
wasn't home and there was never any comfort.
My Auntie Doreen and Uncle Keith were also into
camping and we would often all go together, although
they were far more professional than us. However, that
didn't stop their tent blowing away one night. It just
goes to show, you can be prepared, head to toe in all
the latest gear, be the next Bear Grylls even, but it can
still go wrong. I wished ours would blow away too. I
was never that lucky.
In the evenings, Mum and Dad would go to the local
pub and we would sit outside. I know that sounds
terrible because Mum and Dad were never big pub
goers. In fact, Dad would brew his own lager and they
would rather have a couple of drinks at home. When
camping though, they would go to the local pub (maybe
they needed some time alone, or to numb the pain).
While they were in, Mum would keep coming out with
supplies of pop and crisps and to make sure we were
alright. And now your brain has just flagged up the
word 'crisps' from earlier. Top marks if you were
paying attention. Dad hated us having crisps for three
reasons'- the crunching sound they made (yes, really),
they were expensive, and they would make us fat. He
was at least right on the last point. Up until the age of
twenty-six, I always sucked on my crisps so they
wouldn't make a noise.
Imprinted on my mind is a photo of us all standing
outside the tent on one of these expeditions, and I'm
there, big boobs, moobs if you will, even at the age of
thirteen. Looking at that photo, I could see what other
people saw and I didn't like it. I felt embarrassed to
realise that's what people saw and imagined what
they'd be thinking. It's a horrible, sinking feeling.

I guess I was a little frightened of my dad. Dads are
always the main 'enforcer' in the traditional role of
family life, so I think everyone has been a bit wary of
their dad at some point. If we were ever too naughty
we would be sent to bed early, which carried an even
worse punishment with it - missing out on supper! Dad
could look quite stern at times and that look was
generally enough to put a stop to whatever bad behaviour
was going on. Dads are good at that. There must
be a book somewhere with dad rules, regulations and
advice on the right look for every occasion'- How to Stop
your Children Fighting with Facial Expression Only ...
How to Lighten the Mood by Doing Something Silly,
Pretending to Trip Over or by Facial Expression Only. Behind the sometimes-stern expression there was a
heart of gold and we could always rely on him if we
needed anything. That's what dads are for and they all
know this regardless of whether they have the mythical Dad Rule Book or not.




At the age of eleven, I started at Alfred
Barrow Secondary School, and to get there
and back I had to walk through Barrow
town centre, passing lovely cafes and pie
shops along the way.
I enjoyed going to secondary school, though it was
always marred by my shyness. I would have loved to
get involved in the drama groups and be a bit more
active, but with my lack of confidence and self-esteem,
my courage always deserted me and I was left looking
on and dreaming of what might have been. Maybe
playing the Lion in The Wizard of Oz would have been
fitting.
So with any acting aspirations being a non-starter, I
had no idea what I wanted to do with my life. I was
never one of those who knew as soon as they were born
what they wanted to do and stuck to it. Thank God. At
one point, I joined a club along with some friends called
the FTG (the Furness Transport Group), who had an
old double-decker bus that they would take to bus
rallies and carnivals. I had no idea bus rallies even
existed until then. It was great fun. And one thing you
may have noticed is that I joined with some friends ... I
wasn't Charlie-no-mates anymore.
Most of the kids in the group were those who'd be
labelled as nerds these days. We were not exactly cool,
being a member of a bus group, in the eyes of others
anyway, but to me it was great because we travelled
around the country in an old double-decker bus.
For a short time I wanted to be a bus conductor.
Don't know why, really. They got to stand around on
buses and it probably seemed a bit cool at the time. If
cool is the right word. But they were being phased out
and when I thought about being a bus driver instead,
to keep the bus theme going, I thought no way could I
do that because I couldn't drive. Even at twelve years
old, the famous self-doubt held me back. Why would I
tell myself I couldn't drive? My voice hadn't even
broken and I was still at school. It was quite obvious
that I couldn't drive, but it was like this inner-me
would always drag me back to reality once a dream
was hatched; like it was poised with a pin ready to
burst any bubble.
If watching TV and, well, it could have been
anything really - a singer in a band, someone playing
football, a magician -- if anyone came on who could do
something, I'd get 'You couldn't do that,' 'They wouldn't
want you,' and 'You're incapable of that' from Mum and
Dad. It's never nice for any child to hear a parent have
such un-great expectations and this is something that
does affect kids later in life. It was like being
conditioned and it surfaces any time I feel great and
positive; it's always there in the background to repress
those feelings of having and worth. It had a massive
impact on my life, being brought down in such a way. If
they knew what they were doing, they'd have stopped.
Rather than it being a malicious thing, I think it was
all largely because of Mum's background. Her mum
worked in service at a stately home as a maid and her
dad was the groundsman, so all that 'knowing your
place in life' attitude stemmed from that.
It's no wonder there are so many messed-up people
in the world because parents have always thrown such
off-the-cuff comments at their kids, always put them
down through what they'd call 'only having a laugh',
and those are the things kids take with them into
adulthood. Stop doing it! I was always a sensitive lad,
always will be ... maybe I took it all too much to heart.
I know it had an impact on my confidence. I've never
pushed myself career-wise. I'm just not that type.
Steven is successful in life and Jackie has so much
confidence. How are they so different? How didn't they
turn out the same as me? Well, I just don't know.
Maybe it all rubbed off on me because I'm the more
sensitive. I know the kind of comments that were
dished out would just go over Steven and Jackie's
heads. Maybe there is no proper explanation, no real
reason other than we're all different; no two people are
the same.
In those days, career aspirations began with going
on a YTS (Youth Training Scheme for those of you
under thirty-five) and getting a trade. My dad used to
always come out with that one, as I'm sure every other
dad in the country did. 'You've got to get yourself a
trade' was used by dads in a time when there was trade
and industry in the country. Nowadays everyone is
looking for careers in telecoms and IT and the jobs for
life in industry that employed entire communities are a
thing of the past. I used to tell Dad it was never going
to happen. I wasn't going to be a shipbuilder. I may
have looked for a job doing admin in the site office, but
there weren't any jobs in that side of the industry.

Dad was made redundant in the early 1980s and
bought a static caravan with his redundancy pay. It
was a nice thing to do for the family and it meant that
our weekends and holidays were sorted for life. I loved
it! I'd spend ages swimming when we were there - it's
a wonder I didn't grow gills. I was like Bobby Ewing in The Man from Atlantis.
During the odd times when I was on dry land, I
started helping out around the camp, doing any odd
jobs and as a result of socialising, slowly but surely, I
began to emerge from my shell (pardon the marine
based pun).
On Sunday afternoons they would have a kids' talent
show and every week I would get on stage and tell
some jokes. I enjoyed it and, for some reason, with a
microphone in my hand I could be a different person. It
was if someone had given me a free pass to have a life.
It was just like doing the Eamonn Andrews impression
at home with the hairbrush; I could be someone else as
long as I had something to hide behind. Typically,
nobody laughed. I didn't think I was that bad if I'm
honest. Talk about a tough crowd! I think I was just
ahead of my time. Dad was the only one who laughed
and quickly my catchphrase became 'Thanks, Dad.' At
least we enjoyed ourselves. Maybe having the king of
the bad jokes laughing at mine was a sign of something.
One
afternoon I was asked if I fancied calling some
bingo numbers for the caravan owners. I was only
around fifteen years old and this was my first bingo
gig. Boy, was I amazing. I know I'm being a bit coy
about it all, but I was out of this world - I took to it like
a (Wal)duck to water. It all seemed to come naturally
to me, like I already knew what I was supposed to do,
like I was answering to my calling. At school one day
afterwards, I told the careers adviser that I wanted to
be a professional bingo caller. I can't remember exactly
what the response was, but I doubt there have been
many others with that career path since. It would be
great to know I was his success story that he told other
pupils about once I'd 'made it'. 'Oh yeah. Charlie
Walduck? He said he liked numbers and the entertainment
industry so I told him to be a bingo caller. It's
all down to me.'
I tried my hand at so many other jobs at the caravan
park: I was a DJ, glass collector, cleaner and
barman extraordinaire! Any job that cropped up I'd
give it a go. It gave me so much confidence and independence.
I wasn't a shy kid anymore. Of course, I was
deep down, but you wouldn't think it on the outside. It
got to the point where Mum and Dad used to leave me
behind on a Sunday evening and return to Barrow.
Being sixteen years of age with a caravan all to myself
was a stomach-churner of excitement. And a stomach
filler, as it happened. It was such a buzz to be alone
there with the adventure of fending for myself. I think
it was more because I knew it was short-lived freedom
and I could return to normality, rather than being
stuck for real in an adult life, that felt so good. A taster
was all I wanted.
One evening, just after I'd waved goodbye to Mum
and Dad and watched the car disappear out of view,
and despite the fact I had just eaten a big meal, I
decided to cook myself some beef burgers. It was a
craving I couldn't resist. They were there and so was I.
Out came the frying pan, the gas was cranked up, the
oil was sizzling and I was happily cooking away when
the caravan door opened. To my horror Mum and Dad
had turned back because they had forgotten something.
My mum immediately demanded to know what I was
cooking and why. I was so embarrassed; I could have
died on the spot. I stammered something about making
the burgers for my supper so I wouldn't have to mess
on when I returned from the club. To this day I am not
sure if they believed me and they would have been
right not to. See, for me it was never a case of having
my own space to throw wild parties and get drunk. A
bit of freedom was freedom to indulge in my one and
only vice.
Also, round about this time, I'd lost most of my
puppy fat and for a while I was quite slender; something
else short-lived. Working at the holiday camp
during the summer months meant I was earning real
money and not relying on pocket money handouts. As it
was my hard-earned money, I could spend it how I
liked and on what I liked: food. Glorious food, in fact.
As the weekends rolled on, so did the pounds I was
gaining. The money literally was in one hand and out
the other. The holiday camp was fine because they'd
pay me and I'd spend it all there. At one point, Steven
had a job there and so did my dad. When we first got
the caravan we used to hire it out when we weren't
there so that we could pay the ground rent, but then
we made a pact to all get jobs so we wouldn't have to do
this. We'd do odd jobs here and there and it paid our
way. Dad used to cut the grass and it all went into the
Caravan Savings Fund and meant we could spend all
of our summer there. It was a great way to live and it
taught me about having to earn money to pay your way
in life.

One day when I was about fifteen, back home in
Barrow, I remember walking out of the shop on Bath
Street with a bag of freshly made pork pies tucked
under my arm, straight past Granddad. I was
oblivious. I felt ashamed of myself and always used to
recall it in my mind to punish myself. There have been
plenty of moments in my life like that where you'd
assume it would have encouraged me to change my
ways out of guilt alone. If I could have I probably would
have, but addicts need a bit more than that to 'cure'
them. It made me feel bad - it didn't kill me. I could
brush it aside. He'd seen me, that much I knew. It was
never mentioned and it took me ages to get over the
embarrassment of it. Later in life, my dad told me he'd
seen me coming out of the same shop armed with pies.
It was really distressing because every time I was out
of their company he thought I was off somewhere
eating. A lot of the time I was, but not always.

Time was running out. Weekend holiday camp work
wasn't ideal and Dad had the thumbscrews on me to
get a trade and so, like everyone else in school, I
applied for an apprenticeship at the shipyard. I never
got it and I was not surprised one bit. Thank God. I
just wasn't very good at anything practical or
mechanical; it wasn't my thing at all. Without any
work to go into, I ended up at sixth form college doing
some further O levels. It's always been the norm for
kids to do that when they are undecided and I bet it
has also always been a time for widespread panic
amongst parents. I was always pretty sure I'd end up
doing something, I just didn't know what. It wasn't
that I was lazy - I literally hadn't been enthused
enough by anything to want to do it as a job for the rest
of my life. I only had one friend there called John, but
more so because we were outcasts rather than mates as
such. We just spoke to each other because neither of us
had any friends. It wasn't that enjoyable and I didn't
get up to much or make any lasting friendships. It was
just a case of walking there on a morning, doing my

classes and walking back.
Dad would worry that we would get up to no good as
we got older. Drinking, smoking or glue sniffing were
the pastimes for many a wayward teenager back then,
but it never appealed to me. Even if it did, there was no
one to do it with. The closest I ever came to alcohol was
walking home one night from sixth form past a drunk
who threw a glass of beer over me - just my luck! No
idea why anyone would want to do that and I doubt he
even knew he'd done it. But he had, and it was me that
the bastard did it to. I got home and went straight to
the bathroom to put loads of Mum's perfume on to hide
the smell of beer. I'd have hated for them to think I'd
been out boozing. Satisfied I'd got rid of the smell, I
came downstairs without mentioning it at all. I got a
few dodgy looks from my dad that night, I can tell you.
I think he was suspicious for a completely different
reason, although never said anything.
Just before my seventeenth birthday was quite a
bad time for us. Dad had a stroke and a heart attack
and was in hospital for a while. When he was cutting
the grass at the caravan park and used to come into
the caravan panting quite badly. He went to the doctor
and was told that he was allergic to grass. It wasn't
long after that he was taken to hospital after having a
mild stroke and was then told that he'd also had a
heart attack. He was in hospital for a while and Uncle
Keith came to the caravan to help keep us in order
because we were a bit wild at the time and Mum found
it difficult to cope. Not that many people visited Dad in
hospital. I know us kids didn't go and when he was
eventually let back home he seemed different in a way.
It was only afterwards that I found out he'd been in a
bad way and it was touch and go whether he'd pull
through. He still gets confused with his words now. I'm
not sure medically how to term it all, but it affected the
side of the brain that deals with speech rather than the
side that can paralyse. It took him a good few months
to recover and, once he did, he worked at a restaurant
one day a week rather than at the caravan park.

After a couple of years at sixth form college I was still
none the wiser about what I wanted to do with my life.
To make things worse, I was heading towards page
fifty of my memoir and was still at school. I don't know
what's worse. I mean, I could easily skip a few years in
the memoir, but finding a proper job always takes time.
I had a huge interest in what I saw as 'the entertainment
industry', though any possibility of a career in
this seemed slimmer than Keira Knightley on hunger
strike.
There was one more problem as well. I was getting
fatter and fatter because of my other huge interest.
Dad had noticed and, whilst he weighed in at around
nineteen stone himself, told me he thought I'd be as big
as him by the time I was eighteen. Sadly, he was right.
In fact, I weighed more than he did by that age. I only
had myself to blame; I was out of control and desperately
in need of help. Overeating has never been
recognised as a serious problem or an addiction though.
Only in recent years has childhood obesity been flagged
up. And that's mostly down to Jamie Oliver, rather
than the government initiating anything. Until then
kids either got ridiculed and turned into fat adults and
ridiculed further, or they were 'normal'. By spending
all my money on food I was just like any alcoholic or
junkie, experiencing the exact same dependence, but
without any assistance to kick my drug habit.

With summer over, I started a BTEC Business Studies
course at Barrow College. I got comments such as 'By
the time you finish, you'll be the oldest student in the
country' from my dad. He should have known by now
what comments like this did to me. It just wasn't funny
at all. I had aspirations that had been quashed and I
didn't think it worth telling my parents that I wanted
to be a performer of some sort because I knew the
reaction I'd get. It was sad that I felt that way.
On my first day I stood there in that hall as a nervous,
frightened, overweight teenager. It was a bewildering
experience being there amongst a sea of strangers,
all seemingly with a purpose, knowing what they
were doing, where they were going, and then there was
me: static. Where I was supposed to fit in amongst all
this was anyone's guess. What was Charles Walduck
doing in a place like this? What did he think he was
doing? I was engulfed by all the negativity that I
always carry round, yet at the same time it was
exciting and I somehow managed to feel optimistic
about being there. It was a strange contradiction, but
the course started, studies got underway, and I met
some great people. Some would become close friends
over the years. I desperately wanted people like Mark,
Scott and Les, (three of my fellow students) to like me. I
wanted to be part of the group and I would listen on
Fridays as they planned a night out at the weekend
and listened on Mondays as they talked about what
had gone on at the weekend. I was desperate to be
included and I tried to use my humour to endear
myself to them. They did grow to like me and I would
often meet with Les in the evenings and we would have
a walk around Barrow town centre and became good
friends.
I had an eighteenth birthday party soon into the
course. Naturally, I was too frightened to invite the
lads out of fear they'd say no, so it was just the usual
crowd present. It was still a great party though. It
would have been good to have some new friends there,
if only to show I had some. I couldn't have coped with
that kind of rejection though, especially early on in a
friendship. The thought of asking people I'd just met to
commit to me ... well, it just filled me with utter dread.
There would always be the popular kids in every class
and I never was one of them. Years later I told them
about the party and they said I should have just
invited them and they'd have come along to it. Typical
me.
Many nights I'd tell my mum and dad that I was off
out to the library as I put my shoes on. But still with
earnings from the caravan park, I'd usually have taken
money out the bank to go and get pie and chips
somewhere in town on an evening. This would be not
long after my evening meal, and they didn't have any
control over me to stop me. I mean, I wasn't an all-out
liar because I did generally go to the library, but it was
stopping off for food that was my main motivation for
going.
I got involved with the student union and started to
become interested in politics and, in 1987, I left home
to share a house. It was a tough call and I know it
really upset Mum when I left. I dare say it is a massive
thing for parents to deal with when their young fly the
nest, though this was also a new beginning for me, and
a challenging one at that. Rather naively, I assumed
Mum was upset because of the expense of me moving
out, but she genuinely was upset by it. I got a grant,
out, as many of you will know, student grants have
never been anything that you can live off.
We shared a house in Church Street and it was good
fun. It was an adventure - it always is at first - but it
was hugely different from living at home. There was
me, Mark, Scott, John and Les, who actually lived next
door, but spent most of his time at our place. Times
were hard and I couldn't afford much once the rent had
been paid.
The first shopping trip we went on together made
me realise that they were from more well-off backgrounds
because Scott suggested chipping in thirty
quid each and I only had a fiver in my pocket to last all
week. It made me feel really awkward because if I was
expected to put that much money in a week there was
no way I'd be able to afford to be a student.
But there was the camaraderie of being in a house
with a good bunch of mates, doing silly student things
like wiring the TV up to a car battery because we'd
heard that meant you didn't need a licence if your
parents had one, sitting around with duvets on because
we couldn't afford to heat the place and having a smalltime
gangster as a landlord. Happy days! The week
before our first rent payment was due, the landlord
came round with four 'heavies' and said, 'Don't forget.
Next week the rent is due.' We were stood there at the
door telling him we knew.
We were on our best behaviour from the start anyway
because we'd heard that he'd nailed someone to
the floor for not paying their rent on time. It was a bit
weird going to all that trouble to scare a bunch of lads
whose only experiences of violence had been watching
the wrestling on World of Sport. We weren't the
maddest student household by any stretch and only
had a few nights out here and there. Our main concern
was keeping warm at night. That's why we went to the
library straight after Neighbours until ten o'clock. It
was somewhere with free heat and light and somewhere
to work from time to time. We were probably the
tamest students in history, come to think of it. Personally,
I was never the type to grow my hair, wear
distressed clothes and tell anyone who'd listen that I'd
lost my accent within four days.
I think the most noise we ever made was when I
bought a brass band LP from a jumble sale and we
played it non-stop. One of the neighbours knocked on
the door and told us that he loved brass band music,
but not all the time, if you don't mind.
And although money was scarce, I certainly wasn't
going to go hungry. I could live as a student, but I was
never going to eat like one. I would often go to the
chippy just along the street; chips with scraps was my
favourite (scraps being bits of batter they'd sieve out of
the fryer). And the pie shop on Bath Street was
another regular haunt.
Anyone who goes out drinking will have tried out
most of the bars in their area and settled on a few they
frequent and one they use as a local. It was the same
with me, but as I've never drunk nor had any interest
in bars, I'd suss out the best places for food in pretty
much the same manner: not bad, disgusting, never go
back to, good conversation, great grub, clean, good
service. And rather than stopping off for a sociably
acceptable couple of pints every night of the week, I'd
be in the takeaways in town buying food that was just
as bad for your health and started becoming less sociably acceptable as my size grew. There's always
something guilt-inducing about buying food when you
are overweight, you start to recognise the looks from
those serving you and can pretty much put money on
the conversation being about you when you've left the
shop. But basically, living away from home meant that
I wasn't being monitored and I could eat all I wanted, aH the time.
At lunchtimes I would go up and see Mum and she
would make me sandwiches. I'd need to be certain that
Dad was out because he never liked to see me eat so
much. He wasn't being mean; he just didn't want to see
me get any bigger, unable to do anything about it.
My flatmates all went home on Fridays and I'd be
left rattling around, tidying up, doing the dishes and
trying to find things to do to occupy myself. I had a
friend called Denise who lived just down the street who
I'd go visit and have tea with on a weekend too. She
was on our course -- there were only around seven of us
on it - and it would help pass the time a bit. Other
than that, I'd probably buy a loaf of bread and watch
TV until they came back. Then on Sundays, we'd meet
up in the pub.

In my second year of college, I came off my bike and
dislocated my shoulder. I'd been out with my flatmates
on Friday afternoon and said I'd race them back home
-- me on the bike and them lot in the car. It all started
out OK until I came to a roundabout and went arseover-tit
as they say, over the handlebars, sprawled out
on the road and in severe pain. As I sat in agony a man
stopped to help and got me to hospital where they gave
me a general anaesthetic and re-set it. After being
away for ages, I got back to the house to find it empty.
Everyone had just buggered off without even waiting or
wondering where I was. I sat through such pain that
weekend and felt so alone. I wasn't too chuffed on
Sunday when they came back without any hint of
concern.

Finishing at Barrow College just delayed the fact that I
still had no career aspirations. Another pattern
emerging here, eh? I know people who are in work now
and still don't know what they want to do as a career,
just going from job to job as a means to an end, so I
know I'm not alone in that one. Like many of my
friends at college, I applied to go into higher education
and was offered a place on a degree course at
Manchester Polytechnic to study Economics.
I moved with Mark into a place in Manchester but
unfortunately we ended up falling out after a few
weeks and I moved into Auntie Doreen's. I hate
confrontation and falling out, so the opportunity to
move in with her solved a problem for me. There had
been a bit of tension with Mark over money for bills
and keeping on top of the practicalities of living. He
was always organised and I wasn't, so we got on each
other's nerves a bit and it came to a head one day. He
worked out on a Sunday how much we owed and, as I
didn't have a cash card, I said I'd get the money out the
bank the following day. When I'd got the money out and got back home, Mark was on me immediately
asking if I had been to the bank. I thought it was a bit
abrupt of him and told him that if the tension carried on I'd move out.
'Move out then,' was his reply. And I did.
I loved living with Auntie Doreen and she really looked after me well. Talk about being 'fed and
watered' properly! She would cook my favourite meals day in, day out (sausage, liver and bacon casseroles
were always top of the list) and made sandwiches for
my lunch to take to poly. One day I told her that I liked
haslet and subsequently had it in my sarnies every day for a month.
The dangerous thing was Auntie Doreen used to
make the sandwiches for me the evening before, rather than rushing around in the morning. And then I would take them upstairs to 'pack' my bag. If the sandwiches
ever did see the next day they would certainly be long
gone by the time the bus had done a couple of stops. I
just couldn't help myself. It was food and it was mine.
On my way back early evening I would eat loads of
crisps and sweets on the bus, even when I knew I'd be
having a meal when I got to Auntie Doreen's. It didn't
matter to me. I also used to visit the cafes in the city
centre and would always sneak away from poly at any
opportunity for cottage pie and chips.
I would still go to visit Mum and Dad quite often
and liked to go when there was a home match so I
could combine it with a trip to watch Barrow. I loved
every aspect of going to the football; it was amazing
and gave me such a buzz. It was round about this time
that the love affair began to come to an end though, not
because of the way they played - it was because it was
starting to get difficult for me to stand up too long
during the games. Despite this, every time I was at
Mum's I would pop down to the pie shop for a bag of
pies, eating a couple on the way back. Sometimes I
would stand in the back street out of view to fill my
face.
Not being able to stand for long was a worry. This
was the first time I'd really felt the effect of being
overweight. I know my size limited my athletic abilities
anyway, but standing up is something everyone
expects to be able to do. It was a horrible feeling, like
in a Hollywood movie where snippets of dialogue segue
into each other to shoehorn a point for the unintelligent
audience. Suddenly I could see Mum bursting in
on me cooking burgers in the caravan, I could hear the
voices, the childhood parties, queuing up in the pie
shops, see the looks from people in the street...

Look at the size of him.
You're eating your own grave.
I've made your fa vourite.
You wouldn't be able to do that.
Charlie's is the one with the most on.
You'll be heavier than me soon.
I've saved some more for you.
The oldest student in the country.
Do you want some more, love?
When are you going to get a job?
Here's some pudding.
Don't you think you should go on a diet?
You fat bastard.
Why don't you ever play out with friends?
Look, he can hardly walk.
Those trousers look a bit tight for you.
You've put on weight.
Are you ea ting again ?

I used to see Mark around college and he'd say hello
and I'd blank him. I was really hurt by the way he
went on, but if I was honest, it wasn't all one sided. I
was quite untidy and Mark is one of those perfectionists
who have an immaculate house, and he's always
been like that. It was difficult for me because I'm not
the type who bears a grudge, so it was difficult to blank
someone I liked and wanted to be on speaking terms
again with.
But we cleared the air by talking for a long time
over too many cups of tea and, soon after, I moved back
in with him for my final year. It was getting a bit much
travelling from my auntie's every day, so it worked out
well for me. It was only years later that I found out
that Mark had been going through a really difficult
time personally when all this was kicking off and it
made me feel bad that he had had me adding to it all.
Feeling a bit optimistic, I decided I would lose some
weight and Mark said he'd help me ... as if sitting my
finals weren't stressful enough. My usual definition of
'cramming' is a bit different from the studious one and
it was never easy just to sit at a desk and not pick at
snacks in the process. In addition to this, Mark had
taken a year out and we started to go out quite a lot (so
much for the help!). I got a part-time job at the Top
Rank bingo club in Newton Heath to help fund being
able to live and, although it brought money in, it added
to the chaos. As we know, losing weight needs discipline
and a complete lifestyle change and, at that point, there was so much else going on. This is the
excuse that's all too easy. How many times in the last
week have you said you are too busy to do something?
And it is usually the things that mean a lot: too busy to
call or send a text message to someone, too busy to take
time out to relax, too busy to read a book or to visit a
friend. Although I actually did lose weight with the
regime, it probably wasn't enough. I was still chubby,
unattractive (in my eyes) and very shy. Losing the
weight was an accomplishment that I just never saw. You may have lost weight, but you re still fat. It should
have been a positive to keep me going. I'd always put
my own spin on it and would always end up feeling bad
rather than good.
When I finished my course I was disappointed to
only get a 2:2. A Desmond is nothing to be sniffed at
though. Mum and Dad and my Auntie Doreen came to
the graduation and were as proud as punch. Wearing a
mortar board and gown is enough to make anyone feel
a bit silly. Once you see everyone on your way to the
ceremony and meet up with people who are all dressed
the same, your inhibitions leave and you feel an
amazing sense of achievement. You are dressed like
that for one big reason - you passed! I'd passed. I'd
done it. I was the first Walduck with a degree and it did mean a lot to me. The other side to graduation is
the job side: you have just been studying for three
years to set you on the road to a lifetime's career.
People from my course were talking about the job
interviews they'd had since I last saw them, many had
secured good jobs and told me of their plans and what
they'd been up to.
"I have a job,' I said. 'I'm a bingo caller.'
Everyone it seemed, apart from me, was doing well
for themselves and I was working for very low wages at
the bingo club. I was getting left behind. They may
have been friends for three years, but in the big, bad
world, they were competition. Or not, as the case was. I
don't know what they really made of my job, other than
probably thinking I had no ambition, because with
respect, it was a job I didn't need a degree in
Economics for. From my point of view, it was a job I
enjoyed doing and that counted for a lot. Was I so
wrong not to be chasing a high-earning city job?

I didn't stay at Top Rank all that long and went to
work at Mecca bingo club in Bury. The manager from
Newton Heath moved jobs and asked if I'd go to work
with him over there, so it was like being headhunted
for the first time. This is when the weight started to
pile back on, I would eat all the time and I got bigger
and bigger again. I had a great time working there and
made some wonderful friends though. I knew I was
getting bigger, I knew I was eating too much, I knew
exactly what was going on and what the problem was: I
Just did nothing about it. I was only interested in
eating food, not trying to work it off. Exercise wasn't

part of my lifestyle and I was reaching the point where
even thinking about exercise was just ridiculous. I was
a big lad, always had been, always would be. Pointless
trying to change it.
Every Monday, Cynthia (the boss) and I would start
a 'diet' and every Tuesday we'd have trifles from the
cafe next door. It was a farce. I'd usually volunteer to get them just so I could eat a couple on the way back on
the QT and then have the other in Cynthia's company;
'on the way back' literally being a few steps. I probably
peaked at around thirty stone because of things like
that. I was getting slower and less inclined to walk or
go anywhere because of the effort it would take. This
was taking me right into the danger zone. Just like the
feeling I got about not being able to stand up for long,
my mobility going downhill was something that I
started to put up with rather than do something about.
I did have spells of losing weight, which always went
hand in hand with setbacks.
I once went on a sponsored weight loss and actually
put weight on! How bad did I feel after that? As a
forfeit, I had to call bingo dressed as a fairy. I didn't
mind so much though; it made for a more entertaining
evening. Every Friday night I would sing a song for the
customers and dress up - I had always wanted to
perform and it was a great excuse to do something I
loved. It was like starring in panto every week.
Even though it was fun working there I would
occasionally try and escape the bingo life and find
something else. I'm not sure if it was out of curiosity,
just to see if somewhere else wanted me, or if I actually
did want another job ... or even the option of one.
Maybe I just never felt completely happy anywhere I
was. When I got knocked back, I would respond by
knocking back the pies. To be fair, I never needed
much of an excuse, but this was always my way of
dealing with it. Self-harm, Walduck style. It was an
extreme form of comfort eating, gorging out on all the
fattiest foods known to humankind without a care for
any of the associated long-term consequences.
Overeating gave me the control in my life that I needed
and calmed a situation down, bringing a sense of
balance back. Food for me was like taking a razorblade
and carving into my arm.
In 1995 I left Mecca and was offered a job at the
Riva bingo hall in Belle Vue, a club I would work at for
the next twelve years. It was sad to leave all my
wonderful friends behind, especially Karen, Sue and
Cynthia. I knew we'd always remember the laughs we
had; I still think about it all even now.

No two days are ever the same working in a bingo hall
and, over the years, I am proud to say I have met and
made many great friends at all the places I've worked.
I hope in some small way I made the customers' lives
more fulfilled. That was something I always strived to
do because the customers were everything to the
industry. It was them who made it a community; a
place to talk, to share conversation, to have a laugh
and to just be part of something that meant, well ... it
meant everything. A friendly greeting and a lovely
smile makes all the difference, and knowing that the
customers were happy always made me happy too. I
was king of the double-edged compliment. It was all in
the spirit of the night and we had a good laugh.
'You smell lovely tonight. What is it you're wearing,
Domestos?'
'You've got the look of a Hollywood actress. Who is it
I'm trying to think of ... Oh yes, Lassie.'
The old jokes are always the best and I loved the
banter we'd get going by having the punters heckle us.
It was always about setting the joke up and everyone
knowing there'd be a punchline coming - no matter
how bad or old it was, the reception it received would
still be good because people expected that kind of
humour. It was never about making fun of someone or
humiliating them because then I wouldn't have been
doing my job properly; no one should feel uneasy on a
night out.
This was why I wasn't in my graduate management
scheme and plotting when I'd make my first million.
Being part of that community made me feel good about
myself. When I was calling bingo, I was in charge, I
was cracking the jokes and I was making the night an
enjoyable one. And that went a long way - people
would approach me to talk about something I'd said, or
say thanks, or carry on the laugh the next time they
were back. That's what made it special. Then on the
way home it would all be over and I'd be back to being
the real me, back to an empty house and a fully stocked
kitchen.
One misconception people always have with regards
to bingo is that it's a game for elderly people - that is,
until they experience the game for themselves and
enjoy not only the chance of winning money, but also
the social element. Bingo halls had a bit of a PR push
in recent years to bring more people in. I mean, the
money you can win is phenomenal. It's progressed so
much over the years; you'd be amazed if you gave it a
go. But that progression also looks like its downfall.
With everyone being on t'internet now and because
of the smoking ban there are fewer and fewer people
attending and more places closing down to make way
for luxury apartments and shopping centres. And there
are so many online incentives so that you don't need to

leave the comfort of your own home to win just as much
money. I'll stop now because I'm aware that I'm
advertising online bingo when I'd much rather see
more people getting out the house. The whole part of it
in the first place was about creating an enjoyable social
experience. Now it's like we're too busy for all that.
It never ceased to amaze me just looking at the mix
of people and ages all under one roof. When there was
a big win, there was never any jealousy; folk who
played were always chuffed for those who won. No
fighting, no arguing and swearing ... although some
nights it would have been funny to see it all kick off
with the oldies if some twenty year old won on their
first go at playing.
I soon got to the point where it became difficult to
find a uniform to fit me. I'd been living with this all my
life, not necessarily feeling myself physically gaining
the weight, but seeing all the reactions and feeling the
strain of it on my being. My head was in the sand but
the truth was that I was embarrassed by my size. My
food consumption was growing all the time, much like
the parallel of an addict's fix, needing more to satisfy
all the time. There are not many people who are
comfortable with telling people their clothing size for
uniforms, even if they are what we call a 'normal' size.
There'll always be someone slimmer waiting to give
their measurements next. There's always the pressure
to say a size smaller to save face a bit, but it just
means your clothes won't be comfortable either.
Nobody likes to admit that they can't fit into clothing.
I couldn't really get away with telling them I was a
thirty-four-inch waist. Or even double that. The
managers had to phone round to find suppliers of big
clothes and I'd have to have my shirts specially made
to measure because you couldn't buy my size anywhere,
other than if you were planning a camping trip. See, I
joke, but it was a harrowing thing for me to go through.
I remember being asked to take a coach load of customers
on a holiday and I only had two shirts and one
pair of trousers. I squeezed into the trousers and one of
the shirts before going to meet all the other customers
and staff from other clubs who'd gathered to go on the
trip. The seats in the canteen had fixed middles and I
knew I would not be able to fit. It was frustrating
because in these situations it was designers and
manufacturers of furniture that were alienating me,
making a point that I was too fat to sit at one of their
dining tables. I went and sat on an 'easy chair' that
was anything but easy to sit in. As I sat, my shirt
bulged open and the buttons were ready to pop under
the strain. I looked down to see that a pen had leaked
in my pocket, completely ruining the shirt and leaving
a big blue patch. I was gutted. I was limited enough
when I only had two shirts! Why did these things
happen? Pens only leak in shirt pockets in comedies,
not in real life.
I loved going on the holidays and would be very sad
once they ended and it was time to go home. It was the
same story - never wanting something good to end
because it meant that I had to come back to reality. It
was great to be there with everyone though; having a
nice time and enjoying just socialising, away from it
all. They were always a friendly bunch on those trips. I used to get upset when all the other staff members
from the other clubs got dressed up and looked great
whilst I could never get clothes to fit me. It was the
only part I didn't enjoy about it.

It stands to reason that carrying so much excess weight
around is not good for you and I was under no illusion.
It was difficult to move around, to 'just squeeze past'
anyone or anything, to get upstairs, downstairs, to sit,
stand, walk, lie down, get dressed, put shoes and socks on, have a bath or shower, get washed in general, get
dried, go to the toilet. Anything. Anything you can
think of was difficult. And it was all because of food.
The more weight I put on, the more stressed I became
by it. I was in an impossible situation. I hated
what I was and would sometimes take out my frustrations
on my friends and colleagues by snapping at
them. Not the best thing to do, really. I was angry with
myself all the time and those close to me would be in the firing line. It felt worse because I knew I wasn't
that kind of person. I don't go around shouting at
people, but when I was consumed by this 'thing' I
changed. I dare say that food had an impact on my
mood too. I just know I was fed up, miserable ... all the
negative connotations you can think of, I was them.

When walking round the club finally became too much
of a chore, I would park myself on stage and would be
set for the night. That's always a downside to having a
job where you sit down for a living - any amount of
food you eat is not getting burnt off through exercise.
Then, in 1997, a chance came up for me to do something
about it. I decided to retire from bingo calling
and work on night security instead. I really thought it
was a chance to lose weight, to be walking around
constantly and start to change the way I lived.
It turned out that night security was just a way of
being able to eat twenty-four hours a day instead. I
hadn't been told this when I started, so imagine my delight when a delivery of cream cakes arrived first thing in the morning for the diner. The first time this happened it was like Santa had been! Or Satan.
Whichever. It was like a mirage. I had to rub my eyes a
massive tray full of gorgeous-looking cream cakes
just sitting there, all of them calling out to me in such
angelic voices: We love you. Please take us in and eat
us. No one will ever know.
So ... I took them inside. And you know what? I didn't eat them. Honest, guv. I think it was the consequence
of the embarrassment that stopped me. I took
them down to the diner, although I did take a couple of
them and leave the money. It was impossible to resist.
On my way home I used to go to one cafe and have a
breakfast, then go to another and another if the need
was still there. The venue change was because the guilt
of sitting there amongst the same people and them
seeing me eating plate after plate would have been too
much. Not too long after, I got over that guilt. I didn't
care what anyone thought, I didn't want the feeling of
food being in my mouth to end. The taste of it, the feel
of it was just so amazing. I'd only stop once I was
completely satisfied, stuffed to the point of self
loathing. It wasn't guilt as such that stopped me; it was
a feeling of disgust that I'd done it. After a night shift, I'd end up going home and sitting in front of TV and
eating. And eating. I was no longer consuming the food,
it was consuming me.
Inevitably, my health worsened through this and I
may have gotten stuck into the routine if it wasn't for a
girl at work called Anna telling me a story about a lad
she knew who had died.
'He had to be lifted into the grave by a crane,' she
said. 'He was so big when he died that the hospital
reckoned his organs just collapsed.'
I could not believe what I was hearing. It was such
a sad story. Was this going to happen to me? I didn't
want to just keel over one day and then need a JCB to
bury me. I decided right then - and told everyone - I was going to lose weight. That was it, I'd had enough.
The signs were there and I didn't want to end up in
that predicament. And that's what I did. It was the
wakeup call I needed.
I turned my life round entirely. It felt good - I knew
exactly what I had to do. And then, a couple of days
later, I turned back to food. The moment had passed;
the shock was over ... back to the same old routine,
back to the rut I didn't want to be stuck in. It was
pretty pathetic, really. The worst part was that I
always had these eureka moments when I'd announce
to everyone that I, Charles Ambrose Walduck, was
going to transform himself. Maybe the first time
someone may have thought I meant it ... not after I'd
said it ten times though. I don't blame them for having
no faith in me. It must have been sad for them to see
the enthusiasm on my face, saying this time it was
different, and them knowing that at best I'd resist a
cream cake or pie for a couple of hours.
Working overnight was clearly bad for me, so I
decided to rejoin the land of the living on the daytime
shift and started to feel better immediately. That was,
until I was sat calling the numbers one day and felt my
heart miss a beat. I didn't think too much of it and just
carried on. A couple of minutes later I felt it again. Oh
my God, I thought. I am having a heart attack. It got
worse over the next couple of weeks. Then one Monday
night I sat down in the office at work and knew
something was wrong. My heart was beating
irregularly all the time and I just sat there sobbing,
Panicking, helplessly. An ambulance was called and I
was taken to hospital for an ECG.
'Your heart is fine, Mr Walduck,' the doctor told me.
But you need to lose some of this weight.'
I was so delighted to be given the all clear. I knew
after such a scare that I'd make a conscious effort 'doctor's
orders' and all that. After Anna's story and
then this, I really did have to give myself a shake and
get into shape. I caught the bus home, went to the shop
en route and, knowing I'd be starting the diet
tomorrow, bought myself a couple of pork pies, just to
see me through. A couple more couldn't do any harm,
eh?
At work the next day I was sat in my usual spot on
stage calling bingo and I began having palpitations
again. I left work in a panic and went to the doctor
immediately. He told me he would put me on a heart
monitor for twenty-four hours and do some blood tests.
It seemed the irregular heartbeat was being caused by
stress and anxiety. I knew I was stressed, and being
told that by a doctor just stressed me out even more.
I'd moved to my present address in Failsworth,
Manchester, not long before the palpitations, so I put a
lot of the stress down to moving house. A house move
can be a bit stressful, but I wouldn't have said it was
that bad; certainly not bad enough to affect my heart.
Without making any of the changes I kept promising,
without exercising, dieting or making any real attempt
at even small changes, my health was bound to get
worse. At this point I'd stopped functioning as a human
being in so many ways and it was like my body was
starting to close down on me because I was abusing it
so much.
It wasn't just because of not being able to stand that
I'd stopped going to the football. There was a chronicle
of events that led the way, all of them not nice to recall.
It had been increasingly difficult to squeeze through
the turnstile and I no longer wanted to suffer the
indignity of trying to. It'll be difficult for many to
comprehend this. Try to imagine the anguish building up when you are in a queue ... and then the inevitable:
the looks from the stewards as they mentally prepare
for the struggle, the shame as those in the queue nudge
their friends and point, waiting for the struggler to get
through, the ultimate embarrassment of either getting
stuck or not coming close to fitting. Then the queue
would be held up and grow impatient because I was
blocking the turnstile. Simply being told not to bother
trying hurt just as much. It was always a home loss to
Walduck as he'd end up going for an early bath (so to
speak - don't get me started on actually trying to fit
into the bath).
There was a bloke I knew who worked for St John's
Ambulance at Stockport Football Club. He was also a
big lad and any time he was near or on the pitch he'd
get shouted at too. The thing is with him, he had the
confidence to let it go over his head and revel in the
chanting and not let it get to him. He'd take his top off
in bars and would dance around to the chanting too completely
mad as a hatter but completely happy in his
skin. Or that's the impression he gave. It was maybe a
defence mechanism to deflect and diffuse the ridicule.
The fact is that people still gave him a hard time
whether he could take it or not and it still wasn't fair.
So what, you have to join in with the bullies and laugh
at yourself, then cry behind closed doors?
It wasn't exclusive to just football fans though,
anyone can be heartless if they put their tiny mind to
it. I'd regularly get abused in the street - people
driving past, beeping their car horn and shouting
something derogatory before speeding off. Walking past
any group of people, it was a certainty that someone
within it would shout something at me.
But I don't just blame the narrow minded and ill
informed. People ridicule others for all sorts of reasons:
to feel better about themselves, to cover up their own
insecurities, because they have no manners, were
brought up that way, or just to have a laugh at others'
expense.
Then we have the influence the media has over
public opinion. Celeb mags aren't as bad as they once
were because they do have a balanced view now showing
celebs who have put on weight as well as the
ones who have lost too much. There is more of a social
conscience these days and their main view is that it
isn't good to be too fat or too thin. But pick up any
tabloid newspaper and the way they label fat people is
rarely balanced -- rollypolly, lardy, lard arse, tubby whatever
description they use, it's picking fault at
someone because of their weight. It usually is targeting
someone 'bad', but all this does is fuel negativity
towards fat people.
It also gets me quite angry when I see celebrities in
magazines after they've just lost a couple of stones,
telling us how great they feel having sorted themselves
out once and for all. Then they'll be back a few months
later when they've put it on again, and again when
they've lost it. It's always the same couple of stones.
and usually the same celebrities. What's the point,
other than to sell more magazines?
It's through celeb culture and sites such as Pop
Bitch that we now have a much better understanding
of how the media works. The 'celeb frolicking on the
beach' shot is rarely not set up in advance and the
stars are working with the photographers or magazines
that they usually claim to hate. But, as consumers of
pop culture, we lap all this up. We love reading about

who's been at the pies every week and we love to see
the photos of it as evidence.
Then there are those other celebs - the ones who
have had surgery - that have had their fair share of
good and bad publicity. Once I'd lost my weight and
become known as an 'ambassador for the obese', I'd get
asked my opinion on the surgery debate. I'm always
reluctant to criticise anyone, having faced it all my life.
Some people may genuinely find it impossible to
train their mind to make them want to stop eating or
may not have the motivation to do exercise. If surgery
is what'll work for you, then it's fine. I'd maintain that
I'm living proof that anyone can lose weight the nonsurgical
way, though.
What I don't like is when someone who's had
surgery suddenly becomes the voice of the fatties. I
don't think you can be if you haven't lost weight the
non-surgery way. Having a band fitted means that you
cannot physically eat any more than the band allows,
so you cannot overeat. It's impossible. Can you speak
for the obese and about the problems they face from
that position? I don't think so.

I didn't know it then, but I'd soon be at a point in my
life where I'd have to make changes or die. It was that
simple. You can't carry on taking that kind of physical
abuse for too long, and I was nearing the end. If you
think about how alcoholics are told that their next
drink could be their last, it was the same with me.
Each pie, each greasy, stodgy piece of food I gorged on
could have been my last. When you are aware of the
risks and you still carry on, you know you're on
borrowed time.
I've always had that New Year depression that
people often moan about. Mine is a real
depression though, rather than an off-the-cuff
comment by the water cooler on a dark January
morning. The year 2003 began pretty much the same
for me-' the thought of the coming months, the dull
days, dark nights, the miserable weather, isolation,
desolation and the constant need to comfort eat filled
me with a sense of impending dread. When I was on a
real low, there was nothing that could bring me round.
By February, I was the heaviest I had been in my
entire life. I was just under fifty stone in weight and
my future, if there was one, was bleak. At the start of
each day I would regularly telephone the local cafe and
order two or even three full breakfasts to be delivered.
I had no qualms about leaving the front door open as I
was completely happy for the delivery service to bring
my food straight through to the living room. Let's face
it - by the time I'd heaved myself off and out of the
chair, up, through the house and opened the door, the
delivery guy would have either given up or the food
Would have been cold. It was easier and it meant I got
my food quicker. At the back of my mind, I was beginning
to think about just staying in bed and having it

delivered as a breakfast in bed. It would have made life
even easier for me. The temptation was very strong,
but luckily something held me back and thank goodness
it did. Perhaps it was the thought of the shame to
my family and friends and knowing that if I started
doing that it would have signalled the end. I have no
doubt that I'd have died in my bedroom from eating
and eating. Having food delivered started to feel like
some seedy drug deal. Like I was an incapable junkie
who needed his fix brought to him. They'd bring the
food in, I'd pretend there were other people in the
house that the food was also for, and it became such a
farce. We all knew there was no one else in the house;
we all knew I had no kids or friends. And to turn it into
even more of a freak show, the bloke who delivered the
food actually brought his family round to look at me.
That was a real low because they didn't even pretend
to hide why they were there. It was to gawp.
It's always expected that I have no feelings, being
this size - but to have people come round and gawp
when you are at your lowest is disgusting. I was
helpless, couldn't do anything about it, couldn't react ...
I just wanted my fix.

A Typical Day in the Life of an
Overeater



At my heaviest, I'd get up at around ten in the
morning. It was never the best sleep in the
world because there was always discomfort
and restlessness. Sometimes I'd wake up at
a daft time like five in the morning and go downstairs
to my chair to sleep. I had two walking sticks to use to
get out of bed. Pushing myself up could sometimes take
a good while - ten minutes, twenty, an hour. It all
depended on how my mood and energy was first thing.
It was like having a workout as soon as waking up. I
would always go to the toilet first thing because if I
went downstairs first I always had to think about my
energy reserves and whether I could make another
trip. As bad as it is to admit, I couldn't wipe my arse
properly. This is another downside to being so big. I
had to lay a towel on my bed and sit, roll and manoeuvre
myself and do the best I could. To get washed, I
couldn't get in the bath and didn't have a shower, so
this was another laborious task. I used to get through
more talc than Pablo Escobar.


All the things you take for granted become the
impossible when you reach that size, and take a dozen
times longer to do. It was just something I learnt to
cope with over the years - once you realise you can't do
something, you have to look at ways around it and
improvise when you need to. I got in touch with Social
Services to get some help with having a shower
installed and they agreed to pay a hundred pounds
towards the installation. The whole cost was a couple
of thousand anyway, so didn't go ahead with it. I used
to get sores under my stomach and they'd cause me a
lot of discomfort. My belly hung right down and I'd
have to move it out the way to wash and to go to the
toilet. And the sores used to smell bad too - like
rotting, dying skin - and I had a big sponge to wash as
best I could, then back to the bed to roll around in more
talc before getting dressed.
I had only two jumpers, red for at home and blue for
at work. Lucy had cut an old Gala Bingo polo shirt up
to get the logo and then stitched it on to my sweatshirt.
And I had two pairs of jogging bottoms with an eightytwo-inch
waist, bought from a company online and both
of which had seen better days. The drawstring snapped
in them a long time ago, giving me an extra couple of
inches. I didn't wear any socks because I couldn't
physically put them on and I'd wear slip-on shoes
because I could no longer tie laces either. My feet used
to swell up a lot and some days it would take twenty
minutes just to get them on. I always got them a size
too big. At least it meant I didn't have to deliberate
over what to wear every morning'- red or blue on top,
same old jogging bottoms, same old shoes. Easy, yet far

from ideal.
I'd phone a taxi as I prepared to put my shoes on
and it would usually arrive just as I was ready to go.
The taxi company knew exactly who it was and where
I'd be going just by me saying, 'Hi, it's the big fella.'
I'd always carry a plastic bag around with a few
essentials in. One of these was a tea towel that I'd put
down on the passenger seat of the taxi. They'd always
put the seat as far back as it would go and recline it to
a virtual horizontal position so I could fit. Every time I
got the towel out, I'd make an excuse up. I'd usually
say it was because I'd just put my pants on from the
wash and they weren't completely dry. I don't know if
they ever had their own theory. The real reason behind
using the towel was because I was terrified that I'd
missed something when I was trying to clean myself
and would be mortified if I left anything behind on the
seat.

Once at work, I'd walk over to the reception desk and
lean on it for a bit to catch my breath and recompose
after around a minute's worth of walking. If my friend
Billy was at work, I'd usually sit on the settee at
reception for a bit of a chat and then he'd help me get
up. I'd take another rest at the counter where they
used to sell the bingo books and make my way down to
the stage after that. This usually took around twenty
minutes. Even the oldies could do it quicker. And at
this point, nothing was about food. I'd not have eaten
anything since waking up and might have a cup of tea
when I was on stage. Sometimes, if I was that hungry,
someone would bring me a fishcake down from the
diner, having carried it in their pocket. It was pretty
unhygienic, but what the hell. I wasn't going to refuse
a fishcake just because it had a bit of pocket fluff stuck
to it.
I'd work from eleven in the morning until my tea
break at around three o'clock. The food that was served
in the bingo hall, or any I've worked at or been in for
that matter, has never been for the health conscious. I
mean, the 'healthy option' generally meant a bit of
salad in your burger.
Tea breaks meant making my way back to reception
and sitting on the settee for two and a half hours. It
was pointless and too expensive to go home for this
amount of time. I'd usually sit with Beryl and she'd
bring food in for us and I'd bring a few things in too. If
anyone so much as moved, I'd always ask them to get
me something, always wanting to know what shop they
were going to. 'Can you just get me ...'
After my break, I'd sit with Sue at reception to meet
and greet before being on stage at half past seven to
call the numbers again. I'd also have the odd nap
during breaks because of my disturbed and restless
nightly sleep pattern. I bet I looked a right state,
nodding off in my chair until being woken up by the
regulars to get back to work.
At the end of a shift, there'd usually be food left over
from the kitchen diner - plates of burgers and fishcakes.
They'd tell me to help myself as it would just be
thrown out otherwise, so I'd be straight in and would
eat as much as I could before bagging the rest for when
I got home. I don't know if they were having a bit of a
laugh at my expense, seeing my eyes light up and
chuckling about me taking the leftovers home, or if it
was out of kindness. It mustn't have bothered me that
much because I still took them. I had the last laugh
when I made off with my plunder.
On my way back home I'd ask the taxi driver to stop
off at the garage so I could stock up on some food.
Garages aren't really known for their healthy options,
so the kind of stuff I'd get would always be pasties,
pies, crisps, chocolate - all convenience rubbish to
satisfy that night's craving. As time wore on, I got too
big to get out of the taxi at the garage, and the taxi
drivers ended up going in for me instead. They must
have cringed at drawing the short straw on a night.
And then, rather than making a pit stop, it became
easier for the taxi driver to order a takeaway and
swing by to pick it up. It was certainly easier for me
and the food intake kept progressing all the time.
Sometimes I'd be falling asleep in front of the TV, still
eating my supper, but would rarely give up.

That was what my routine consisted of and my days off
were on Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday. That was
when the real eating took place.
The cafe on the corner of the street, as you now
know, was great for fry-ups. I'd order a couple of
breakfasts, a burger, a pie and some cakes over the
phone and they'd deliver it straight to the door. I'd get
them to chuck a knife and fork in because I never had
the energy to go to the kitchen. It would be fifteen quid
for that little lot and sometimes I'd ask them to stick
one or two cups of tea in there as well. This was the
place where I'd pretend I was ordering for me and 'my
guest'.
I'd get my shopping delivered from one of the
supermarkets online. I'll not mention them by name in
case they send me free food as a thank you. Online
shopping is brilliant in some respects and bad in
others. For starters, it meant that I was even less
likely to leave the house than before and meant I had
an excuse to stay in because I couldn't miss the
delivery. And once it arrived, more often than not, I
used to sit and eat most of it, if not all, depending if all
of it was instant gratification or had to be cooked. It
was very likely that most of it wouldn't make it to the
cupboard, fridge or freezer. If there was a place online
where they brought you the food, cooked it and served
you it, you can bet your life I'd have been on it.
I'd sit in on a night, lonely and miserable. I've
always been single -- never had a partner to share my
life with and have always wanted to know what it's like
to be in love with someone and in a relationship. I
knew I'd never go anywhere where I'd be likely to meet
someone and always felt I was missing something in my life. And of course, there I was every night filling
that void with food. I'd just eat and eat until it hurt.
There was no pleasure in it. At my low points, I'd
crumple any leftovers up, smother it with ketchup or
the dregs from a cup of tea so it would be destroyed and
disgusting, and throw it in the bin. This was so I
wouldn't be tempted to try to eat it, but sure enough,
there were times when I retrieved and ate it.
Other than a routine of work, there was nothing.
When I was off work, I would get up, order food and
just sit. And sit. Then, when I began to feel more
depressed because of how I looked and felt, I'd take
time off work and just sit. Eating and sleeping was all I
had in times like this. When I got to the point of hardly
being able to move, then this was another reason for
staying off work and locking myself away. My days
were spent battling with my inner turmoil and all of
these battles were lost. The forfeit was always to
overeat. At least when I was at work there were fewer
opportunities, although I'd always make up for it
whenever I could.

I had huge, horrible, weeping ulcers on my legs that
wouldn't heal up. I was in constant agony and getting
up on a morning was such a miserable start to the day.
I used to have a metal-framed bed that had been quite

sturdy until one night it collapsed under my weight. It
had been a bit of a rude awakening, but there was very
little I could do about it at stupid o'clock in the morning
so it was a problem that I just slept on, pardon the
pun. After a while, I got someone to take the bed frame
away, leaving me with just the mattress on the floor.
And that was how I slept from then on, making it a
thousand times harder to get out of on a morning.
Sometimes it could take anywhere up to two hours,
with having to manoeuvre myself and roll to the edge
of the mattress and struggle to get to a sitting position.
I'd be knackered doing this. I often imagined that one
day I might not be able to do it; that I'd die there on my
mattress having not been able to move, not having had
the energy to quite make it.
The walking sticks I mentioned earlier were to help
heave myself up and it became a bit more manageable
that way. I got them after falling over in the bathroom
one day and not being able to get back up. Stuck for
two hours, I had to crawl my way out and was scared I
was going to die there. The desperation of being alone
in that situation is difficult to recall. The energy it took
to crawl, pulling myself along on my own floor, having
to keep stopping, having to muster up more energy all
the time, fearing that if I gave up I'd be dead. I would
have been one of those sad stories like Anna had told
me, a newspaper article or an embarrassing addition to
the local news. This was another time where I should
have done something about it.

The 'should haves' were growing all the time and my
life turned into a desperate mess, a tale of how not to
live, a textbook-style "I told you so.' And all the time,
there was a catalogue of missed opportunities to lose
weight. All I had to do was realise I was killing myself
and do something about it, really. Until then I was
quite blissfully ignorant about my 'condition'. Yes, I
knew I wasn't in the peak of my physical prime, but
when your legs are covered in sores, it is time to begin
to accept some responsibility and try to seek help.
In all honesty, because of my obesity, I'd never even
known a 'physical prime' in my life. My legs continued
to get worse and change colour and, as I had nothing
better to do, one day I got out my medical dictionary. A
few minutes later and Dr Walduck had the full
diagnosis: blocked arteries, not enough blood getting
through my legs to my feet, no pulse in my feet ... I was
going to lose my legs. I managed to convince myself of
that. This only led to further panic because I refused to
go to see a real doctor and seek help, knowing that I'd
be told the inevitable.
Lucy, one of my dear and closest friends, came
round to my house each day without fail, bringing with
her antiseptic lotions and creams, purchased from the
chemist or acquired from friends and family. She would
tenderly bathe and dress my disgusting legs to help
relieve the pain and misery. They say true friends are
hard to find and Lucy is quite simply one of the best. I
will never forget all she has done for me.
I really felt like she was saving my life. It must
have been difficult for her, and for her to keep a brave
face and try to lift my spirits. I even bought some
healthy food in a desperate bid to lose weight and save
my legs, and then two days in I thought, What the hell.
I don't use my legs anyway so what's the point in
trying to save them?

One evening I phoned my mum. I guess I was at my
lowest ebb and in the depths of depression because I
never gave any thought to her feelings as I poured out
my heart and complained about everything that was
bad in my life. I told her that I was so sick of living in
this body, so sick of being me that I just wanted to end
it all. I couldn't see a way out. How could I lose it all if
I couldn't even move? Just sit there and eat salads all day until I shrunk?
It must have been horrific, being told all that by
your son. I began with my weight, then my ill-health,
the state of my finances and the atrocious state of the
house, which because of my lack of mobility had been
left to go to rack and ruin.
That night was probably the longest of my life. I
watched the seconds and minutes slowly tick by,
riddled with pain, every tortuous movement inducing
more tears of anguish and remorse. What a pitiful
creature I was; what a self-deprecating slob I had
become. I hated myself and everything I was. I looked
around and was disgusted that I'd ended up this way: a
grown man who'd eaten so much all his life that he
couldn't move, couldn't even get out of a seat to tidy his
own mess up, couldn't even have a proper wash
because he was too fat to have a bath or shower and
couldn't even wipe his own arse properly if he went to
the toilet. I was so ashamed of myself.
A few minutes later, Mum phoned back and said she
was on her way over to see me. It was such a relief to
know that Mum would help. She talked to me and
comforted me; she cleaned my house from top to
bottom. She herself had mobility issues, but that didn't
bother her one bit. She never complained; she came in
and got on with the job. My throat was dry, my fists
were clenched and I failed to fight the tears back while
I sat watching, helplessly. It pains me to recall the
vision, and this may help you understand how much
mental torture I endured-' Mum had to get on her
hands and knees to do all the housework, crawling
around in all my mess to clean up after me.
Mum had a fall in the street years earlier and was
never quite the same. She used to always go to town on
a Friday, and when we'd grown up a bit and didn't go
any more she continued going on her own. She'd
slipped on a strawberry in Barrow market. After the
fall, she could never walk without getting the sensation
that she was falling and became scared of walking. It
was like severe vertigo. We used to say it was in her
head, meaning that she just thought she was going to
fall but wasn't actually in danger, but Mum took it that
we meant she was making it up. It must have been
horrible for her. She can't really walk at all. She'd hold
Dad's hand for a bit, then she used to hold on to other
people. At my graduation in 1991 she used a walking
stick, which she did for a time until Dad got her a
wheelchair; typically, one that was too big to fit
through doorframes in houses.
Mum also motivated me into having the guttering
at the front of the house repaired. Every time there
was rain, it would pour down the walls in the living
room. My gas boiler was broken at this time too -- it
had a big British Gas sticker on it saying 'Do not use'
so I was without central heating and hot water and the
house became damp and smelled because of it. She
stayed with me all that week and, when Dad came to
pick her up, he brought me a pair of slippers. I was
more or less bedridden at this point and he came up to
see me and put the slippers on my feet. He never used
to lecture me about losing weight. He'd always say 'Do
the necessary and look after yourself and I'd always
say "I will, I will' and never did. It must have been
difficult for him all the other times, but I'm sure that
this one had been the worst. It was like he was coming

to see me on my death bed. An animal suffering like
this would have been put to sleep long before.
Mum got in touch with Social Services too and
arranged for a cleaner to come around once a week to
help out. This also added to the shame: having to alert
the council to the fact that I was in no fit state to look
after myself. She also made me go to the doctor, where
I was given anti-depressants and felt I'd taken my first
step on the road to recovery. Mum's only reward for all
her hard work was the promise from me that I would
try to lose weight. And after putting my mind to it, I
did lose weight. And after finally overcoming my fear of
the doctor, I started to feel much better. I was
determined this time. I was going to turn it all round
and really make a go of getting my act together. The
start was made, I was feeling good and I stuck to a
plan.
And then I destroyed it all again. I don't know what
made me feel the worst, letting Mum and Dad down
again or letting myself down again. I certainly couldn't
have felt any worse if I'd tried. When the weight was
put back on, when the promises became empty, when I
reverted back to living like a slob with no self-respect,
all that misery and depression came back a thousand
times worse. I was convinced this time that there really
wasn't anything I could do. I'd tried so many times and
made so many promises. No one would believe me
anymore. Why would they? And why would they even
bother to help me? I just said anything anyone wanted
to hear to their face while in private had my finger
hovering over the self-destruct button.
And speaking of a thousand times worse, that gives
me a perfect link to what happened in August that
year. It was a spate of bad luck that I didn't think was
ever going to end. The first straw was a visit from my
sister, Jackie. As a result of a recent split with her
boyfriend, she decided to come and stay with me for a
short break. I like my own space, but when a family
member is in need, you do what you can, and although
I love my sister dearly it wasn't long until we were
bickering. This led to a few nasty arguments and harsh
words, none of which need to be repeated, and it's safe
to say we both gave as good as we got.
At the time, Jackie was drinking rather more than
she should have been and this added to the tension in
the house. She was obviously upset about the breakup
and I think I became the focus of her attention. From
day one she took control - I think she thought she
could be my saviour. I, on the other hand, wanted
nothing more than to be left alone in peace and quiet. I
couldn't be bothered with it all, especially when we
both knew she was there for a short period of time and
I would have been a part-time project to get left behind
when she went back home.
One evening I took her along with me to work,
hoping she'd enjoy a few games of bingo and forget
about her problems for a bit. They'd still be there the
next day, so a night off from all that wouldn't hurt.
Unfortunately, I've never owned a crystal ball. I'd
never had the need for one until after that night. Even
more unfortunately, I exchanged some rather harsh
words with a work colleague over something quite
trivial, but nevertheless the argument was overheard
by Jackie. It was something that needn't have
happened; you know how these things escalate.
After my shift was over, I decided to take Jackie to
the local pub where I'd heard that many of my work
colleagues would congregate to round off the evening.
Of course, I chose the wrong evening and the pub was
completely empty. If I'd bothered to go out with them
instead of being in a rush to get home and eat, I'd
probably have known this was not a night they'd be
there. We stayed anyway and Jackie had a bit more to
drink and, whether it was the result of too much
alcohol or not, Jackie was soon quite animated and
decided to give me some home truths.
In her opinion, I was a complete waste of space with
no friends to speak off. She went on to say that it was
evident that I was disliked by work colleagues too. Her
contempt on that evening was all too clear and I was
deeply upset. They say alcohol allows you to say what
you really want. Well, I certainly found out firsthand
that night!
Completely demoralised, I once again turned to my
friend Lucy. She was quick to reassure and promptly
invited me, Jackie one of Jackie's friends to her house
for a meal the following evening to see if we could
rebuild a few bridges. This could have gone either way:
potential for Jackie and me to make up or a venue for
round three. And it was also the perfect opportunity to
wear my new white shirt that I was dead chuffed with.
As I pulled the delicate material over my body, it clung
to me like a second skin. I started to feel really self
conscious about it. Despite this, when I looked in the
mirror, I remember thinking how smart I looked. You
can't beat the buzz of something new to wear and I felt
good for a change. I've since looked back on photographs
taken that evening and I cannot believe how
deluded I was. I looked horrendous.
Lucy, as always, proved to be the perfect host. The
food was superb, the drinks were flowing and once
again Jackie soon got tired and emotional. And then
she got to the point where it was quite embarrassing,
it's never nice when you take someone to a friend's
house and they get hammered. I knew Lucy didn't
blame me, but I did feel responsible for it. This took the
evening from bad to worse and eventually the taxi
arrived to take me, Jackie and her friend home. I was
so relieved to get out of that situation.
As Jackie got louder and louder, the taxi driver
became really annoyed, to the point where he couldn't
take any more and ordered us out of the cab. You know
you're bad when someone who is used to driving
drunks around actually throws you out his car! And it
makes it difficult to get another cab to pick you up.
How good was this for my stress levels? We were
dumped unceremoniously outside a petrol station a
good distance from home and Jackie then decided she
needed the toilet. As there wasn't one around, she
made do with the forecourt (who said the Walducks
aren't classy?). There are not many things more
annoying than trying to keep a drunk in order ... trying
to keep two in order beats it hands down though.
Jackie and her mate were rolling around all over the
place, shouting and laughing, and it was turning into a
nightmare.
My legs were really aching and I longed to be home
and safe in bed. The night was dragging on forever and
I thought I was never going to get home, but we
eventually managed to secure another taxi. To my
complete humiliation, it took both Jackie and her
friend to ungraciously pull and tug and drag me out of
it and inside the house.
I vowed there would never be a repeat performance
of such a disastrous evening. It was a great relief when
Jackie reconciled her differences with her boyfriend,
packed her bags and left for home. She's my sister, I
love her, but there's no way we could both exist in the
same house without us driving each other mad! I'm
sure she'd agree. I still haven't got round to getting the
crystal ball either.
Without wanting it to start sounding like my catch
phrase, things then went from bad to worse. If ever
there was a time for needing a crystal ball, this would
have been it. August 2003, and roughly a week before
my thirty-fifth birthday, it was my turn to be on reception at the club. This meant I'd be taking telephone
calls and issuing temporary membership cards.
It was a Tuesday night. Beryl would always make
something for us to eat on Tuesdays and we'd sit and
have our break together. Any day ending in a 'y' was
food day. It's funny how you build up routines and the
slightest thing can cause a huge change. Our breaks
would always consist of sandwiches and I'd usually
have a pork pie and crisps along with it. I'd then make
the trip from the settee (which I used to more or less
fill) over to my chair in reception to work with Sue. Not
the most thrilling routine in the world, I'll give you
that, but a routine all the same.
My chair only had one arm as the other had come
off, but it was comfortable and nobody else would ever
sit on it because it was my chair. I later discovered the
real reason: it was because it smelt so bad from me
sitting on it. Working with Sue always entailed having
a right good laugh, talking, singing songs, messing
around making fun of the customers. We'd make fun of
them in a friendly way, and usually with them, so
they'd join in -- never anything bad behind their backs.
And this night in particular, it seemed that everyone was in, so there were plenty of people stopping by for a
chat. It was sometimes easy to leave your troubles
outside and lose yourself in the fun of the evening and
this night was one of them.
At around 7.20pm I was getting ready to make the
short but difficult journey from reception to my chair
up on the stage. I was still smiling as I began to heave
myself up, then I glanced over to the main doors to see
three men wearing balaclavas burst into the club and
straight toward me. They had axes and bricks with
them and looked very dangerous as they strode toward
me purposefully. I stood off my chair as they
approached - I have no idea what was going through
my mind - and they demanded money. I was gripped
by fear, cemented to the spot. The foyer was completely
empty apart from us and there was no way of alerting
anyone. I had absolutely no idea what to do. I couldn't
run, hide or fight them. I couldn't give them money
because there wasn't any.
I hope you never find yourself in this situation. Believe
me, having three masked blokes with brandished
weapons demanding money from you is the most
frightening experience. I was numb. It wasn't a cliched
'slow motion' situation either, just so surreal and
terrifying. I said something to the effect that I didn't
have any money there and one of them smashed me
hard in the face. It was so quick, I didn't know if it was
a punch or I was struck with an axe handle. I fell to the
floor and I knew I wouldn't be able to get up. There I
lay, helpless, waiting for the inevitable kicking. A brief
silence followed before I heard more commotion and
Sue shout 'They've hit Charlie!' The would-be robbers
threw the brick in my direction and made off, empty
handed.
I was left really shaken that night. It's the last
thing you expect to happen and it made me feel really
vulnerable in a place where I used to feel safe and
secure. I was convinced they were going to come back
and hurt me. I mean, I was the one who foiled their
plans, and revenge would be quite easy as they knew
where I worked and what I looked like. All that was
going through my mind was Why me? Why me? It was
almost like they'd waited until I was alone, like I was
targeted. It sounds a bit selfish, but it was typical that
I was the only one for it to happen to, the only one to
get punched.
The next day I had a massive bruise practically
covering my face. To deflect the incident and to help me
cope, I made jokes about it at work. The truth was it
took all the courage I could find just to walk back into
the club. I don't mind admitting I was still terrified. I
was on the stage calling the numbers by 7.30pm and
joked to the customers that I would have given the men
the money if the customers hadn't kept winning it all.
When the interval came I managed to make my way to
the toilet and, once inside, I locked myself in the
cubicle and broke down in tears. It was a delayed
reaction to extreme trauma. I'd never felt so desperate,
alone and stripped of my dignity. I had one of the worst
panic attacks I'd known and phoned Mum.
I was terrified those men would find out where I
lived and come round to finish me off. For all I knew
they were in the audience, listening to me sneering at
them, and had followed me to the toilets. I felt useless
and wanted to die. I went home and sat with tears
rolling down my face, thinking about my life, wiping at
the tears with one hand and holding a packet of crisps
with the other. I read on the Teletext service about the
robbery and there was no mention of me being injured.
It was if I never mattered. You read about robberies
and they always say if someone was injured but not
this time! even crime reporters overlooked me. The
police were due to come back the next day and take
pictures of my injury, but they never did. Why would
anything that happened to me matter to anyone? Who
was really bothered that I was injured? Who'd really
have cared if they'd come after me and smashed my
skull in with their axes? I remember the police asking me on the night how old I was and I told them it would
be my birthday next week. I think that made it worse
because birthdays always conjured up such happy
thoughts for me, yet here I was in the depths of despair
with my next one just around the corner.
I still think about it all now. I suppose some people
would say that this would be another spur to lose
weight, but in actual fact it almost tipped me over the
edge. It made me question myself and my existence
even more than usual. Would things have turned out
differently if I had not been so grossly overweight?
Perhaps I could have been a hero instead of a snivelling
overweight wreck. I replay the scene over and over
in my head and reflect how quickly my life could have
ended that evening.

The third and final incident also happened on a
Tuesday night a couple of weeks later.
As usual I was sat on my chair on the stage, ready
to call the evening session at good old Gala. Behind the
microphone, I was comfortable and I was in control. I
always liked being in that position because I had
power. People listened to me. Customers laughed and
joked with me, but above all else, and I guess what
meant the most, was that, up there on my throne, the
customers respected me. I don't mean I loved the power
in the sense that I'm some sort of tyrant ... it was the
fact that I didn't have to fight to be heard, that people
could see me and hear me and paid attention.
Everything was running like clockwork. I began to

call the numbers, then ... to my horror ... I fell. The
chair I was on had only gone and collapsed, hadn't it.
And on cue, the entire hall erupted with laughter. I
suppose it was quite a spectacle to behold. We know we
shouldn't laugh, of course we do ... but we still do it.
Once all the laughter had died down there was an
extremely uncomfortable and embarrassing silence. I
was mortified. If I could have got up and run, I would
have. Instead, I had to listen to it all and then wait
until they decided to help. The attention was on me for
all the wrong reasons, and I knew what they'd all be
thinking: He was too heavy for the chair, it collapsed
under his weight and now he's paid the price by getting
hurt.
The manager rushed down to the stage. By that
time, customers were congregating around me, pulling
this way and that, trying to help but just making the
embarrassment even worse. I told the manager to carry
on calling the game. Of one thing I was certain - as
soon as he called the next number, the customers
would beat a hasty retreat back to their seats, their
urge to win being much stronger than their desire to
help me. My plan worked, though one customer
remained and somehow (goodness knows how) she
managed to roll me to the edge of the stage, enabling
me to sit up. With a little further help from my friend, I
was eventually pulled up and got back to my feet. As
I'm sure you can imagine, by this time my dignity was
in tatters. Nevertheless, I sat back down and carried on
calling the numbers for the rest of the evening.

Each of these incidents had dragged me down further
and made me loathe myself even more. I went home
that night sore again. This acted as the catalyst for me
taking time off work. What with the assault and falling
off my chair, I didn't feel like I belonged there anymore.
It was like the one place I felt I could be myself
and be someone turned out to be a sick joke; another


,,;
aspect of my life that I'd failed at. Then, because I was
off for so long, I worried that I'd get sacked ... and then
where would I be? You know what it's like when you
start skipping doing something though, it gets harder
and harder to go back to it and that was where I was
heading. I must have been resilient to get this far in
life though, must have been doing something right. All
these obstacles would have finished many people off.
But I was hurtling towards my threshold. Sometimes I
felt I'd never got the chance to dust myself down before
something else happened.
I think luck is very much a state of mind. If you
think positively, then positive things are more likely to
happen and, when they do, they boost you and lead to
more positivity. When you are bombarded by negativity
it is the exact opposite. You get lower and lower and
can't see a way out, even reversing any success to fit in
with your negative mindset. It becomes impossible to
escape.

Just after my birthday in 2003, I was sitting on the
settee in my living room, unable to move and very
depressed. My legs were in so much pain that I could
hardly sleep. It was three o'clock in the morning and I
was watching a documentary about orchids. To be
honest, I was hardly even bothered about what was on
TV. But orchids? Who'd even want to make a documentary
about them anyway? And what kind of sad
audience would they attract at this time? Well, people
like me, I suppose.
I really wanted to ring someone but there was no
way I'd call anyone at such an hour. My legs were
weeping so much that there was a massive puddle on
the carpet where I was sitting. / can't go on like this, I
thought. My legs were covered in huge ulcers, gaping
holes oozed pus constantly and smelled rotten. It was
like something out of a horror movie. I really wanted to
end my life there and then but I just couldn't do it. If I
thought I'd been low before, it was nothing compared to
this. I didn't want to live anymore and I didn't want to
die either. I'd sat so many times like this, and it felt
like this was my very last time. I was weak, like I'd lost
any fight I once had, like those were going to be my last
moments.
I couldn't go to bed because, if I did, my legs would
dry out and then tomorrow they would bring agony all
over again and then would start to weep. But that's all
they did anyway, that was the routine. I couldn't bathe
them properly and so they'd be infected constantly too.
I was even past the point of feeling disgusted with
myself, my whole being was in pain both physically and
mentally. I didn't feel all those other emotions, embarrassment,
loneliness, distress ... it was like I'd submitted
to all of it and nothing mattered anymore. Almost
like being at peace with all the torment and torture
and that I'd accepted that I was going to die. It was an
odd sensation, though it was never a 'peace' in the real
sense of the word.
I must have dozed off a couple of times and when it
was time to I squeezed myself into a taxi and managed
to make it to work. The shame of phoning up and
saying 'It's the big fella,' the shame of putting my tea
towel down on the seat before getting in, the shame of
being out of breath after a few steps outside ... none of
it mattered. I was on autopilot and didn't care. I would
be safe and amongst friends at work and my good
friend Lucy would look after me and have a look at my
legs.
I arrived at work and, despite the fact I was in a
mess, the customers always gave me a warm welcome
and were pleased to see me. Gary and Marie were sat
in their normal place, as were Mrs Ward and Philip,
Cath, Audrey and my Marlene. They'd always be there.
As I spoke to Lucy, she said that one of the managers
had asked her to have a word with me because he
was concerned about my personal hygiene. This was
something I was always concerned about too, but it was
very hard for me - impossible, in fact - to be as clean
and presentable as I wanted to be. I was very angry
with him. Did he not realise how hard it was for me?
Much of the bad smell coming from me was from the
weeping dead flesh on my legs and under my stomach.
I couldn't help that. I wanted to grab him and show
him, make him understand some of the pain I had to
live with.
Glenn, the general manager, was more sympathetic.
He'd been concerned about the amount of time I'd
taken off work and I know a lot of people thought it
was only a matter of time before I went off sick and
never came back. Lucy was one of the few people who
believed that I would come through. When I used to
phone in sick she would shout at me and make me
come to work; she knew, as I did, that being at work
was better for my mental and physical wellbeing than

sitting at home.
Lucy was such a good listener throughout all this
and helped me keep sane. In fact, she helped keep me
alive. I know if it wasn't for her and her kindness I
wouldn't be here now. Then one day she said something
that took me by surprise.
'That's it,' she said. "I am writing to Fern and Phillip
at This Morning. I'm going to get some help for you.'
I didn't know what to say, whether it was an off-the
cuff statement or not. It was just left hanging in the
air, really. But I kept asking her if she'd written the
letter each time we spoke. I suppose I was goading her
into doing it because I wanted her to. I worked with
Lucy, and a few others had been part of the
conversations, so it was all witnessed. She told me that
she'd really fall out with me unless I did something
about my weight because she was convinced I'd die.
She obviously knew I was taking more time off than
being in work and said she didn't want me to
completely withdraw and sit alone at home eating
myself into an early grave.
And then she did it. She wrote and sent a very moving
letter saying that she was scared I would die and
that the world would lose a wonderful man loved by
thousands. She said she would rather see me lose
weight than win the lottery. With the nation behind
me, she said, I'd do it. It really hit home that she cared
for me so much and wanted me to change. People at
work said I still wouldn't stick at it. She told them that
she believed I would and it was her belief that started
to give me the kick in the pants that I needed. If
someone had such faith in me, could I really fail? Or
similarly, if someone put her neck on the line in such a
way, could I break her heart by letting her down?
I was mad with her once she had sent the letter, but
deep down I was excited about it. It was an odd mix of
emotion: angry ... yes, happy ... yes, anxious ... yes,
scared ... definitely. It felt like a real step this time,
like I was finally able to admit to the world that I had a
serious problem and I needed help before it was too
late. In some respects, I already thought it was too late.
I saw this as my last ever I mean it this time. It was
probably on par with going to an addiction centre and
announcing 'My name is Charlie Walduck and I'm a foodaholic,' only I was going to announce it on national
television rather than to a roomful of people.
Of course, I was pessimistic about anything ever
happening once the letter had been sent. And just to
prove me wrong, the producers of the show rang me up
just before Christmas 2003. To say I was slightly
concerned about going on the show was a bit of an
understatement. My nerves couldn't take it. But not
only is Lucy a great friend, she's also very persuasive
and told me I had to do it. It wasn't just friendship at

stake here.
I said to Steve the producer that I would do it, but I
wanted a say in how it would work. It isn't usually
something that TV people agree to, but I asked if they'd
not show any of it on TV until I had actually lost some
weight. I didn't want the pressure of going on first,
then having every man and his dog commenting,
asking how I was doing, saying it didn't look like I'd
lost weight or anything else. There were so many
scenario possibilities that I needed to limit. People who
knew me would obviously know what I was taking part
in and that was fine. Another aspect I wanted a say on
was some of the visuals they'd be shooting. It wasn't
that I was being a prima donna - I just didn't want to
be filmed eating. I've seen countless documentaries
where the fat bloke says he wants to lose weight and
you see him in cutaways shovelling food down his
throat. I didn't want to be featured in that way because
of public opinion and because it wouldn't have helped
me at all. You wouldn't have seen an alcoholic necking
a bottle of Scotch or a junkie shooting up, and I didn't
think seeing me eating was that necessary. The
producer agreed and I was happy to embark on the
journey.

I'd been on dozens of diets in the past. And yes, they'd
all been successful: I lost weight on all of them, but as
you know, I never sustained it and put the weight back
on soon after. Diets are usually based on the same
basic principal: eat less and exercise more. I always did
eat less for a bit and I never could exercise. And it was
doomed from the beginning because I had no commitment.
Before
meeting up, Dr Chris Steele phoned me to
introduce himself and I was amazed. I didn't think it
was him at first because he was a TV personality and it
all felt a bit surreal. I used to watch This Morning and
would switch the TV over a fair bit when he was on. It
wasn't that I didn't like him, it was because I'd sit
there and get paranoid about my health. There was a
guy on once who had really sore legs through an
infection and it was upsetting because it was just like
the excruciating pain in my legs at the time.
When we met up, I told him that I did have an understanding
of what a diet was and didn't want him
telling me what to eat because I'd fail in a couple of
weeks if I didn't like the foods I was supposed to live
off. Dieting on something you don't like is never going
to work because you'll never stick at it. And there are
so many weird ones available to try, I can tell you. I
know someone who tried the cabbage soup diet who
didn't like cabbage and wasn't that fond of soup either.
She didn't stick at it and never lost any weight before
moving on to the boiled egg diet. She didn't like boiled
eggs, loved them fried though. Then, to even the plate
out, she'd add a sausage or two, some bacon, mushrooms
to balance the meat out with some veg ... and
before she knew it, she was on the fry-up diet.
I also said to Dr Chris that we needed to keep my
diet simple. I didn't want to be stuck in the kitchen
twenty-four-seven cooking and preparing food. It would
be too difficult to do that because of my mobility and
also because I wasn't brilliant in the kitchen anyway. I
just wanted food with minimal fuss. I said I had a
microwave oven and wasn't afraid to use it.
Anything like cooked meats, bread, cheese, yoghurt
- anything that could be eaten without being prepared
I couldn't have in the house and had to stop myself
from buying it. I needed to have food that required
some amount of thought to turn it into a meal or food
that I just wouldn't pig out on, otherwise I would have
been battling temptation from day one.
We settled on a plan: meals to contain less than
three per cent fat and an eating curfew set at six at
night.
'If it looks right and if it works, we will stick to it. If
it doesn't, we'll agree to reassess and we'll get some
other people involved to help,' said Dr Chris.
That sounded fair enough and it all moved along
quite swiftly. As far as consulting my own doctor before
going on a weight loss plan, I mentioned it, told him
what I intended to do and he was fine with it. There
certainly wasn't any panic. I mean, a forty-odd-stone
bloke asking the doctor if it was OK to go on a diet
sounds like the beginning of a joke, doesn't it? It was
dangerous to go from 20,000 calories a day down to
1,500, but the way I'd been living was dangerous
enough anyway. Each day I woke up could have been
my last. There wasn't much to lose when you think of it
like that.

My new regime was to have breakfast cereal on a
morning with skimmed milk. I'd have this at home
before going to work. And when I was at work, Beryl
would bring fruit in for me for lunch, rather than us
having the usual junk food fix. It was great that I had
friends who were prepared to help. Even if they were
not convinced by my dubious past attempts, I'm sure
they were on their way to believing and wanted to
make sure I gave it my best shot. Now, I'd still do my
shopping online, but I'd buy low-fat healthy choice
ready meals. I know these kinds of meals are constantly
criticised for their sugar or salt content ... so
hear me out. For me, they were portion controlled,
cheap and easy for me to cook. I stocked up the freezer
at home and at work and them being frozen meant I'd
have to think about it before eating it, so it was on the
'safe list' of foods (i.e. not immediately edible). I'd have
these for tea if at work and Beryl, bless her, would cook
them for me. I made a note of everything I ate on a
daily basis and it all went on a spreadsheet.
There would always be someone who'd suggest cooking
a healthy chilli and freezing it. Well, I knew that
cooking a huge pan of food would only lead to one
thing. I just needed people not to interfere with their
pearls of dietary wisdom and let me do it my own way.
If it went wrong, then I'd take advice.

After filming schedules and other TV-land issues were
sorted, the camera crew turned up in February 2004
for our first shoot. Deep breaths ... in through the nose,
out through the mouth ... I'd have given anything to be
anywhere else that morning. What I had to keep at the
back of my mind was that it was going to change my
life. I think that's why I felt such pressure; putting too
much emphasis on it and giving it the all-or-nothing
status could have been detrimental, though I'd defy
anyone not to think like that in my shoes. There had
been so much anticipation from that initial phone call,
through Christmas, into the New Year, and then the
date had finally arrived. It was like when you book up
for a holiday months in advance and don't think about
it until you have to find your spending money from
somewhere by the following week.

They say that TV cameras make you look ten pounds
heavier too. D'oh!
So, there I was, ready for my television debut.
There's a saying about 'bricking it' if you are
worried. If this saying were true, I could have
built a few bedrooms and a new dining room
on to the back of the house while I was waiting.
Like many others, I'd cringed at reality TV and
vowed never to do anything as potentially damaging to
myself. And yet here I was opening the doors to
television cameras in what was a first for the show and
a first for me, of course. Once I'd said yes, there was no
way I could just back out either. I'd made a commitment
to seeing it through with regular filming to follow
my progress. It was to be filmed over the course of a
year, not just an insert showing me sampling a few
salads for a fortnight and going back to pies after
losing a couple of pounds. I was looking to lose the
equivalent weight of nearly forty-seven large penguins,
for God's sake. This was a serious mission.
It doesn't get much bigger than being on This
Morning and I was determined that my waistline
wouldn't either. I knew they were genuinely doing it to
help me, but I'm not daft enough to think they were
doing it just for me out of the goodness of their hearts.
They were also doing it for the goodness of their
audience figures, which is fair enough. Although I
know there was no exploitation going on, whatever
happened on my journey was sure to have enough
drama to make good TV. I was fine with all that ... all
or nothing. I was prepared.
Steve the producer phoned me on Thursday when
he got to Manchester just to let me know he was there
and all was well. I think it was to calm my nerves
ahead of the shoot, and it did - until I put the phone
down and it dawned on me. I was going to be on
television!

The following morning was the one where I was
bricking it. If I could have paced the floor with worry
I'd have done so. As it was, I made do with tapping my
fingers on the arm of my chair, channel hopping on TV,
trying desperately not to think too much about it in
case I backed out - all the usual things someone goes
through just before making a fool of themselves on TV.
That was the point. No matter how good and
positive I knew it was going to be, there was another
perspective where I imagined what the viewers would
be thinking. Would they laugh at and ridicule me?
Would they pity or have empathy for me? At least by
saying I didn't want to be filmed eating, I knew there
wouldn't be as many 'no wonder you're so big' comments.

I
was embarrassed that I was so big that I had to go on
TV for help. It was like being fat defined me as a
person: I'd become Big Charlie, the bloke who couldn't
stop eating. No one saw me as anything else. Going on
TV was almost like going back to when the delivery
guy brought his family round to see me ... morbid
curiosity of the morbidly obese, only now the entire
nation was being invited round.
As mad as it sounds, I breathed in a bit when I
opened the door to the crew that Friday morning. I
know it had no impact, but it was a natural mechanism
- if the attention is on your belly, you breathe in to
save face. And I was embarrassed about the state of my
house too. Their visit had coincided with 'the maid's
week off and it showed. I'm pretty sure that they knew
I was in no fit state to tidy up, so it would never have
been an issue for them. For the crew, my house was a
set that they had to light and film in. They really
weren't that bothered about the tidiness as long as
there was electricity, room to set up the camera and
monitors and, most importantly, that I had a kettle.
One thing that wasn't shown on television was this
enormous set of scales they brought with them that
took the best part of the morning just to assemble.
Steve the producer tinkered with them and got everything
calibrated before I set foot on the plate. The
problem was that an error message kept coming up on
the display. It turned out that they only went up to
forty-two stones and they wouldn't take my weight.
Another set was sent down a couple of weeks later and
I was able to get a reading at forty-four stone and two
pounds. With this being nearly three weeks into my
weight loss programme, it had been estimated that I
was around the forty-seven stone mark at day one
proper.

I kept a weekly diary during the entire process because
I needed to monitor my progress. And I turned into a
right geek with spreadsheets for everything: food
intake, calories burned, where I walked, how long for,
every meal and menu. Other than monitoring my
progress, it was also compiled to help me spot anything
I was doing wrong if the plan didn't work for me.

Weekly Diary Of Charlie Walduck

WEEK ONE

44 st 2 lbs

The camera crew left and I burst into tears. I felt so alone and
isolated. Nobody had been in my house for such a long time
and it was great to have some wonderful people caring for me.
I hope I can do this. I'd been joking on with them all day, so
when I said I was going to run the London Marathon in two
years they all laughed. I was being serious about it! I know
they'll not take it seriously at the moment though. They don't
know it, but doing the marathon is my goal. Steve said he
would do it if I did. I bet he doesn't!
I think that deep down Dr Chris doesn't think I can lose the
weight. He's probably seen dozens of people half my size
saying "I'll start tomorrow,' so who could blame him? And
following on from the filming, I had great supportive phone
calls from him and Steve.
It is difficult to start something like this on a non-work day.
I got back into work on the Sunday and everyone was asking
how I was doing and I said I felt great - I've done a full day of
diet, but nobody seemed impressed. I hope they are not
expecting miracles, but it's early days. Dr Chris phoned Mum
and she was delighted. She has told all the neighbours about it.
The first day was the hardest this week, but Dr Chris told me
that the first day would be the hardest and that every journey
starts with the smallest step. He also said this is the biggest I
will ever be and my weight will fall off as I continue. I feel
great.

I'm not sure what I was expecting to happen. There
was nothing to happen, really. After all the build-up,
there was the inevitable comedown. I cried bucket
loads; pure, pent-up emotion came flooding out. And
once it was all out, I did feel good. It was like the first
day of the rest of my life - a brand new start. I wiped
away those tears, composed myself and phoned Mum
and told her that the crew had been and gone. It wasn't
that I was begging them to stay? I knew why they were
there, I think it was more because of how it had made
me feel. I was the centre of attention, in a good way,
and this was quite a first. I wasn't a sideshow getting
pointed and sneered at; people were asking me questions,
listening to my replies and it was all interesting
enough to go on TV. I felt special for the first time in
ages. They'd been there from nine in the morning until
nine at night, a long day for us all.
It did come with its downside though. Even in
documentary-style programmes like this, you have to
set scenes up to give an impression of reality because
it's still a constructed story. That meant they had to
film me walking to the kitchen, walking upstairs and
whatever else to show what I'd be doing if the camera
wasn't filming me (although I'd probably just be sat
down all day). I'd generally only go upstairs once a day
(when I went to bed) so this made filming even more of
a strain. Sometimes I just slept sitting on my chair if I
couldn't get up. The pain in my legs and knees from
having to perform for the camera was excruciating.
Remaining positive through this wasn't easy but,
because I could, I knew there was hope. The thing is,
even if me walking to the kitchen was perfect first
time, they would usually call this their 'safe take' and
get another as backup so they had plenty coverage for
when they went into the edit. If they don't have enough
visuals, it either means a reshoot and more money or
losing the shot or sequence, so I just had to go with
what the team said and trust they knew what they
were doing. Which they did.
I had a few ideas of how I wanted to come across,
but back then I wasn't the media-savvy expert I am
now. All I thought was that I'd answer questions, talk
for an hour or so and then they'd screen it. Being
edited means they'd pick out the best bits and can give
their own 'spin' on the situation, to an extent. I don't
mean this in the 'They did me good and proper stitched
me up like a kipper!' sense, just that I didn't
know the process.
To get to forty-odd stone takes a hell of a lot of dedication
and to lose thirty of it takes a whole lot more. At
that point, all I was to Dr Chris was just another
promiser. The cynical Mr Walduck just thought, 'Oh
well, I'm never going to see him again' when he left my
house, and he proved me wrong by phoning me on the
Monday. He told me to write down how I was feeling
and to put a spreadsheet together of all that was going
on, what I was eating, what exercise I was doing and
send to him so a record was kept.
I used to weigh myself on Saturday mornings and
would ring Mum to give her 'the scores on the doors'. If
it was a good week, I'd be so happy about it that when
she asked for the 'scores' I'd be like, 'Have a guess,
have a guess!'
The first few days of dieting were the worst.
Obviously, no one was ever going to see a change in me
within those days, but inside I could feel it. I knew I
wasn't eating all the rubbishy foods I'd usually
consume and I felt great that I was resisting the temptation. Man, this was a massive breakthrough and
I wanted to run around shouting about it. You know, a
day without crisps or a pastie for me was a miracle
that didn't mean anything to anyone else.
I think my colleagues at work were rather sceptical. He's on another diet? OK, we'll see how long this one

lasts.
I knew they'd be thinking these thoughts. What the
hell. Stick at it. Show everyone what you are capable

of.
I pre-warned them that on my birthday on 30
August I'd be having all the treats that I'd missed out
on and for them not to give me a hard time because it
would be a celebration, a reward.
He's making plans for August when it's only
February. He'll never even last until March.
When the crew had gone I felt so low after the high,
and that was when I'd usually turn to food. I didn't on
this occasion. I'd taken that first step and couldn't
wreck it all on the first night. This was going to be
good, I could feel it.

Please give me the courage to be able to do this. Please
don't let me mess up, don't let me fail. I'm a good bloke,
really. I know that if I'm granted this one last chance, I
can make good of it. You've got to believe me.

WEEK TWO

44 st 2 lbs (amount lost 0)

I feel as if I have eaten too much this week but I also feel as if I
have lost some weight. I have had loads of calls from Dr Chris
and support from the team at This Morning. Everyone at work
is totally behind me and it feels so right. My legs are still very
sore and I am having a nurse around every day to wash them
and put bandages on. One of the nurses was very rude indeed.
Some people are just plain horrible, even in the 'care' profession.

The
nurse was so open with it. It was disgraceful. She'd
been round previously in her 'nursing' capacity and I'd
actually complained to have her taken off my case. As I
started to lose weight, my legs still needed treatment
and I still needed a nurse. I was dreading this woman
coming round.
"I see you still haven't lost any weight,' she said
when I opened the door.
I wanted to tell her where to go, to be as nasty as
she was, get in her face and really show her what it's
like to be bullied, but I've got more manners than she'll
ever have. What a spiteful way to go on, eh?
To be a nurse, you have to have a bit of understanding
and empathy. The world is full of people like her
though. Luckily, I haven't encountered that many of
them. I got used to the odd comment such as 'It doesn't
look like you've lost much' or 'You can't have that
because you're on a diet,' and it would have driven me
up the wall if I'd let it get to me. There were a few
times in the supermarket when, once someone had
recognised me, they'd look into my basket to see what I
was buying and then think they had the right to
comment.

You know, I could easily have become aggressive,
always on the attack, always snapping at people for no
reason, if I didn't rise above it all. These were the
smaller obstacles, but all the same, they were the ones
that would niggle away at me when I had some spare
time on my hands and when my inner demons were
there to mess with my state of mind. Importantly, once
the demons got me in their grasp, I'd start eating
behind closed doors again. If these people knew the
effects of their snide remarks, I'd like to think they'd
keep them to themselves.

So, with my legs, Lucy had always been my carer and
had done everything anyone could to help me. I went to
the doctors and was advised to see the district nurse
who'd apply treatments and bandages and whatnot,
but I just couldn't physically get there. No one seemed
to grasp this, but in the end they did, hence nurse
sourpuss coming round.
At my lowest point, I wished I could just have my
legs amputated and be done with the pain. I knew it
was my own fault and certainly didn't want to be
reminded of it by others.

This is it, Charles. This is it. Two weeks into a diet and
already you're moaning and want to quit. That's you all
over though, isn't it? If it's too much, just give up ...
make some excuses, tell a little joke and go back to
eating. It's all you know. It's all you'll ever know.
Oh, woe is me. Isn't it terrible, having to eat normally?
It's
pathetic. Re-educate yourself? Don't make me
laugh. You've lost no weight and you never will. Get
used to it.

WEEK THREE

44 st 2 lbs (amount lost 0)

I am into week three and I still have not lost any weight. HOW?
It is so frustrating. I am feeling very low and not sure if I can
carry on with this. I will hopefully lose some weight this week. I
am eating breakfast every morning, fruit on my lunch break
and a low-fat ready meal for my main meal. Surely this must
be doing something.

Oh God, someone please help me. Three weeks of living
like this ... three weeks. I made my promise. I stuck to
it. I've done everything I should be doing. Why has
nothing happened? What's wrong with me?
I'll do anything, give anything. I just want to lose
weight. This body is killing me. I can't take much more.
Please do something.

WEEK FOUR

44 st 2 lbs (amount lost 0)

Nothing. Again. Dr Chris has told me to keep on doing what I
have been doing, but I'm getting a bit bored with the diet.

Why did I do it? Why did I live like that? All the time I
was shovelling food down my throat without a care in
the world, was I actually thinking at all? Why the hell
did no one stop me? What kind of person eats and eats
until they're the size of an elephant and doesn't do
anything about it? The only time I finally say I'm going
to seriously do something about it - and go on national
television to do it - and what? Not even half a miserable
pound. I must be the only person in history to go
on a diet for weeks, scrutinising every meal, every
mouthful, and for what? Nothing, that's what.
All those times coming out of pie shops and feeling
guilty, the looks from people in the street, the abuse ...
all down to me and what I did to myself. It makes me
sick just thinking about it. Why couldn't I just be like
everyone else?

WEEK 5
43 st 9 lbs (amount lost 7 lbs)

Oh. My. God!
At last! I weighed myself today and I am pleased to say I
have lost seven pounds. Seven pounds! I checked and double
checked, and double-double-checked. Seven pounds! I am
feeling so much better about myself and feeling thinner too. Dr
Chris, Steve and Natalie from This Morning phoned me for
updates and I was so chuffed to tell them because I was
beginning to think they thought I wasn't even trying.
Brenda at work has been great and she has said she will do
as much as she can to help me. My legs are very swollen and
sore and I have been struggling to get around. At work this
week we were short staffed but I couldn't get off my chair to
help and I felt very guilty about it. My friends Gary and Marie
(bingo customers) have been really supportive too. It's great to
know I have such good friends.

In discussing weight loss with Dr Chris, he put my
mind at ease with regard to the initial disappointment.
As I'd started my diet and hadn't been able to weigh
myself until two weeks into it because of the error
message on the first set of scales, he said that I'd
almost certainly lost weight immediately during that
period. When I did get the chance to weigh myself, it
must have been after losing initial pounds and it was
quite common to not lose any more for a few weeks
after. So really, there had been no problem, it was all
normal, I was just a bit out of synch with my weeks to
begin with. It was just the kind of positive news I
needed to get me really fired up.
At that early stage, it would have been so easy just
to pack it all in. It was so demoralising to commit to it
and to see no weight whatsoever come off. It was just
ridiculous. What did I have to do to lose even a single
pound? Run a marathon a day? It seemed impossible
that I could make an absolute change of lifestyle and
see no difference.
At just five weeks in, I used to think I couldn't face
having the same food again. It was day in, day out low
fat ready meals fresh from the microwave. To stay
motivated, and believe me it was difficult to stay on
track at the thought of another shepherd's pie, I'd
think about a conversation I had with a girl. She had
lost a load of weight herself and looked amazing; it had
been a real transformation she'd gone through and it
had all been by sticking to a weight loss plan. I asked
her how she kept going when she looked forward (or
not) to the same meal for dinner, which she'd been
having every day for a year.
'Nothing tastes as good as the feeling of being slim,'
she said.
How cool did that sound? Maybe it should be
attributed to someone else (she didn't come across as
someone who spent her time postulating such QVC
presenter-esque sound bites) but it was always
something that would come back to me time and time
again when piercing the plastic film on the ready meal
packaging.
At around this point in my mission, I started to eat
different foods. It wasn't a case of lapsing back into a
"&u habit, though: I created a new and better one.
Thursdays were my day off and I started to get a bit
adventurous with my food. This didn't entail just
sitting in front of the Discovery Channel while having
a fish pie, but actually involved real cooking. I tried my
hand at making a chilli and found that I had a real
talent for it. If I'd tried that before starting my plan, I'd
have shown my main talent and demolished the whole
thing immediately. It was unusual for me to behave
like this. I was well on my way to transforming myself
and my mind. I was reconditioning myself through
positive thought. I didn't need to eat everything in one
sitting. The temptation was there, but if I kept the
chilli, there'd be some for the following day. You have
no idea how good I was feeling. Although I hope you do
and I hope you have felt it too, because it was the best.
By making a chilli, I'd usually eat a bit more than
my usual pre-packed portion, though it wasn't anything
that would set me back. And having this as a
weekly treat gave me something to look forward to. It
gave each week a focus and broke up the monotony of
'same old, same old'. I'm sure pizza every single day
gets boring at some point.
Did I just say that out loud?

WEEK 6
43 st 3 lbs (amount lost 13 lbs)

No, really, did I just say that out loud?

I weighed myself and I have lost six pounds in the last week.
I'm very happy about this and feel very satisfied.
I had Yorkshire pudding and roast beef for my tea on
Sunday. It was really nice but I thought it was a bit fatty. It was
amazing that I could taste the fat on the roof of my mouth
afterwards.
I seem to be moving around much better this week although
my legs are sore and the nurse has given me some
cream to put on them. I have been feeling a bit anxious too. I
have another appointment with nurse next week and will also
have my toenails cut. In terms of weight loss, I am feeling quite
good. I am hoping to get down below the 600-pound mark
when I weigh-in next (I'm currently 605). I have a tape
measure now and will take a measurement and give details in
next week's update.

I knew there were a lot of people who thought I
couldn't do it. My track record at sticking to diets
wasn't that impressive, so who could really blame
them? I couldn't get bogged down with negativity
though. Yeah, I knew I'd not stuck to dieting in the
past, but I also knew that I had a 'do or die' attitude
now. Once I saw the weight starting to come off I felt
unstoppable.

Lap it up while you can. It won't last, mark my words.
Losing a bit of weight ... so what? You've lost that
before and it was back on quicker than you lost it. I
know you too well. You'll never do it. Thirty stones?
Now that IS funny.

WEEK 7

42 st 9 lbs (amount lost 1 st 7 lbs)


The weigh-in: fantastic news! I have lost eight pounds in the past week and I am so very happy. I'm working tonight, and to top a good day, Barrow FC won too! I can't wait to feel Mentally and physically fit enough to go to a football match again.

Took my waist measurement at seventy-eight inches. It was
about eighty-four inches when I started. A loss of six inches!
Feeling really good this week. My legs still feel terrible, but
they cannot dampen my spirit.

WEEK 8
42 st 0 lbs (amount lost 2 st 2 lbs)

Wow, another nine pounds lost in a week. I can't believe it! I
feel amazing today, on top of the world.
We had a quiz on Sunday of this week at work and they put
a big buffet on. Pork pies, sausage rolls, sandwiches and
savouries - all my favourites - and I never had any of it. And I
won the quiz as well!
I have had the nurse round every day this week to treat my
legs and they have got much, much better. I've been to see my
doctor this week and she was very supportive about the
weight loss project. I made an appointment because I've been
feeling a bit stressed of late (I can't imagine why!) and she
gave me a leaflet about coping with panic attacks, etc.
Producer Steve e-mailed on Sunday, Dr Chris on Tuesday ...
both pleased with my progress. I hope I can keep it going - it's
the weigh-in next week. Fingers crossed!

WEEK 9
41 st 9 lbs (amount lost 2 st 7 lbs)

Another five pounds bites the dust. I'm pleased with this but I
would have liked to have lost a bit more. I'm on a roll now and
not even a sausage in sight. It's mad that I lost five pounds and
feel I could have lost more.
My legs are still quite sore and getting me down, but they
are feeling better than they were. I'm concerned that I'm not
walking enough at the moment; this will come in time. Lots of

articles and stuff in the papers this week about obesity and
get-fit campaigns.
It would be great to think that I can be a positive role
model in eighteen months to two years' time. I want to show
people that there is no such thing as 'the point of no return'.
You can always turn your life around if you want to. I've not
done it yet but I am so determined this time. I tell myself every day 'you are fitter today than yesterday and tomorrow you will
be even fitter.'
Next week I am off work for almost three weeks so this will
be a real test of my willpower.

Looking back at my diary, it brings back the feelings I
had at the time. It's like reliving it. To have been that
size, becoming that size literally all my life and having
to live with it - to see it starting to drop off was the
biggest high. It was fuelling me to carry on*- with each
pound I was losing, I was saying goodbye to a body I
hated being trapped within.
It also reminds me of the trouble I had with my legs
and knees. I still have the scarring on my legs as a
constant reminder. They had been under so much
strain for those years and it's a wonder I hadn't done
permanent damage to them; just the cosmetic shame I
now suffer.

WEEK 10
41 st 1 lbs (amount lost 3 st 1 lb)

I have weighed myself and I am delighted I have lost eight pounds this week. I am thrilled by this. I am moving around
much better. I know I tend to repeat myself and write the same every week but this is how I feel.

I know I tended to repeat myself and write the same
every week, but that was how I felt.

Week ten already? Three more weeks and I have done a
quarter of a year. I am going to take my scales into work soon
and I'm going to do a weigh-in every week with some of the
customers. I am going to try and organise the diner at work to
do a healthy special and we are going to have our very own
diet club every Sunday lunchtime. I announced this week's
weight to the customers this afternoon and got a big round of
applause. It was amazing. I'm hoping to drop at least another
stone while I'm on holiday. Steve and Dr Chris are coming to
visit next Saturday.

You just need to go back a few pages and it is like
reading the outlook of two different people. I was on
the brink of giving up everything not too long ago and
here I am saying I want to lose another stone while on
holiday. I mean, holidays were usually a time to wallow
in more self-pity and overeat; a time for sitting in front
of the TV for the duration and spending all my money
on having unhealthy food delivered.
At ten weeks in, I really was a different person. I
had a purpose, I had a goal and I had the support of
people to help me along. I'd always have my dark
moments and periods of doubt. My depression was
never going to just get up and leave because I lost some
weight. It's never that easy. Having fire in my belly
rather than a load of pasties was a good feeling and I
had a fighting spirit. I knew I could fight the inner
demons and I knew they could easily win battles if I let
my guard down. Because those demons are The', that's
what makes it all the more difficult. Your demons
know all your weaknesses.
WEEK 11

40 st 10 lbs (amount lost 3 st 6 lbs)

A loss of five pounds over the previous week and Dr Chris and
Steve were here to witness it. It has been such a busy week
this week. On Wednesday afternoon I went and had my hair
cut and got stuck in the chair. It was something to laugh at
rather than feel embarrassed about because I knew that a few
weeks ago I wouldn't have even made it to the barbers, never
mind fit in the chair in the first place. I went to a quiz at Belle
Vue dogs that night and it was really enjoyable. Thursday was a
long day spent with Steve and the crew. It was nice being with
them and it was easy to forget that it was 'work'.
I bought a new pedometer from eBay and I managed to
break it after just a day, so my step-count is still guesswork.
Since starting the 'plan' I have lost forty-eight pounds, which is
three stones and six pounds and represents 7.77 per cent of
my original weight.
On Thursday, going to Barrow was very stressful for me,
just getting on a train for the first time in years was very hard. I
was being followed by TV cameras as well.
'Is it Brad Pitt?' I heard one lady ask.
Yeah, he spends all his Thursdays in Barrow, did you not
know?
I got on the train and someone asked if it was one of those
fancy tilting trains. It is now, I thought as I stepped on. At the
end of the day the crew left and went to Barrow for a pub
meal. I really wished that I could have gone with them. Maybe
next time. The next couple of days at Mum and Dad's is going
to be tough because I know their kitchen will be well stocked.
They have gone away and I am looking after the dog. I would
love to try and take her for a walk while I am here.

WEEK 12
40 st 2 lbs (amount lost 4 st)

I lost eight pounds this week, which is another amazing result.
Steve from This Morning rang and I was telling him I felt like I
was being re-born - like a plant that had not been watered for
ages and was being to grow again.
I have lost fifty-six pounds now, which is more than a sack
of spuds! And the percentage now lost is 9.09 per cent of my
starting weight. I have been on the scales every day this week,
which is probably not the thing to do, and I don't seem to have
done very well. The pattern seems to be eight or nine pounds
one week then five pounds the next. I went to Morrisons
supermarket for the first time in two years as well this week. I
am so very proud.

WEEK 13
39 st 8 lbs (amount lost 4 st 8 lbs)

Another eight pounds bites the dust. I ate my first bread in
three months this week with my lunch on Wednesday. It was
really nice. It really gave me the taste for it. I used to eat a lot
of bread. Maybe better off steering clear if I can.
When we get to the end of this week then it is actually
thirteen weeks since the start, which is a quarter of a year. I
went to Carpet World on Monday afternoon to buy a rug for
my bedroom. I am really starting to take some pride in my
home and trying to take some pride in myself also. This is a
good sign because I never had any pride for either in the past.
My waist measurement on Monday night was taken at
seventy-three inches. It's reduced by eleven inches since I
started. People are starting to notice that there is something
different about me, finding it hard to determine exactly what.
When I see that quizzical look on people's faces, I know I'm
making good progress. It'll soon click with them immediately.

WEEK 14
39 st 5 lbs (amount lost 4 st 11 lbs)

I walked around the block this week, thought I was going to
collapse when I got back, had to stop and sit on someone's
wall for a few minutes (I hope they don't need to rebuild it!). I
could only manage it once, but every little helps doesn't it? I
only managed to lose three pounds this week but that's OK.
When I started my BMI (Body Mass Index) was eighty
seven and is now down to seventy-seven. To achieve a safe
BMI, I would have to be thirteen stone. Just twenty-six to go,
then! My pedometer entries are estimated this week as I need
to get another new one, as my last took a swim down the
toilet. Have been reading some interesting things on the This
Morning website about 'good' foods, turkey being one of
them. I always thought turkey was foul though (get it?
Foul/fowl? I know, don't give up the day job).

BMI stands for Body Mass Index and is the measurement
of fat in your body. Nearly all of us have a set of
scales and nowadays they can be quite technical and
give us all sorts of information about our bodies. It is
important to always use the same scales every week,
weigh in the same place and wear more or less the
same clothes. I always weigh naked on a Saturday
morning. I have had some funny looks in Boots I can
tell you! When you are trying to lose weight, the
temptation is to step on the scales every day, and I'd be
a liar if I said I didn't get tempted, but try not to
because it really can put you off.
BMI is quite complicated to work out to say the
least (weight divided by height squared), but you can
find BMI calculators all over the interweb.

Categories of BMI18.5
and below means you are underweight
18.5-24.9 is normal
25-29.9 is overweight
30 or above indicates obesity.

WEEK 15
39 st (amount lost 5 st 2 lbs)

The hot weather is playing havoc with me and I have terrible
'nappy rash' at the moment. I'll have to stop wearing nappies
soon - see if that helps shift it. When I get down to my
marathon weight, things like nappy rash will be a thing of the
past. I was very sore on Wednesday and Thursday this week
with it and was a bit low as a result.
My mum and dad came round on Thursday which was
really nice. I filmed my mum talking about how I am doing. We
went for a short walk down the road but it was hard because
my legs were really sore. Natalie from the show rang me the
other day for an update, which was nice, and she was really
impressed with me ... she said she is going to do the marathon
as well!

I wasn't really wearing nappies. I meant that my legs
were rubbing together and with such heat it was an
absolute nightmare and I needed to bathe as much as
possible.

WEEK 16
38 st 12 lbs (amount lost 5 st 4 lbs)
only lost two pounds this week and I am very disappointed.
did a piece-to-camera and I was so upset. On top of that, my
legs are still sore. I don't know if I can carry on but I will keep it
going for now. Feeling desperate.
Had my shopping delivered on Wednesday. Have bought
some Sultana Bran because I am not going to the toilet as
regularly as I used to and I think I need a bit more fibre in my
diet. Last week was so bad weight loss wise I decided to weigh
myself every day this week to see where I might be going
wrong (if indeed I am going wrong). By Wednesday, I was six
pounds down on the previous week and then by Wednesday
night I was only two pounds down on the previous week, so I
have knocked that idea on the head.
Got a new pedometer from Steve at This Morning. My
average steps now are about 1,000 a day; it was only 400 when
I started.

WEEK 17
38 st 2 lbs (amount lost 6 st)

Lost ten pounds in the last week - fantastic! I have also
increased my steps this week and the daily average is now
almost 3,000.
One of my main rules is to not eat after 6pm but when I got
in on Sunday I had one of my meals. I couldn't stop myself and
this worries me. I suppose this is my first slip even though it's
just a little one.

This was a dark time for me. I was gutted that I'd
broken one of my rules; it was something I couldn't get
out of my head. The main worry was that if I could
break the rule once, I could easily do it again, and that
would see me lapsing back into my old ways. I was also
still a bit down from the previous week and these were
the things I was trying to get rid of from my life^
negative thoughts and eating at the wrong time.
I'd made too much progress to throw it all away. If I
didn't let go of the negativity, I'd sink back and I knew
I'd start to eat again, convincing myself of failure.
So that was it. I regretted it, hated that I'd done it,
but I had to move on. If it was so easy to lose weight,
I'd have been able to do it long ago. I just needed to
stay focused. It was a tough job and I was the only one
who could do it.

What did I tell you? I knew it! Can't do it, can you? I
knew you'd never last. You never do. This is just the
start.

WEEK 18
37 st 13 lbs (amount lost 6 st 3 lbs)

Only three pounds lost, but on Friday I walked the most steps I
have ever done since records began ... 4,400!

WEEK 19
37 st 9 lbs (amount lost 6 st 7 lbs)
Four pounds. Average

steps 3,300 a day. Not too shabby.

WEEK 20
36 st 11 lbs (amount lost 7 st 9 lbs)
considerably, which was a bit of a downer. I sat at the bus stop
and, as I looked around, I could see loads of other people
totally unaware that I was having difficulty just being there.
Getting on the bus was a right struggle and a half. I had to let
two buses pass before I eventually had the courage to get the
third. I felt proud of myself, but at the same time very
frightened. Not sure I will be able to do it again for a while - I
started to panic a bit when I got into town. I had to meet
Joanne, Brenda and Zeta from work to look at some Christmas
stock for next year. It was hard work and they carried a chair
around so I could keep sitting down. Beryl from work has been
walking me around the car park. I'm hoping to be able walk a
bit further soon.

One thing that Dr Chris said to me was that I needed
to exercise. I needed to start walking. My reply was
that I couldn't make it from one side of the room to the
other in one go, but he told me I had to start doing it.
He'd given me my first pedometer and I did 300 steps
on my first day and vowed to increase on a daily basis.
Pedometers had a very limited life expectancy with me
and I knew I had to step up a gear or two.
Beryl and I took a trip round the car park at work
one day and we increased that to walking round the
building, to the bus stop and pretty soon I thought that
if I could make it to the bus stop comfortably, there'd
be nothing to stop me getting on a bus more regularly
than once every three years. You need goals to keep
you motivated. The same thing each day gets too
boring for someone like me.
When I told Dr Chris I was walking, he agreed to
come round every Thursday on his day off. The first
time, we literally only managed a few meters before I
started struggling. I was short of breath, sweating and
deeded a sit down. If I were in Dr Chris's shoes, I'd



have been wondering what the hell I'd let myself in for.
Our walks round the block took twenty minutes and, at
one point, we passed a group of kids who I was certain
would shout abuse but we got by without incident.
Safety in numbers!
Thursdays were great - we'd walk and talk and he
never questioned what I was eating because he could
see I was doing the right thing. The results were
visible. My plan was working and didn't need to be
altered. I'd also have less than the allocated 1,500
calories if I could.
Progress with walking was slow, but it was progress.
We kept going a little bit further each week,
making sure everything was achievable; nothing too
silly. That was the key. Do what you can and don't kill
yourself by doing an extra few steps. As I built up these
walks with Dr Chris, I gained enough confidence to go
without him. I was keen to prove to myself I could do it.
Going out alone was something I'd never have thought
possible before starting the weight loss programme and
was another great confidence booster.
We got to the stage where I would go over to see Dr
Chris if he couldn't make it to my place and the
conversations were no longer based around food. It had
become a proper friendship.
Once we were out together and were stopped by a
man on the street who was keen for a chat. He said
how great it was that we were out exercising. 'You
must be proud of what you've done, helping him lose all
that weight,' he said to Dr Chris.
'No. I'm proud of what Charlie has done. He's done
it all, not me. He's the one who has had to live with it
all this time. I'm just here once a week,' he replied.
I knew he understood, but hearing him say it meant
a lot to me. It made me proud to have such a mate.

WEEK 21

36 st 3 lbs (amount lost 7 st 13 lbs)

Eight pounds. This is just bizarre. This is now the longest diet I
have ever been on. Most steps ever on Friday, 6,300. How
good is that? Ian Botham eat your heart out!

WEEK 22

35 st 13 lbs (amount lost 8 st 3 lbs)

Lost four pounds last week.
Wednesday: I cooked turkey breast in chilli with two jacket
potatoes. It was far too much, but I hated to throw it away, so I
ate it all. I feel bad about it. Very bad. When I was eating it I
felt as if I was slipping back into my old ways and, for a few
moments, a kind of mist took over my body and I wanted to
eat everything in sight. It was horrible. I felt really out of
control and it scared me quite a bit. This is exactly what they
mean by 'falling off the wagon'. I did resist everything humanly
possible after that moment though. I weighed myself on
Thursday morning and it seems I have lost NOTHING this week
yet. I'm a bit disappointed about this, but am now back on
track and staying positive about the weigh-in on Saturday. On
Thursday I went to Morrisons for a look around. I did my most
steps ever on Friday this week, almost 9,300.

Nine thousand three hundred steps! Who'da thunk it,
eh? It felt great to be able to just go out and walk
somewhere, like a miracle had taken place. I used to
envy people who could walk and used to know that,
deep down, it would be something I could never do. And now I was walking freely wherever I wanted and doing things I hadn't done in years. I was determined not to start taking walking and catching the bus for

granted. When you've lived without something for so
long, it is impossible to imagine having it back. To me,
it was like a fresh start. Like when you learn to ride a
bike as a kid, you want to go everywhere on that bike.
That was me with walking. I couldn't understand why
people would want to drive to the shops or get a bus
into town.

Oh, another slip up? That is good news. Don't think
that going for a walk will make it any better, because it
won't. Let's see how long it takes for the next one.

WEEK 23
35 st 10 lbs (amount lost 8 st 6 lbs)

I lost three pounds last week and I am now down to five
hundred. I'm really craving pies and pasties this week. I literally
can't stop thinking about them. I dream about the food I miss, almost to the point of thinking my duvet is pie crust and I'm in
a giant pie, eating my way out. I could easily eat my duvet if
I'm not careful.
I do feel positive and, as we move to the six-month mark, I
think my progress has been remarkable. Not blowing my own
trumpet or anything, but I mean, eight and a half stones is the
weight of another grown person! I've lost a person in weight! I
know that if I want to sustain this forever, then I need to reeducate
myself and come up with a plan for the rest of my life.
The only way that this will work in the long run is if my life
changes and I can continue on my fresh start in terms of
everything I do in my home, social and work life.
My average daily steps are now close to 5,000, which is half
what is recommended. I need to do more!

I will always be prone to weight gain because of my
addictive personality. Much like depression, it's always
going to be there, following me around and waiting for
me to slip up. Other than my life changing, I need to do
it the active way, rather than passively. I need to
change my life, not hang around waiting for it to
happen.

WEEK 24

35 st 3 lbs (amount lost 8 st 13 lbs)

Lost an amazing seven pounds last week, meaning that twenty
per cent of my start weight is now off.
On Tuesday night a narrow-minded customer said something
very insulting to me about my weight. It upset me
because I can't understand why people feel they have to do
this. Are they so insecure that they have to insult others to feel
better about their own lives?
On Wednesday I had some visitors round, but in the morning
before they came I was very depressed and low. I don't
know why and later I felt better. I did a lot of walking on
Wednesday too. I did the duck walk (not a duck in sight) in the
morning then went to Newton Heath market, Morrisons, Asda,
the antiques place and the catalogue bargain shop - loads of
walking. The duck walk is so named because there should be
some ducks around by the water. There never are. It's still
going to be the duck walk though. I'm sure one day I'll see one.

On Friday I am seeing a counsellor at the health centre; I'm
trying to sort myself out mentally too. I need to start to build
my confidence and not worry so much. I need to learn to like
myself. I am feeling quite low this week so I am looking
forward to the chat.

I always get embarrassed talking about growing up,
shaving and being a man. Especially in front of Mum


and Dad. The counsellor said this was maybe down to
something traumatic happening during adolescence
where I'd put a hold on certain feelings and I hadn't
actually fully gone through the adolescence process. I
can't think of anything or maybe I blocked it out.
Maybe being overweight meant I didn't experience
adolescence until I'd lost it all. There was never any
interest in chasing girls, playing football, driving cars
or anything else that lads growing up have an interest
in. We all know my interest by now.
When I'd been to counselling in the past, probably a
year before, to talk about my concerns, it had been a
case of getting a taxi to the health centre that was
literally just round the corner, then getting up a couple
of flights of stairs when I got there. It hadn't been
worth my while at all. Having to get a taxi somewhere
that you could probably hit by throwing a stone is not
very good for your self-esteem. If it wasn't so obvious
why I needed a taxi, I'm sure the driver would have
had a go at me for going on a journey that didn't even
require second gear.
I think it may have been the armed robbery that led
to me going to talk to the counsellor, because of the
downer that I was sent on from it. The robbery left me
shaken and I felt like a real victim for quite some time
after. I thought seeing someone and talking about it
might help me to forget about it, put it to bed and move
on. Having to walk up the stairs though was practically
impossible for me. It made me feel worse about myself,
going to see someone and not being physically able to
make it to their door.

WEEK 25
34 st 11 lbs (amount lost 9 st 5 lbs)

r
Lost six pounds last week! What's that? The weight of a cat?
Not quite as good as losing a dog's weight, but a cat is not to
be sniffed at. Especially if you have allergies.
When I weighed myself last Saturday I was delighted because
for the first time in ages I weighed less than my age. This
felt like a massive milestone for me; a personal goal achieved. I
always used to joke when I was a twelve-stone twelve year old
that I would weigh fifty stone by the age of fifty. I almost made
it there before the age of forty. That's pretty bad. I need to
keep what Dr Chris said in mind - I will never be that big again.
I am on holiday next week and I need to start to plan what I
am going to do to fill the days. I am going to try and find
something to do every day so I'm not tempted to sit at home
and eat. Duck walk: where the hell are the ducks?! If I don't
see any soon, I'll have to call it something else. They must see
me coming with a loaf of bread and hide, thinking I'm coming
to make a sandwich.

Ten things that have changed:

1.
I can walk more
2.
I can put my hands behind my back
3.
My watch is loose
4.
My shoes are too big
5.
I can clean myself a bit better
6.
I can fit in chairs
7.
My clothes feel better
8.
I wore underpants for the first time in ten years
9.
I sleep well every night
10.
I fit into the toilet at work
Seeing these changes was amazing. You know,
these things are experiences that I'd never had. I'd only
ever been able to fit into the disabled toilets at work
because the doorframes had been modified and were
wide enough for wheelchairs. I'd never been able to
find underpants big enough, my shoes were a size too
big because my feet were fat and I could actually reach
parts of my body now to clean. It was unreal. I could
never transpose that kind of feeling on to the page.

WEEK 26
34 st 4 lbs (amount lost 9 st 12 lbs)

Lost seven pounds this week. Next week it will be my official
six-month weigh-in and would be great if I was to hit the ten
stone mark for the occasion. Not to be ten stones - I mean to
have lost ten.

WEEK 27
33 st 8 lbs (amount lost 10 st 8 lbs)

The official six-month mark and I am delighted to have lost
more than ten stones. I lost ten pounds last week! Me, Charlie
Walduck, losing ten stones in six months. No one would have
believed it was possible. I should have gone to the bookies six
months ago and put a few hundred quid on the big fella. In all
seriousness though, ten stones in six months is pretty much
impossible. If I can do so well in half a year, I can do the same
in the other half.
Last week was a stressful one and this week has been too.
It was my birthday on Monday and on Tuesday my Auntie
Margaret was taken ill. It is very difficult being off work. If I'm
not constantly occupied, I'm risking turning to food. A lot is
happening this week. I can't believe it is six months since this
thing started. In some respects, it's flown over, and in others, it
has dragged out. I've seen such a dramatic change in everything
about myself and I'm muchos chuffedos about it. I've
been as low as I always used to be and have come out of it
each time unscathed. There's been one or two times where
I've overeaten that I'm not happy about, but what can you do?
At least I didn't lose the plot completely and ruin all the progress I'd made.
It turns out that blueberries are the new 'super food'. Dr
Chris recommended them and I bought some at Morrisons.
Can't say I liked them that much. They taste much better when
surrounded by muffin. A mate of mine said blueberries are 'a
bit pointless' as they don't taste of anything, and I'm beginning
to believe her. I estimate that I have walked nearly nine miles
this week. It's like being back in the Sunday Club!

I used to hear people complaining about how difficult it
is to lose a few pounds. There'd always be someone
somewhere who would come out with a ridiculously
long sigh, followed by 'I'm depressed' or 'I'm fat.' I used
to cringe. It was like they'd be gloating or were
probably too dumb to realise they were saying it in
front of me. It was generally for attention that people
would say that, fishing for compliments and wanting
someone to say 'You're not fat, you're gorgeous.' I'd just
lost nearly eleven stones by putting my mind to it, not
eating too much, eating less fat and walking. That's all.
It was no big million-dollar secret. It would be great if
people thought before opening their mouths, but some
people can't. I really hate the 'I'm depressed' line. You
just don't say it if you are depressed or if you've
experienced any kind of mental illness. I don't know ...
some people, eh?

Half-time break



If someone was to pass me in the street at this
point, which they did, they'd still stare at me.
Which they also did. At thirty-three stone, I was
still a big bloke and still struggled to do things.
A six-month success was only part of the journey. I
mean, it was still front-page news that I could walk
anywhere and do things because most activities were
physically taxing for me.

One of the biggest changes I made eating-wise was
breakfast. Before starting my weight loss plan, I either
didn't eat breakfast because I didn't have time, or I ate
a few breakfasts in one go. There was never a happy
medium. And not having time is just like saying you
don't have time to walk to the shops ... all you need to
do is schedule an extra twenty minutes or so and it will
set you up for the day.
If you're serious about losing weight or just wanting
to be healthy, the best way to start is by having a good
breakfast. Any time I have skipped brekkie I wanted
mid- or late-morning snacks, and that's where the big
problem is. A balanced breakfast can also provide the
right vitamins and minerals to kick start your
metabolism and make you feel awake and alert and
ready for your day. I know that sounds like something
from a healthy eating leaflet, but it's true. Those times
when I just got ready and went to work left me
starving all day and I was also a lot slower and took
forever to wake up properly. We live in busy times
where we need everything in an instant and we live at
a fast pace. If we started to think more about the fuel
we need to do this, we wouldn't skip meals and
wouldn't need daily fixes of energy drinks and fast
food. I'm sure there are many of you out there who can
relate to what I've just said, and really, all this is about
is common sense and looking after yourself properly something
we're all capable of doing.
Breakfast is a meal; that's something we tend to
overlook too. It's like we feel guilty for having something
substantial on a morning, going for something
substandard instead. I mean, is a slice of toast going to
fill you up and provide the right energy to keep you
going until lunchtime? Would you have a piece of toast
for dinner? I think the sooner we realise that breakfast
is the most important meal of the day then the sooner
we'll be able to live with having more than two mouthfuls
of food without feeling ashamed.
It's also common sense that if you have a big breakfast
you have the whole day to burn it off. A good friend
of mine once told me that she struggled to lose weight
and that she never ate, but simply snacked during the
day. When I suggested she wrote down everything that
she ate, she was amazed by how much she actually
consumed. I told her she needed structure and every
structure needs a foundation and our food foundation is

breakfast.
Never forget that you have a choice of what to eat.

It isn't just bird seed for breakfast and rabbit food for
lunch, you know, and it is worth considering what is
out there and doing a bit of research ahead of devising
a plan. There are loads of choices when it comes to
breakfast and, like with everything else, we are faced
with a series of healthy or unhealthy choices to make:
will I lose weight by having cereal or wholemeal toast
rather than a fry-up? Is a full pot of coffee with two
sugars in each cupful good for me? Is it wise to lean
over the bed and start eating the takeaway from the
floor first thing in the morning? Hopefully, these are
all common-sense answers.
Look out for wholegrain cereal as it is widely
publicised that it is good for the heart, and skimmed
and semi-skimmed milk will help you reduce the
calories. A good serving of milk each day on your cereal
will give you much of your daily calcium requirement
as well -- it's a win--win situation. As an alternative to
milk, I sometimes use yoghurt or add fruit whether
with milk or with yoghurt. Bananas are great with
cereal and will go towards your five-a-day fruit intake,
as well as containing three natural sugars: sucrose,
fructose and glucose, great sources of energy.
Toast can be wholemeal bread with low-fat spread
rather than white with lashings of butter; breakfast on
the go can become a muesli bar (look out for low-calorie
ones) rather than a McKentucky King fast food
solution or greasy sarnie from a van. If you are accustomed
to the Great British Fry-up, try toning it down a bit and replace the bacon for turkey rashers, sausages
with Quorn ones and boil, scramble or poach your eggs.
Don't fry anything: use the grill instead, it's much
healthier. Eggs are packed with a range of nutrients
deluding protein, essential vitamins A, D, E, and B
groups as well as minerals iron, phosphorus and zinc.
They're relatively low in saturated fat, containing
around eighty calories each, so they are eggstremely
good for you. And they are not eggspensive (I'll stop
now). In fact, if you've got a hen, they are completely

free.
Beans are cheap as chips! Maybe the wrong simile
to use there but you can get cheapo tins of beans in
most supermarkets for less than ten pence these days
and you can do loads with them. They can be used as
part of breakfast, lunch, dinner - whatever - and even
the skins are full of nutrients. Just watch out for the
salt and sugar levels in them; this will be listed on any
tin and most places do a healthy option version these
days. They are exactly what you have bean waiting for,
and no kitchen cupboard should be without a load of

tins.
Oats are oatso very good for us and have been
around since the beginning of time. They contain
soluble fibre that helps to lower cholesterol levels and
keep you feeling full for a long time afterwards. Good
old-fashioned oatmeal porridge will provide you with
an excellent slow-releasing carbohydrate. This is
another versatile one and is worth experimenting with
by adding to it'- chopped almonds for your good fat and
protein, and sliced sultanas can be used to sweeten it.
Or you can soak them in soya milk overnight, mix in
sunflower seeds, add dried fruit and some more soya

milk to taste.
In short, oats rule, but it is also well documented
that we don't seem to bother with them that much.
Recently, it's been said that oats can'- help hangovers,
help you stop smoking, fight infection, heal the skin,
fight heart disease, slowly reduce diabetes risk, beat
depression, prevent constipation, cut childhood obesity,
boost energy, fight osteoporosis, help dieting, reduce

blood pressure, help longer life, fight cancer, be good
during pregnancy and improve your sex life. I'm not
sure I can testify to all of them, but surely you oat it to
yourself to give it a go. That kilt-wearing shot-putter
on the cover of the box didn't get in the shape he did by
necking fry-ups every morning, did he?
Of course, milk goes hand in hand with porridge
and oats and is a great source of protein, vitamins and
calcium. When I first started with my weight loss plan
I really did have to re-educate myself. As I say, you
cannot jump into something like that without doing
some background research, and finding out facts about
food was quite refreshing. As a child, we were always
told that the cow juice was good for us and encouraged
to drink it at school to go towards our recommended
daily calcium intake, but it was only when I looked a
little bit further that I found out all the positives. The
one we're always told is that calcium is good for bones
and teeth, but it also helps to regulate muscle
contraction so is good for your heart and is said to help
reduce high blood pressure and protect against some
cancers. You also get calcium from green leafy
vegetables such as broccoli, turnip greens, Chinese
cabbage, cauliflower and salmon, tofu, almonds, Brazil
nuts and dried beans.
A glass of skimmed milk measuring around 200
millilitres or so contains approximately 73 calories
compared to full-fat milk at around 128 calories, but
the amount of calcium provided is more or less the
same.

As I've already said, one of the worries for me was that
I'd get bored easily of the same food each and every
day. In what seemed like no time at all, my mind was
Wandering and, when that happened, I knew I was in
danger of eyeing up other foods. It's the same with
anything once boredom sets in, so you need to spice
things up a bit. Try warm milk on cereal in the winter,
try a new variety of cereal when you start to wake up
on a morning wishing you had something else to eat,
try adding some exciting extras to your porridge. And
some cereals contain essential Omega 3 fish oil, which
means they are much better for you than a bacon and
fried egg butty on a morning (mmm ... with tomato
sauce). Or if you can be bothered with picking all the
bones out and can put up with the after-smell in the
kitchen, you could go to work on a kipper. Just make
sure you keep a tight hold of it.
Healthy eating is not about punishing yourself, it's
about reconditioning and finding out what you like.
Don't eat the wrong foods at the wrong time and
wonder why you're not losing weight. Although I
always say it is a simple plan, you still have to go about
it the right way and there's still a certain 'science'
about it. The big thing for me was getting myself up
out my chair and starting to walk. That was my big
step, but my first smaller step was to start by having a
balanced breakfast, which in turn was part of a
planned weight loss programme.
You just need to type 'breakfast' into t'internet to
see the amount of facts it brings up, such as 'Research
has shown that a child of twelve that skips breakfast in
the morning has the mental agility of a seventy year
old in the classroom.'
When you see facts like that, it makes breakfast all
the more important. Without a proper start, kids'
ability to learn at school is limited and as adults we're
not functioning to the best of our abilities either. We
supposedly burn fewer calories through the day if we
skip breakfast regularly, and regular breakfasters are
less likely to suffer colds, flu and other respiratory
tract illnesses than daily dodgers are. Presumably, this
is because breakfast boosts your immune system. And
by eating breakfast regularly, you are less likely to be
emotionally distressed, depressed and to die by suicide,
and you are four times as likely to win the Lottery and
marry a supermodel.*
All you need to do is make the time. It is a very
minor change that can have a major impact. The
ingredients are not mega-expensive and the benefits
are amazing. The one big temptation I had was not too
long ago when listening to Radcliffe and Maconie on
the radio. A bloke phoned in with a claim that he'd
invented a breakfast pie. Mark and Stu were as
stunned, as I was. A breakfast pie? This was like the
Holy Grail of blokishness! I defy anyone who heard
that broadcast not to imagine the biggest, most
unhealthy fry-up packed into pastry, coming out the
oven golden brown. Sorry to have put that in your
mind, but breakfast pie! That is a genius idea. If
there's ever a low-fat one, I want it.

Lunch, just like everything else in my life, also lacked
structure. If I could have gotten away with it, my
entire day would have been lunchtime. There was no
regularity, no set time ... nothing. And, when I did eat,
there was no moderation. As a child there was structure,
but as I started to grow up (and out) that structure
disappeared slowly but surely.
My new rules meant that I ate at the same time,
had quite a grasp on controlling my portions and ate
food with a certain fat content. I'll not lie - cutting
down was an absolute nightmare. And like any addict,
I can and likely will fall off the wagon at any point in
my life. It's something that I'm prepared for. Off days
are allowed as long as they don't overtake and your life
becomes one long one.
If you forget to make your own lunch to take to
work, there's always the temptation of buying the
wrong food. We look for something easy and something
where we don't have to think, and this is where fast
food 'restaurants' cash in. Avoid going anywhere where
they want to supersize you, as that's what you'll
become, and avoid eating pre-packed sandwiches all
the time. I used to think that the best thing to put into
a sandwich was your teeth, but even I can be wrong

sometimes.
Avoid the ones with loads of dressing because there
is no such thing as low-fat dressing. Some products
claim to be 'light' or 'diet', but those words have no
legal definition. Try sandwiches made with low-fat
meats and salads, try wholemeal bread or wraps or
wholemeal pitta bread. There was a TV documentary
on where many high-street chains were slated for their
food's salt content. I'm not saying that they were right
or that it was balanced in any way, but one chain came
out on top and, if any, that would be the one I'd buy
from. Then again, if you take the time to make your
own and consider the ingredients in advance, you'll be
saving a lot of money too.
It's quite common to think salad as soon as you
think diet. If that's you, avoid those with too much
dressing. Many supermarket salad bowls are laced
with calories and a high amount of fat. For instance, a
300-gram bowl of shop's-own coleslaw contains around
about 750 calories.
One of the easiest things to do if you are sat at a

desk working all day is to snack. Especially if your job
is as boring as some of the jobs my friends have. And
snacks are generally not good for you, unless you plan
them with fruit, fruit salad, dried fruit or maybe a few
nuts rather than a chocolate bar or something like
Maltesers that you'd have one of every few minutes.
Don't be deceived into thinking that snacks are OK
simply because they are advertised as being lower in
fat or calories. In my experience there is no such thing
as a low-fat biscuit. And don't forget vegetables can be
turned into a snack too. It doesn't take long to turn a
carrot into carrot sticks. It costs a couple of pence and
you can crunch away all day. Try the same with celery.
And pea pods, when in season, are the best snack in
the world ... you can even pretend they are miniature
green Maltesers, if that helps. Just don't go dipping
them in chocolate.
A friend of mine always eats his sandwiches at his
desk half an hour before his official lunchtime. Then,
when lunchtime hits, he's out on a walk for the best
part of an hour and gets back to the office for some
fruit and water before his break is over. A good thing
with working in offices these days is that they always
have water coolers. If your place of work has one, use it
to get your daily intake. Fill a water bottle up before
you leave and drink on your way home. Some call
centres even supply free fruit because they know the
positive impact on productivity.

Dinner, or tea if you're not as refined as me, is often
the main meal of the day and, for many of us, it
normally signals the end of a working day and a time
to relax, unwind and catch up with family.

At forty-four stone it was difficult for me to stand in
a kitchen and prepare and cook a meal. And without
going for the sympathy vote, living alone meant that no
one else would offer to do it for me. My dinner was
usually a variety of unhealthy options from the shops
near the bingo hall or an unhealthy option from the
diner there. Either way, it would almost always include
loads of crisps and a few cakes. I'd be sat down all the
time at work and would ask people to fetch food for me
if they were going to the shops or ask them to bring a
burger or fishcake from the diner for me to snack on. It
was textbook-style unhealthy living, and, of course,
rounded off by junk food from the garage on the way
home before a takeaway was delivered. When you can't
cook, the easiest option is to have it delivered. In my
case, though, I was having enough food for four people
delivered.
When cooking from scratch, I try to go for low-fat
meats. Turkey and chicken are both low in fat and can
make a large number of meals. Quorn (the meat
alternative) is also very versatile and can be used in a
variety of meals. It is also very filling and surprisingly
tasty. There are some veggie products that literally do
look and taste like cardboard, but it isn't my place to go
bad-mouthing them in print. Diets are not about eating
something you can't stand even if it is better for you.
Look around, see what's out there. Cut any visible fat
from meats and boil or bake potatoes rather than
having chips or roasting them. I tend to put jacket
potatoes in the microwave first, then crisp them up in a
pre-heated oven. There's always the temptation to
whack a load of butter in, so go for low-fat spread or
maybe baked beans to add something moist to the
plate. Fish and vegetables with jacket potato is
delicious too. I try to have vegetables with everything
and always have water on the table and drink plenty of
it.

On With the Show: Charlie's Weight
Loss Diary, part deux. We rejoin
Slimmer Charlie as he gets to:

WEEK 28

33 st 3 lbs (amount lost 10 st 13 lbs)

I went to Oldham Hospital on Monday for blood tests and
chest X-rays. It was as bad as I imagined and now all I have to
do is worry about getting the results.
I also went to Barrow this week and found it much easier
than before and I'm sure I will be able to do it again soon.
Something like this, just the thought of having to go anywhere,
used to grip me with fear. Now it's an adventure. I like getting
on trains and buses to go places and am so glad that I don't
have to get a taxi and take my tea towel with me. It was a bit
early in my progress to be going to Barrow but I wanted to visit my Auntie Margaret in hospital. She was so pleased to see me and it was nice to see her. She didn't look well and I'm hoping she will be better soon. It's never nice visiting anyone in
hospital, but you always have to remember it brightens their day up if you do.
I did loads of steps again this week (my average is now
6,861 a day) and I'm moving about much better this week. I
walked to the barbers for a haircut and it was hard work
walking around ... and it was shut. Typical!
I'm having an ECG next Monday and then on Wednesday I
have an appointment with the doctor. I don't know how much
more of this kind of fun I can endure. I'm not really a big fan of
anything medical, even Casualty on a Saturday night does my

head in.
I've done almost nine miles again this week. Not bad at all.

WEEK 29
33 st 1 lb (amount lost 11 st 1 lb)

Only lost two pounds this week so I was a little bit disappointed,
but all weight loss is something and I need to keep
that in mind.
Blood tests: the doctor said all my tests were normal apart
from two of them. The ALT [a test that detects liver injuries
and disorders} was up, but Dr Chris said not to worry about
this as it was likely due to having a 'fatty liver'. Also BSR [which
indicates inflammation somewhere in the body, likely due to
wear and tear on the jointsl was up.
Quorn: the advertising campaign for it is to 'Try it - you
might be surprised/ and I must admit I was surprised. It
mustn't have taken long for them to come up with the strap
line for it; I could have given them that one for the price of one
of their cottage pies. It was really good and I will definitely be
having it again. Very nice indeed. Only 4.2g of fat for the whole
thing and only 174 calories. The only problem: not enough in
this 300-gram pack for me.

Dr Chris wrote to my doctor to ask if he'd send me for
medical tests. I later found out that he thought I'd have
all sorts wrong with me, such as diabetes. Then there
was the problem with my legs; I was terrified that I
was going to lose them. They stunk so badly of ... well,
of death. It was like they were dying from the abuse
they'd endured and if I went for any tests I knew this
would be discovered. All my anxieties from my self
diagnosis resurfaced again. I reluctantly agreed to
tests as long as Dr Chris agreed to accompany me.
When the day came, Dr Chris couldn't make it, so I
had to go to Oldham Hospital on edge and on my own.
When I got there the lift wasn't working and I had to
be on the third floor. It was a miracle that I made it
alive, to tell the truth. Walking was bad enough, but
going up flights of stairs really took its toll on me. If I
didn't have a heart problem previously, I was certain
I'd have one after getting to the top. Medical tests were
supposed to assess your health, not add to your health
problems.
As an added poke in the eye when I finally made it,
I was too heavy to get on to the table for a full X-ray.
They managed to X-ray some of my joints, including
my knees, and I was told I had arthritis in them. A
blood test turned out to be fine, blood pressure fine,
cholesterol fine and I didn't have diabetes. However,
my liver appeared to be functioning abnormally and I
had to take a bucket away with me to wee in for
twenty-four hours (not non-stop, don't be silly). Actually,
when they said I had to urinate in the container
for twenty-four hours I did think they meant non-stop
at first and couldn't help but have a chuckle as my
mistake dawned on me. I'm sure they were used to the
reaction. I had to tip some of it out in the end. I could
have easily filled another, grabbing an old KFC bucket
out the bin and sticking a bit of cling film over the top:
'Here you go, doctor. Not at all. Don't mention it.'
It seemed I waited for ages to get the results back.
Convinced it was going to be cancer, I phoned Mum to
blurt out all my anxieties again.
"It must be cancer,' I said. I'm losing weight and
everything.'
'Don't be so stupid, son. The reason why you're
losing weight because you're on a diet,' she replied.
She had a point there.
Eventually, the results came in and showed I had
Gilbert's Syndrome. I've no idea who Gilbert is, but his
syndrome cannot be treated. Thankfully it isn't life
threatening.
When Dr Chris saw the results, he said 'Charlie, I
don't understand it. You have none of the diseases that
are associated with obesity. It doesn't make sense.'
Other than a bit of wear and tear on my knees and a
common liver complaint, I was medical science fiction
and very relieved about it. If my weight had also been
down to drinking or if I'd been a smoker, then I
certainly would have had a load of health problems.
The embarrassment of taking my clothes off in front
of someone, feeling like the Elephant Man and the
indignity of being examined were the reasons behind
never wanting to seek medical advice in the past.
Being there in Oldham was because I had to. I'd lived
in fear of surgery for such a long time and knew that if
I did need any kind surgical procedure then I may as
well wave goodbye because I wouldn't survive it. I was
too heavy to come out the other side cured: people my
size don't. I didn't want to die having a routine operation,
and you never know when you're going to need
one of those. Any stomach pains I had, and I endured a
lot, I immediately thought it would be appendicitis and
I knew I wouldn't pull through if that was the case. I
always just took the blokey 'It'll be gone in a week'
approach to any ailment.
When I discussed my concerns with Dr Chris, I
mentioned the time I'd been put under general
anaesthetic when I dislocated my shoulder. He told me
it could have been fatal. Back then I probably weighed
around thirty stones and the hospital should have
known the danger. I've fallen over in the street since
then and dislocated it again. I fell in Bolton (why is it
always Bolton?) where I had five people trying to pick
me up. A shopkeeper brought a chair out and it took
forever to get to my feet. Talk about embarrassing. I
was so angry with myself in situations like that. The
anger was that I'd let myself get so big that I couldn't
even do a simple thing like get up off the floor - so
heavy that I couldn't lift my own weight. I went to the
hospital after that fall and the nurse said 'You know,
you're going to have to lose some weight, Charlie.'
If there was ever a call for a 'No shit, Sherlock'
reply, that was it, but I just told her I was well aware
of that fact. The thing was, at the time it happened, I
actually had been losing weight.

WEEK 30

32 st 10 lbs (amount lost 11 st 6 lbs)

I lost five pounds last week, really happy with this. That's 160
pounds lost in 29 weeks, so it's an average of over 5 pounds a
week. Morrisons have brought a new range out called Eat
Smart, they are healthy option ready meals with less than 3
per cent fat and around about 300 calories per meal. I tried the
curry and rice and it wasn't too shabby (seven out of ten).
When I was in Morrisons on Monday I bought pizza for
Beryl for her tea as I always get her something for tea, and one
of the women who works there said, 'You can't have that!' I
explained it wasn't for me, but I don't think she believed me.
Not the best saleswoman in the world, eh?
On Friday I did a massive 11,234 steps, which is fantastic. I
started by walking to Morrisons, then caught a bus to
Manchester and did some shopping. And while shopping I
bought some socks and shoes ... Me, in socks! And what's
more is that the shoes are proper lace-up ones, not slip-ons. I
couldn't even reach my own feet for years and now I'm buying
footwear. It's unreal. From there I got the bus to Belle Vue and
walked into work. I am so proud of myself. Over ten and a half
miles walked this week.

It was great actually going to a supermarket and being
able to walk around. Yes, I'd still get the odd dodgy
look (and comment from the staff even), but it didn't put me off. I'd always read the food labels and choose
foods with less than three per cent in fat; three grams
per one hundred.
A mistake to make is going shopping without a list.
All you do then is impulse buy and that is not good at
all. If you're anything like me, you'll just walk aimlessly
up and down the aisles and pick up whatever
catches your eye, no method, no reason, no structure. If
you've planned your meals in advance, you'll know
what you need and you need to stick to the list. Oh,
and do not go shopping when you are hungry.
Sometimes it is best not to take a trolley because
you resist the urge of filling it unnecessarily. If you
shop day by day, you can always get more walking in
while you do it. Try getting one piece of fruit or veg you
haven't had before each week, too.

WEEK 31
32 st 1 lb (amount lost 12 st 1 lb)
never tire of - the scores on the doors. I really can't believe it. I
thought, and I know Dr Chris did too, that I would have slowed
down or even stagnated by now, but it's still happening for me.
Let's not tempt fate.
It has been a fairly sad week this week as my Auntie died
on Tuesday. The funeral is on Friday and I am going to Barrowin-Furness
for that. I loved my Auntie Margaret and she was
always kind to me. I know she would want me to do this and I
am more determined now than ever. It has been very stressful
and exhausting ... maybe one of the hardest weeks so far on
this thing.
On Thursday I went to see the doctor with regard to the
test results. Everything is OK apart from my BSR [Blood
Sedimentation Rate] and my liver function tests. I will be
seeing a consultant, but the doctor thinks there is nothing to
worry about and it is just a formality. The ECG was fine and
normal. X-rays: fine apart from a bit of wear and tear in my left
knee, which will get better with more weight loss.

Auntie Margaret had been in hospital after a blood
transfusion where she was given the wrong blood type.
It was one of those things that didn't have to happen
and it was such a tragic waste. It was sad and it hit
everyone hard. She was ace, my Auntie Margaret. She
had such a tremendous sense of fun, just completely off
the wall, and she was very kind. Some days, she'd
watch the weather forecast on TV and if it was raining
in Scotland she wouldn't leave the house because of it.
I got on really well with her because I think we shared
the same sense of humour, always wanting to find a
laugh in anything.

WEEK 32
31 st 11 lbs (amount lost 12 st 5 lbs)






Another nine pou
146
pounds. This is one aspect of dieting that I'll
Lost four pounds last week.
On Wednesday this week I decided to treat myself ... not
with food but a trip out to Blackpool on the train. It was a
fantastic day and it was also hard work. I went with Gary and
Marie, regulars and good friends from work, and we had a
great time. I don't think I've ever gone to Blackpool and not
enjoyed myself, it's one of those places that has that effect on
me. The rides, the lights, the shops, the scale of the place ...
like Blackpool was built around the idea of having fun. We
played bingo and won a couple of times and walked along the
sea front. The step count was over 15,000 after hoofing it up
and down the promenades and beach and I think it will be a
while before I hit that mark again.
On Thursday I felt stiff and sore but it was well worth it.
Marie suffers from anxiety really badly and she was panicking
sometimes and so was I, so Gary had to put up with the both
of us. We went to see a fortune teller just for fun and she said I
had an exciting year ahead and that I would have twelve
children. Not sure what her day job is, but she shouldn't hand

her notice in.
My average steps now are 7,500 and it won't be long
before I get myself towards the magical 10,000 spot.

WEEK 33
31 st 4 lbs (amount lost 12 st 12 lbs)

m
Seven pounds lost last week! Waist down to sixty inches. I'
the incredible shrinking man!

WEEK 34
31 st 1 lb (amount lost 13 st 1 lb)
customers are commenting about the weight loss. I am feeling
really good and my steps are now an average 8,500.

WEEK 35
30 st 8 lbs (amount lost 13 st 8 lbs)

Another seven pounds off last week, and:
1.	Caught a bus home at night
2.	Went to Barrow to see Mum and Dad
3.	Visited my sister in Ulverston
4.	Managed to get a seatbelt on in Dad's car
5.	Walked to and from station to Mum and Dad's house

WEEK 36
30 st 9 lbs (amount lost 13 st 7 lbs)

I put a pound on and walked almost thirteen miles.

Let's not dwell on it. One lousy pound, for goodness'
sake.

WEEK 37
29 st 13 lbs (amount lost 14 st 3 lbs)

I am back on track with a loss of ten pounds. I also did 16,000
steps in one day last week and my average steps were over
10,000. Dr Chris was as relieved as I was.

WEEK 38
29 st 9 lbs (amount lost 14 st 7 lbs)

Four pounds ... ker-ching\






Lost just three pounds in the last week. At work loads of

WEEK 39
29 st 3 lbs (amount lost 14 st 13 lbs)
Six pounds. Nice one.
WEEK 40
28 st 11 lbs (amount lost 15 st 5 lbs)

Another six pounds. Had a really busy week this week. I went
to a bingo day out with the customers on Sunday, which was
really nice and had a few nice comments from people who had
noticed that I have lost some weight. It was a lovely day, but I
was sad when it was over. On Tuesday I went to Morecambe
and met up with my mum and dad and we took some pictures
at the Eric Morecambe statue and had a nice day walking
around the shops. On Wednesday I had to go the doctor and
got some good news as the doctor was really pleased with my
progress. On Thursday Dr Chris took me down to Granada TV
as he was on a TV show and I got to see behind the scenes.

WEEK 41
28 st 5 lbs (amount lost 15 st 11 lbs)

Six pounds again.
Dr Chris wrote to me: 'I just want you to think about all that
weight you've lost. All that fat hasn't been cut out of your body
- it's been burnt off as fuel for your energy needs, purely as a
result of your increased exercise/exertion. So it is vital that you
concentrate on doing more exercise or the same exercise done
at a quicker pace. What another brilliant week!
'As you say you have now lost 15 stones 11 pounds and you
are certainly on target for losing 16 stones by Christmas. So for
goodness' sake keep walking as much as you can in the next
fortnight, so that you can walk off that 3 pounds, just to be
able to boast that you have certainly lost 16 stones before
Christmas. You must work, or walk, towards another 3 pounds'
weight loss.
'Your next target is the 12-month target, which is only 12
weeks away, but I have to be honest that your target of losing
another 59 pounds, to hit the 20-stone mark by then, is pretty
extreme - it's an average of 5 pounds every single week! But at
least give it a go!'

WEEK 42

28 st 4 lbs (amount lost 15 st 12 lbs)

I only lost one pound last week so I am a little disappointed
with that, but a pound is a pound so it's better than nothing. It
could have been worse - I might have gained. Mum and Dad
came for two days and we went to the Trafford Centre and
also went to see a show. It was good. The seats in the theatre
were really tight, but I'm still a very big guy and am just trying
to take it one day at a time. It will soon be Christmas and that
is going to be a very big test. Average steps now are almost
15,000 a day.

WEEK 43

27 st 9 lbs (amount lost 16 st 8 lbs)

Nine pounds lost in the last week. Get in! I am so happy about
this. I have another busy week this week so I am hoping and
praying for more of the same.
I have now lost an amazing 231 pounds (462 blocks of
butter!). It was the Christmas party for the customers this
week and I was Santa. I went with Beryl from work for a
Christmas meal out and it was great to forget the diet for a bit
and just enjoy being out without feeling everyone was
watching what I was eating, and be relaxed.
We also had a staff night out at Belle Vue dog track
and there was a quiz night on too. There was a big girl
there called Tracey, from Liverpool. I said hello to her
and then my friend Shaun came out with a dodgy
comment when her back was turned.
'She'll not be on the quiz team; she'll only be here
for the free buffet.'
I was stunned. That was the kind of comment I'd
always feared, the reason why I'd stay at home rather
than eat in company.
'Shaun,' I said. 'That's not nice at all. Just 'cos she's
a big girl, doesn't mean she deserves that.'
I turned back to her, 'All set for tonight then,

Tracey?'
'Nah. I'm only here for the free buffet,' came her

reply.
You could have knocked me down with a feather.
What a laugh we had, but at the comment, not at her
expense. Good on her to say it.

WEEK 44
27 st 7 lbs (amount lost 16 st 10 lbs)

My weigh-in was on Christmas Day. I probably overate today
but I avoided cakes, sweets, pastry, bread, fried food and other
festive favourites. I originally intended to have a feast day, but
one is never enough and I was scared what it would lead to. I
lost two pounds in the last week, so I am pleased with this. I
helped out today at the Salvation Army in Failsworth. I've
always wanted to do this and it was very rewarding.
I found an old pair of jeans in the cupboard, size fifty-four
inches, and I managed to get them on. They were a bit tight,
but I can say I had skinny jeans long before any of the Emo kids

did.

Christmas past: could hardly move; just sat down and ate and
ate and ate and ate, my house a mess, my life a mess.
Christmas present: enjoyed the build-up, the shopping and
doing all the stuff normal people do. It was a bit lonely and
quiet, but this year is a period of transition for me and next
year will be better.
Christmas future: hopefully much happier with family and
friends, all enjoying Christmas and everything that comes with
it - and doing a proper job that will give me time off!

WEEK 45
26 st 13 lbs (amount lost 17 st 3 lbs)

Eight pounds lost in Christmas week. How often does that
happen?

WEEK 46
26 st 5 lbs (amount lost 17 st 11 lbs)
There goes another eight...
WEEK 47
26 st 2 lbs (amount lost 18 st)

Three pounds in the last week - not exactly up to Walduck
standards, but I have now lost an incredible eighteen stones
and I can hardly believe it. I'm keen to lose twenty stones by
the time I have done a full year, so I have six weeks to lose
twenty-eight pounds.

WEEK 48
25 st 10 lbs (amount lost 18 st 6 lbs)
Another six pounds down. If I wasn't living through it and
seeing it happen, I'd think it was a lie.

WEEK 49
25 st 7 lbs (amount lost 18 st 9 lbs)
Three pounds this time.
WEEK 50
25 st 7 lbs (amount lost 18 st 9 lbs)

I didn't have a weigh-in this week as I was at Jackie's wedding.
It was nice seeing all the family, including Auntie Doreen and
Philip (my cousin) and Steve and all his family too - seemed
like ages since I'd seen him. I felt really good and took loads of
pictures. My face looks bad; i have a lot of spots at the
moment and feeling very conscious about this, but I am very
much a 'work in progress'. I just need to concentrate on the
future.

WEEK 51
24 st 11 lbs (amount lost 19 st 5 lbs)

I have started to go swimming now and on Wednesday I
managed to swim seventy lengths. I did feel very embarrassed
when I first went to the pool but once you are in nobody can

see.
Dr Chris sent me a great e-mail: 'What great news, that
you've now lost 19 stones 5 pounds. Now the target you have
to get in the next two weeks is a weight loss of another 9
pounds, which means you will achieve your own target of
losing 20 stones in your first year.'

WEEK 52
24 st 3 lbs (amount lost 19 st 13 lbs)

At the end of this week I will have done a whole year. Last
week I managed to lose eight pounds and so I am just one
pound away from losing twenty stones in a year.

One year ago, I could hardly walk. I was spending £100
a week on taxis and £100 a week on takeaways. Things
have certainly changed in the last year and I now have
some wishes to add to my list:
1.	Learn to drive
2.	Go abroad
3.	Find a new job
4.	Go to the football again
5.	Get myself some kind of social life

WEEK 53

23 st 13 lbs (amount lost 20 st 3 lbs)

It's the one-year anniversary of the start my weight loss plan
today. I weighed myself this morning and I'm pleased to say
that I have lost four pounds in the last week, making a grand
total of twenty stones and three pounds in the last year. My
weight is now twenty-three stone and thirteen pounds. As a
surprise for losing so much weight, all the production team
took me to see Barrow AFC play Stafford Rangers. It was
wonderful and we had a great day. Even though Barrow didn't
win.
Everyone was coming up to Dr Chris at the game and asking
him for his autograph.
'What you doing here?' someone asked.
"I'm a Barrow fan,' said Dr Chris.
I felt so very proud.

We went to a restaurant for a nice healthy meal and
some great conversation. All of which was condensed to
a minute or so of screen time. After that evening it was
over, it was a wrap. The entire process was shot and in
the can and it was back to normality, reality and the
comedown that would follow.
I went home and, as you probably have guessed,
started crying immediately. I couldn't believe it was all
over.

Back to life, back to reality, the song goes.
And that's how I felt. I was deflated, a bit
miserable ... it was a huge comedown. It had
all ended. A year of being on top of the
world, of seeing all that weight come off, and now
what? Back to sitting in front of the TV?
The following week I only managed to lose two
pounds and felt devastated by it. If ever there was a
time for a shoulder to cry on, it was now.
I turned to Dr Chris and he wrote the following
letter to me:
'First of all, I thoroughly enjoyed the match at
Barrow. It wasn't such a bad result, 2-2, and, although
it's only a small ground, the enthusiasm of the home
crowd was very impressive. Isn't it great to see such
commitment from the supporters who have obviously
been through "thick and thin" with their local club?
'So, you only lost 2 lbs last week - that's great, but
unfortunately you've set yourself such high standards
that you become disappointed with what is regarded as
a good weight loss. Even if you lost only 2 lbs every
week for the next 52 weeks, you'd end up losing
another 7.5 stones! Everyone going on to a weight loss
Programme is told that, at best, they should expect no
more than a 1-2 lbs weight loss every week. Your
problem is that the "Charlie Walduck Diet" has so far
produced results far in excess of that. You've become
your own severe taskmaster, expecting too much, so
take heart, you are doing fabulously well.'
It was nice to hear these words and it spurred me
on. Dr Chris had been a GP for over forty years when
he read the letter Lucy sent in. He'd seen common
colds, kids getting peanuts stuck up their noses and
hands superglued to broken plates, but he'd never seen
anyone lose thirty stones. At the time we started, I just
assumed they'd read Lucy's letter and gave it a yay or
nay, though that was far from the case.
Firstly, a meeting was held at This Morning and
attended by all the top brass. Dr Chris advised that
extreme weight problems are always difficult and he
said they should find out a bit more about me. From
there, he said he'd assess me and, if OK, they'd give it
a try. If I'd known all this was going on in the background,
I'd have been even more terrified. It's quite a
daunting feeling to have TV producers and experts
discussing you in meetings. It wasn't just about 'Can
he lose weight?'
Knowing my story wasn't being broadcast straight
away and the fact that I might not achieve the goal
limited their responsibility. If it all went pie-shaped,
then it was an experiment that didn't work and they
weren't obliged to screen it. If that happened, then no
one would have known anything about it other than us
who'd filmed it and the odd person who'd heard about
it. The only story would have been another failed
attempt at losing weight because I lacked the will"
power to follow it through.
Dr Chris wouldn't have agreed to me doing it unless
he thought there was a slight chance. We'd spoken on

the phone and he knew I was of sound mind and raring
to go. They'd have massive reservations, of course I
knew that. They'd have discussed me and my mental
health, wondering how someone could get to where I
was and how it had impacted on my state of mind, the
way I functioned as a person ... everything, really. I
could have been an absolute maniac for all they knew,
getting to that size by roaming the countryside on a
night eating cows and sheep. Who knows?
Another factor is production costs. It isn't cheap to
send a camera crew from sunny London up to rainy
Manchester to film something if there is no intention of
it going on air. So it must have been a reasonable
proposition, even if they knew it was a big challenge.
Dr Chris also living in Manchester was another
swaying factor for them. It was a great coincidence for
us, but if we'd lived in different parts of the country I
doubt it would have gone ahead because of the contact
and support I needed. It would have been a logistical
nightmare because Dr Chris used to come over to see
me on his day off and there's no way I could have
expected him to do that if I'd lived anywhere outside of
the same city. At my weight when we started, there
was no way I could have travelled anywhere to meet
him.
I suppose they also had an ethical dilemma to think
about. For all I knew, people may even have been
inclined to complain to the show or the regulatory
bodies claiming that I'd been exploited. Again, this was
why they needed to know that I was aware of what I
was doing and understood all that was about to
happen.
Dr Chris is always keen to point out that he didn't
feel pressured by the process. The process was all down
to me: the pressure, the hard work, commitment.
Everything that happened happened because I did it.
I'm certainly not bragging by saying that, what I mean
is I needed people like him behind me for support. Just
knowing he was there if and when I needed him was
enough to keep me motivated; knowing he was on my
side and was only a phone call or short journey away
filled me with confidence. His son is an Olympic
athlete, so he's seen firsthand what it is like for
someone to commit to exercise. He's watched his son
gobble down 6,000 calories a day and burn it off
through training, and he saw me doing the same but
without the burning off. There's no escaping the
exercise - you cannot lose weight without that element.

As the filming process was coming to an end, there
were some journalists sniffing around, asking if there
was a guy going on TV who'd lost a load of weight.
There was panic at the studio because if the press got
hold of the story and ran with it, they'd ruin the whole
thing by jumping the gun. There wasn't long to go
before broadcast and it was a bit of a weird time. It
would just take one person to mess it up by spilling the
beans .on the whole operation.
Also as we were getting to the end, the crew were
round filming one day and I had the TV on. This
Morning was on and there was a trailer for me on
there! How strange did it feel? Very. It came across to
me as quite 'tabloidy' and shocking and I told them I
didn't like it. I was worried that my segments would be
edited in the same sensationalist style and it would all
look wrong when broadcast. I was assured that this
wouldn't be the case. They said, 'Don't worry. Everyone
will love you.' I can't imagine anyone not worrying.
Up until then, it hadn't seemed that real. I knew I'd
been filmed, but my whole focus was more on losing the

weight and I'd grown so used to being filmed it was
something I stopped being conscious of. Actually seeing
some of the footage for the first time made me realise
that there was another goal - I'd been living it and the
crew had been documenting and telling it. Their goal
was to film me and put the story together in a balanced way. My story. That was another surreal one. My story
now had changed from 'Hugely Overweight Man
Struggles to Get By in Life' to 'Man Who's Lost Twenty
Stones in the Space of a Year Now Has a New Lease of
Life and a Second Chance'. Good things like this surely
weren't supposed to happen to me. I wasn't used to
such positivity. The five films were edited, we had
transmission dates, I knew when I was to appear live
on the show ... it was as real as it gets. The work was
over. Time to enjoy the achievement.

My story started in April 2005, on Monday, and the
films were to be screened over the course of the week
with me being in the studio on the Friday for the big
finale. The first one was the introduction and, naturally,
it had to set me up as a big, overweight man who
was depressed and couldn't move much. As my wish
had been granted, I wasn't portrayed as an overweight
man who sat eating and wondering why he couldn't
lose any weight. There were a lot of tears in that first
film. It was painful for me to watch, but that was
because I was bearing my soul on TV. It was powerful,
wasn't tabloidy and was certainly not something you'd
watch and ridicule. The second film wasn't that
uplifting either, although they did start to get more
positive. The tears were all pure emotion. It was me
being me and telling the world what it was like to be
me. There was no acting.
I had a call from Lucy just prior to the third one
being shown. Something was up. She was a bit shifty
and asked if she could come round to see me. Mum had
been a bit odd around the same time too and I knew
something wasn't quite right. Lucy came round and we
watched the show together. For this episode, unknown
to me, they'd interviewed Lucy, Mum and Dad, Jackie
and my brother-in-law with head-and-shoulder shots of
them all saying how well I'd done and how proud they
were of me. They'd even filmed the taxi drivers saying
well done and wishing me luck! It was amazing having
people who were proud and wished me well. To see that
happen on TV is something else.
I travelled down to London early on the Thursday
and met Justine at the studio before being introduced
to Phillip and Fern. Phillip shook my hand and
congratulated me and Fern gave me a big hug. They
said they couldn't wait to have me on the show, and
just before the trailer for Friday's show they even said
'We're going to meet him later, but you'll have to wait
until tomorrow.' It was great that they were so supportive
and the way it had all been presented and followed
up really involved the audience and made them feel
part of it too. I never try to get overwhelmed by
meeting famous people these days. The first time I'd
had proper contact with a celebrity other than a quick
photo or autograph was with Dr Chris, and now he was
a friend. Meeting Phillip and Fern was one of those
moments where I just wanted to point, scream and
shout 'It's Phil and Fern!' And they were so down to
earth and normal and I couldn't wait to get back there
the following day. After meeting them, I went into
London and did all the touristy things you're expected
to'- covered myself head to toe in Union Flag clothing,
went on an open-top bus, went to Buckingham Palace,
got crapped on by pigeons in Trafalgar Square and got

confused by a the map of the Underground. I did it all.
I also phoned Mark, telling him where I was and what
I'd been up to.
'I'm in London.'
'What are you doing in London?'
'I'm on telly tomorrow. I've been on all week. Have
you not seen it?'
'Eh?'
'I've lost a load of weight.'
Talk about surreal. Other than me saying I was
going to be on TV, the losing weight bit must have
sounded like a practical joke.
'That's mad. I'm in London too,' he said.
And it turned out that he was literally a stone's
throw away from me as we were talking, to the point
where we could almost have heard each other without
phones. It was so good to talk to him after losing touch
for a good year or so. We met up for coffee and had a
right proper catch up, vowing to keep in touch properly
after that. Makes you wonder how you can lose touch
with people so easily.
I was at the studios on Friday for the show going
out live and it was the biggest response they'd had for a
guest in its history. There were phone calls and piles of
e-mails. I cracked a few jokes about takeaways in my
area closing and taxi drivers' car maintenance bills
going down and it was such a great time. I felt so
relaxed and on form. It felt quite natural for me to be
in front of the camera. I know I had been for the past
year, but a studio situation to a live audience is
different: there's no 'cut' and 'let's go again' opportunity,
no seizing up when asked questions, no cups of
tea and no casual swearing to be done. Bah, live TV,
eh?
Then they showed a film of everyone at the bingo
club cheering for me! The crew had shot this on the
Wednesday that Lucy had come round; another reason
for all the shiftiness. And then the tears started again.
It's so difficult to put into words - going through that
process, all the soul-searching, the highs, the massive
lows, the daily struggle, training my mind to readjust,
pushing myself to the extreme and never giving up, the
anguish of not losing any weight at first, the thrill of
losing several pounds a week and the changes my body
and mind went through. Doing this and being filmed,
achieving my goal, proving to everyone that I could do
it, proving to myself that I could conquer anything and then it all coming to a conclusion live on television with
all your closest friends who were on the journey with
you cheering and praising you ... Well, I think I can be
excused for shedding a tear or two.
And straight after the final episode, Phillip
Schofield chipped in with, 'We're going to give you a
makeover!'
Oh, God. Not a makeover. Anything but a TV makeover.
They're not going to give me a makeover, are

they?
I was in a pretty bad way cosmetically speaking', my
skin was awful, I had spots and blemishes and had my
fringe down over my forehead to hide this, as well as
the necessary makeup. I couldn't have imagined
anything worse than Phillip's shock revelation. I mean,
I'd achieved the goal, I'd got my weight right down, I'd
proved myself, but there was still a way to go and I
wanted to get to that point before even entertaining the
idea of being 'made over'. I know losing twenty stones
was cause for celebration, but my personal goal was to
lose another ten; twenty was just a good milestone on


the way.
Then Lucy was brought out and it started getting a
bit like This is your Life. I started having flashbacks to
me with Mum's hairbrush all those years ago. It could
have got a bit embarrassing and overbearing for me, I
think. But hey, it was a good time, it was a happy time
and it was OK to milk it for all it was worth because it
was unlikely that anything like this would ever happen

again.
After the show we all went out and went on the
London Eye and had lunch and champagne, but I
didn't really touch much of it. The downer was kicking
in again. I was talking to, looking at people I'd bonded
with over the course of a year, knowing it had reached
its conclusion and knowing I'd probably never see or
hear from them ever again. It was difficult not to get
upset. I was dealing with a lot in my personal life
during the weight loss and maybe that was another
factor to make me feel low. When I'd been as big as I
was, I was actually considered to be disabled. I was
given a monthly disability allowance from Social
Services as well as support from them for things like
cleaning the house as I just couldn't physically do it, as
you know.
The money that I got from them was gratefully
received because, as a junkie feeding my habit, I'd got
myself into financial difficulty too. What with the taxis
everywhere and the amount I was spending on food, I
was living beyond my means and getting by on credit
cards, overdrafts and loans and even remortgaging the
house. This had all been going on for some time and
was completely out of control. My wages didn't really
cover all of my outgoings at all.
Once I was on my weight loss plan and got down to
around thirty stones, I contacted Social Services to tell
them I wanted to terminate my disability allowance.
They were quite stunned because no one had ever

contacted them to do this before. Maybe it was a bad
move on my part, but I didn't feel disabled anymore
and felt a bit guilty that I was getting fitter and felt the
money would be of use to someone else. They told me
that there were people who weighed less than me who
were still eligible and were given disability allowance,
so I was well within my rights to continue. I don't
know; it would have got to the point where I'd feel I
was cheating the system and I didn't want that at all.
Losing that extra money did put me in a worse
situation financially, but this had been money that I'd
squander on junk food. I didn't need it. If I could still
receive money for being in such a bad physical
condition, that money was essentially keeping me

there.
The next thing to take over from buying food was
buying clothes. I couldn't help myself. It was the same
thrill of finding something new. I'd never had proper
clothes for years, and as I started to lose weight,
clothes would actually fit me for once. But I bought
clothes throughout the weight loss process and consequently
owned every size of clothing you can imagine
by the time I hit my target. I could have opened a
clothes shop if I'd wanted. People were urging me not
to keep buying, and I knew I shouldn't. It was just one
of those things.
Clothes are such a great way of treating and rewarding
yourself, and I was no different. I started to
feel good about myself for the first time in God knows
how long and there was no way I was going to wear my
jogging pants and sweatshirts forever.

Back home from London, I did something I'd never
done before: I sat there for three days without eating a
thing. I'd never known what it was like to not have an
appetite. It was literally from feeling deflated. The
process was over, I'd kept my promise and gone on the
show, it was a success, I didn't mess up ... and then
there was a void, which would usually have been
crammed full of food. It seemed there were too many
comedowns in quick succession: the filming, the actual
twenty stones journey, the screenings, the live appearance,
the goodbye party ... And then nothing.
Until a 'media frenzy' ensued.

Just as I was preparing for normality, I was invited on
to a chat show with Dr Chris in Ireland and then I was
invited back on to This Morning to do a kind of presenting
role soon after.
The show in Ireland was the Gerry Kelly show and
to get there I went on a plane for the first time in my
life! Being the size I was all those years, I'd never even
chanced the embarrassment - there was no way I'd
have been able to fit into one of the seats. Can you
imagine the look of fear on people's faces if I turned up, weighing forty-four stones, to get on a plane? They'd
have to counterbalance it by shoving more people on
the other side so the plane didn't go round in circles. Dr
Chris and I went along to Manchester Airport and I
was amazed at how small the plane was. It wasn't one
of your typical holiday-style planes and the flight was
only around forty-five minutes. This was one of those
flights that people made very regularly. For me, never
having been on one before, regular flight was quite a
lot to comprehend and the show just flying me over
showed me how even air travel can be taken for
granted. Boarding a plane was another achievement to
add to the list! Me on a plane was bordering on the
ridiculous. Oh, yes, and of course This Morning sent a
camera crew up to catch it all on film ... as if I wasn't


nervous enough. It was that odd mixture of excitement
and fear, but I just had to get on with it. I had a
camera with me to film the journey and got plenty of
shots of Dr Chris giving the thumbs up sign. And then
there was a camera crew waiting for us at the other
side to film us touching down. In a way, it presented a
false reality of what I was going through, because I
couldn't back away from the plane screaming and have
to be sedated like BA from The A-Team. Still, it was
enjoyable and great that I had my friend with me.
To go on the show, I was nervous about having
makeup on, because my skin complexion was quite bad
at the time. And then there was the show itself. The
only one I was used to at that point was This Morning and they were always supportive. I wasn't sure what to
expect at all, and then found out that there would be a
studio audience too. It's quite normal to be nervous
before you do television, though, isn't it? I'm sure I can
be excused. Gerry was a really nice bloke, we did the
interview, I enjoyed it, it wasn't stressful, the audience
was great ... no problems whatsoever. Dr Chris was
there with me and we were also asked about how we'd
become good friends as well as all the usual background
questions about losing the weight. It seemed to
be all over in seconds - a blur.
In the green room afterwards we met up with some
of Dr Chris's relatives and Nancy Sorrell, wife of Vic
Reeves, was also a guest on the show. I know she
fancied me, but she's not my type. After that Dr Chris,
his cousin Eamonn and his wife and I went for a lovely
meal before heading back to the hotel that the Gerry
Kelly Show had put us up in ... Officially the most
bombed hotel in Europe.
Soon after touching down back at home, I was on This Morning again, talking about the healthy foods I
ate. There was a chef making a healthy chilli, with me
asking him all kinds of questions about it. They gave
me a camera again and I was told to make the chilli at
home to show how easy it could be. Doing things like
this was something I'd soon get used to. I know I keep
referring to my past life in times like this, but actually
going on a TV show to discuss healthy food and talk
about the healthy food I eat was madder than mad. If
the Ghost of Christmas Future had visited me on that
Christmas night in 2003 and showed me the scene in
the studio of me, twenty-odd stone lighter and talking
about being healthy, I don't think I'd have believed
him. My entire life had been spent being unhealthy; to
be asked on to a TV show as a credible 'expert' was ...
well, incredible, a million miles from being Charlie
Walduck.
Around a month later I was back doing a piece
about curry and they kept asking me back when they
wanted to do anything about healthy eating. Each time
they'd always show a brief introduction of what I'd
been up to since last being on the show and it was
really nice to have such interest in me, in what I was
doing and how I was living. I was on that many times I
thought they were lining me up to take Phillip's job. It
may have cost them a few quid less, but I'd have been
up for it, no problem. Other than broadcast TV, there
were so many newspaper articles and magazine
features going on all the time. Literally, there have
been hundreds of them from the build-up to going on This Morning, to doing the 10k and the marathon, to
doing my own raising awareness initiatives, to doing
anything, really. Sometimes it feels like it's just an
excuse to feature me somewhere. Not that I'm complaining
- any time I'm featured in a newspaper, there
is a chance that at least one other person with obesity

problems will be affected, so it has been worthwhile.
Every time my story has been covered in a newspaper
it has always been in a positive light and to promote
good health, so I'm very pleased that I'm able to help in
some way.
I did the Manchester 10k and the London Marathon
in 2005. In my training for all this I ran with Mark,
having actually kept our word and stayed in touch. We
were going out on Thursday nights and doing 10k each
time, running for short bursts and walking most of the
time. When we started, I knew I didn't want to push
myself too far and end up doing myself in. I told Mark
it would be great to train with him, but I was going to
walk the 10k rather than run. I said I'd run every now
and then, but my goal was to complete it and, by
walking, I knew it would be possible.
I was still a big lad then and probably a bit over
twenty stone, and it was great to have the company. I
was still really at the stage where I needed moral
support. I know in describing my weight loss it sounds
as though I suddenly became the most confident and
fittest man alive, but that wasn't the case. I was still
getting used to being able to move, and not exercising
at all over those years had made me completely unfit.
You need to train to get fit and I'd probably never fully
be that until I shifted some more weight. A training partner really boosts your confidence and makes it less
monotonous. One evening we were out walking and we
turned a corner into one of my biggest fears. In front of
us was a group of lads and I slowed right down. I said
to Mark there was no way I could walk past them,
never mind run past them. He told me to go for it - just
keep my eyes forward, avoid any contact and we'd just
head straight past. I hated this situation because I'd
been in it so many times. We carried on and sure

enough, as we neared them, one of them shouted.
'Oi!'
Eyes forward, take no notice.
'You're him off the telly who lost all that weight,
aren't ya?'
Don't look, just keep walking.
'Well done, mate,' he said as we passed.
And they all gave us a huge round of applause as we
went. It was amazing; a gang of stereotypical hoodies
doing such a thing. Mark and I looked at each other as
they were applauding and I was beaming from ear to
ear. We both were.
And I walked past so many old dears who'd shout
things like 'Charlie, get your knees up!' It was great to
hear it and really gave me a boost each time it happened.
It wasn't quite like Rocky running through the
market, being thrown a piece of fruit and having a load
of kids running with me up the escalators at the
Trafford Centre, but you have to start somewhere, eh?

Once I was walking, there was no stopping me. I'd
walk everywhere, determined to keep shedding the
pounds. I couldn't believe that others weren't walking
everywhere too. At work, instead of walking to the
nearest shops with Beryl during our break, I wanted to
go to the ones the furthest away. I must have been
really doing her head in.
The Man on the Street- Top Five
Insults



Or the woman on the street, or Joe Public, or
the voice of the people, or a group of kids, or
a couple of blokes, or a drunk ... whatever
guise they wear, they all have the same
mission. These are all people in life who take pleasure
in being nasty to you either out of spite or just because
they are too stupid to realise they are doing it. Sorry to
sound slightly bitter here, but these people need to
realise the effect their outbursts can have. I've had to
put up with comments from these types all my life.
They are disgusting, vile people.
Here are some of the confrontations I've had to endure
over the years:

Straight in at number five: I'll never win, so that
makes me a what? by A Gambler who Stunk of
Cigarettes.

When some bloke stepped out of the betting shop in
Failsworth and shouted, 'Put some weight on, have


you?' I was livid. I replied to him by shouting two
words in his direction. The first began with f and the
second one was 'off.
I hate to admit that I reacted by lowering myself to
his level, but this was the only language he was likely
to understand. And of course, he looked offended by my
reaction, like I'd shouted at him for no reason.
'I was only joking,' he said.
'Only joking? Is anyone laughing?'
And he tutted and walked away. I hate confrontation,
especially with people like him, because, more
often than not, they generally didn't have the brains to
discuss anything and would resort to violence within
seconds. What a loser. I wonder how funny he'd have
found it if I'd shouted 'Gambling addiction?' when he
stepped out. This came when I was on track and losing
weight. I'd gotten sick of people like him thinking they
could shout abuse at me. I hadn't come so far just to get
beaten by some moron. I had enough fight in me to
stand up for myself and if that meant getting into a
confrontation, then so be it. I knew I wouldn't get
walked over again. They have no right to abuse anyone
for living their life or try to make them feel bad about
themselves.

At number four'- The grinning idiot by A Grinning
Idiot.

I was out in Manchester one day, and this was when I
was quite big. I wasn't the biggest I've been, but big
nonetheless, maybe thirty-five stone. As I walked past
a bloke, he shouted, 'Oi, you!'
I turned to face him and he stepped towards me. I
could tell that he wasn't out to make friends; he had a
nasty look of spite in his whole demeanour.

'Excuse me. Do you mind if I ask you a question?' he
asked.
Here we go again, I thought. Witty and aggressive
street philosophy by any chance?
'Go on then. Ask me,' I sighed.
'How fat are you?' A smug look spread across his
face like he'd just won his childish little game.
I took a deep breath. It was quite a predictable quip
and, while he thought he was oh so hilarious, it just
made him the most boring person in put-down history.
'Can I ask you a question then?' I replied. 'How big
is your dick?'
This threw him right off guard and I could almost
hear his tiny mind searching for a retort.

'Eleven and a half inches,' was his comeback.
'Well, I'm eleven and a half stone then,' was mine.
I walked away from him glad that I hadn't just kept
my mouth shut.

Still at number three: Aren't we really clever (no,
really, aren't we)?hy A Bunch of Clever Football Fans

There were so many occasions at football matches
where I experienced the wrath of 'the man on the
street', the expert and social commentator that is the
big-mouthed football idiot. I know it's a generalisation,
but most of the negativity that I ever suffered through
cruel jibes was at the hands of bully-boy terrace
meatheads. At the same time, it was always quite a
tribal thing. Being a Barrow fan meant that Barrow
fans wouldn't abuse me. There'd be the ones who would
in any other situation, but at a match, they knew they
couldn't break the rules because I was one of them.
Most people couldn't see that I was one of them
anyway, no matter where we were in the world - a
human being with feelings.
One incident was Barrow vs. Woking away. Fans
weren't segregated then and you could go wherever you
liked once in the ground, so after spotting the Barrow
fans (it was sometimes difficult) I headed over in their direction. To get there, I had to walk past a stand filled
with around a hundred, maybe more, Woking fans who
saw me and decided to shout 'You fat bastard!' over and
over. It used to get me angry that any human could
treat another in such a way. It was so humiliating.
They were never going to stop until I passed them and
being right in front and having so many people project
such hate in my direction was soul destroying. I was
crying inside and couldn't let it show on the outside. I
just had to struggle past. It was pointless reacting,
pointless pretending I hadn't heard them.
I'd paid money to travel down and for a ticket to
watch my team just to be abused by such horrible
excuses for men, stood there in the safety of their pack
thinking they had the right to call someone and make
him feel bad about himself.
I felt so helpless, being such a long way from home
and having that happen to me. If it had been a home
game, I'd probably have just left. I had the whole
match and the travelling back to let it eat away at me,
but I did get the last laugh as we won 3-2. A big 'well
done' to those brave men for picking on another who
was a bit different from them, one that was obviously
struggling with his weight, and then to initiate a
chorus like that, singling him out even more and
punishing him further, making him feel the worst he
could in front of hundreds of people - you can be proud
of yourselves. Mission accomplished. It was a shame to
go to Paul Weller's home town of all places to endure
such behaviour. Why do we treat each other like that?
Why do we take pleasure in hurting people so much? If
they knew the agony I was in just walking past them,
the agony of sitting for such a long journey, the agony
of standing ... would they still have done it? I'd hate to
know the real answer.

Up two places to number two: I've run out of anything to say, you got me back and now I want to fight you by A Football Yob

Once I got off the train at Bolton for a match and there
were two blokes wearing Bolton shirts walking towards
me. They saw me and obviously said something to each
other with a laugh and a nudge as we got closer. I was
so tired of seeing this look on other people's faces. It
wasn't worth just turning and walking away because
there wasn't much I hadn't heard. It was like that Father Ted scene where Ted gets the idea of saying "I
don't believe it!' to Richard Wilson. It was always a
million miles from being funny.
And then it came with such venom.
'You fat bastard,' one of them said.
He was right in my face, aggressive. It was the
equivalent of just walking up to me and punching me that
was the kind of damage he was looking to cause.
'I'd rather be a fat bastard than a Bolton fan,' I
replied.
They stopped in their tracks and he was
dumb(struck). 'What did you say?'
I told him again, and he actually went for me! His
mate was pulling him back and I told him something to
the effect of 'Don't give it if you can't take it.'
People like him disgust me. I could have lowered
myself to his level and verbally attacked him if I'd
wanted, but it seemed I hit a raw nerve by insulting
his beloved football team instead. I've got nothing
against Bolton anyway; it was just the first thing that
sprung to mind because of his shirt. He wasn't the
best-looking bloke in the world; I could have called him
ugly bastard, he had a big nose ... big-nosed bastard, he
was short ... little bastard ... he had no hair ... baldy
bastard ... I could go on. He could have had any prefix,

really.

And still at number one- I'm too daft to know fruit is
good for you, but I'll try to put you down in public
anyway by A N Oying Woman

Once I was eating an apple in the street and a woman
approached me and said, 'Are you allowed to eat that?'
I was stunned. I looked at the apple and then at her.
'Are you allowed to eat one?' I asked.
'Yes,' she said.
'Well ... you're fatter than me, love. So, yes. I am
allowed to eat it,' and off I walked.
I had to pinch myself to make sure it wasn't a
dream. And then she looked at me as if I'd been the one
having a go. I wasn't meaning to be rude to her, but
what was she expecting coming out with something
like that to someone she doesn't even know?

As long as there are people, there will be insults. I'm
not the type to comment on anyone's appearance, it's a
horrible thing to do. The smallest comment can have a
massive effect on a person's state of mind. It is magnified
if it comes from a friend or family member because
it's more personal.




When it came to the day of the Manchester
10k, the organisers were brilliant. They
knew I'd be walking it and they still put
me in pole position up there at the front
with the elite runners and the celebrities. These were
some of the fastest runners in the world and it was
slightly daunting. With This Morning being part of it
all, they had me chaperoned by Julie Dawn Cole for the
run. Julie is the show's fitness expert and was only
Veruca Salt in the original Willy Wonka and the
Chocolate Factory film. How cool is that? I didn't even
know she'd been in the film when we met, but if I had I
wouldn't have talked about anything else, because I love that film. God knows what the elite runners were
thinking when they saw us alongside them. When we
started, I was literally dragged along with them,
unable to stop but unable to run too. I was walking
within a few seconds and was sure it was Christopher
Eccleston who'd pushed me along - pesky ex-time lord!
I did run bits of it - it was impossible not to because of
the cheering and how good it made me feel - and
finished the 10k in one hour and fifty minutes. It
wasn't a bad effort at all.
As I crossed the finish line, This Morning had a
camera crew there to capture the moment, which put
the BBC's nose out of place a bit because they wanted
to interview me first. I met a load of ace people that
day: Liz Dawn from Coronation Street and Sue Johnston
from The Royle Family (and Face by Antonia Bird)
were there at the start, Tony Audenshaw and Chris
Chittell (Bob Hope and Eric Pollard) from Emmerdale and, of course, the doctor from Doctor Who (he's not a
real doctor). The best bit about it was, well ... was all of
it. Any time something like this was on TV in the past,
I would never have stayed on the channel for more
than a couple of seconds. Running was just alien to me;
there was no point in watching as it would just upset
me. But then there was the newand-improved me
actually taking part, completing it and being interviewed
after it!
Seeing the crew from This Morning at the end made
it special because it almost gave a real ending to the
weight loss process, from joking around and saying I'd
do it on that first day of meeting them to actually
losing all the weight and staying true to my word. I
know it's their job to be professional, but with the time
we all spent together, the support they offered and the
friendship that evolved, I know they were as chuffed as
I was when I stepped over the finishing line.
Steve the producer had been in touch with me
throughout the filming by text message, phone calls
and e-mails and it was that kind of dedication that
kept me dedicated. Likewise with Dr Chris; if he hadn't
been in regular contact, if he was someone who didn't
care as much as he did and want me to succeed, I
wouldn't have. Everyone who was part of the crew, part
of This Morning was behind me and I'm so grateful for
all they did.
I've now done the run every year since, other than
when I was away in Australia, getting my time down to
one hour twenty-five in 2009. The organisers asked me
to put my name to a fitness initiative to encourage
more people to take to the streets and get mobile,
which I did, and I helped to promote it alongside boxers
Amir Khan and Ricky Hatton, Paralympic gold medallist
Tanni Grey-Thompson, Kelly Holmes and Tony
Audenshaw, and we all had to run the first mile of the
10k. There were two youngsters with us who'd won the
kids' run the previous day. I think I was as excited as
the kids were. It was such an honour for me to get the
recognition and be thought of as someone who'd give
the campaign further credibility. I loved being part of
things like that.
The day after the 10k I was on the show talking
about my achievement and told the nation I was going
to do the Great North Run next. Lorraine Kelly was cohosting.
'No! It's all uphill, that!' she said.
It isn't strictly all uphill, but I know what she
meant. I'd set my sights on it by then and there wasn't
much that could stop me. I suppose it was part "I told
you I could do it' and part 'Wow. I can do it' that was
spurring me on. I also used my training for these runs
and walks as further exercise to lose that bit more
weight. It was a win-win situation.
Mark and I even stepped up the pace a bit. The
walking got to the point where I could actually jog, not
just walking quickly and jogging for a few steps, actual
jogging! The lead-up to the run was a bit hectic because
the day before was Charlie's Hearty Walk, which
kicked off at Manchester City's ground, filmed by
Granada for a TV advert, and I was also interviewed on
the ITN lunchtime news. The photo shoot for this one
saw me surrounded by three busty blonde glamour
models, who were amazing to work with, and again,

and unfortunately for them, they just weren't my type.
The Great North Run is a half marathon and one of the
most famous in the world. There I was, Charlie the
bingo caller from Failsworth, rubbing shoulders with
the fastest runners on the planet - again - and some
household celebrity names. I was put up in the posh
Copthorne Hotel in Newcastle the night before (totally
looked after as one expects) and was up bright and
early for the run the following morning, escorted to the
starting line by our chaperone, Richard, who ran along
with us. You find with the celebrity runners that there
are always the same ones doing charity runs. They are
either the keen athletic ones like Nell McAndrew or the
ones who aren't that well known for their fitness, but
who've trained their heart out to do the run and raise
money and awareness for a cause. Good on them. And
the BBC got their interview this time as part of the
Great North Run programme.

Justine from This Morning arranged for me to see a top
surgeon who 'does' all the celebrities in London. It was
filmed for the show. He said he didn't really want to do
the job because it was too big. The job was to remove
all the loose skin on my body. As you'll probably know,
being so fat had stretched my skin to its limit and
losing that amount of weight meant there was so much
excess skin left on me. He felt that I wouldn't look 100
per cent after doing what he could and, as his job was
all about giving people confidence and perfection, he
didn't think it was possible to achieve it. Fairy nuff, I
thought. Had it been a few tucks here and there, then
maybe he'd have done it.
I asked my doctor about it and went for tests, assessments,
photographs, on a waiting list, tests,
assessments, appointments, another waiting list ... and

then a date came in for me to have surgery on the
NHS. Going through all the tests was quite difficult
because, in a way, you almost have to play the system
to your own advantage. For example, if you go in there
and tell them you desperately need surgery because it
will change your life forever, then your expectations
are too high and they won't authorise surgery. And on
the other hand, if you go in saying that you aren't that
bothered, you are talking your way out of surgery. So, I
had to say I needed surgery in order to go for a wee
properly and to get jeans that would fit without this
massive overhang. They told me it wouldn't change my
life completely and I said I knew that, as long as it
helped in those areas mentioned, then I'd be happier in
myself.
It wasn't a huge operation, just a bit of the loose
skin removed around my stomach, which totalled
around ten pounds. Annoyingly, with it being on TV
and in newspapers, the bit that stuck in people's minds
was that I'd had surgery. And putting two and two
together, it was assumed that this was weight loss
surgery, rather than what it really was.
I was approached by someone in the street (as I am)
who commented that I'd lost weight, and then he said,
'Because you had surgery, didn't you?' and walked off
while I was telling him what the surgery was. It was a
disappointment because it took away the credibility
that I'd done it all by myself. One tiny tuck and it was
assumed I'd had thirty stone vacuumed out. The
surgery itself was really helpful though. The skin I had
removed was below my stomach, I suppose where a
bloke's beer belly would be, as it had presented a few
difficulties when going to the toilet. I was in hospital
for five days and it healed up really well.

After becoming Runner Charlie, it was time to be
Traveller Charlie for a bit. I'd always set myself goals
when I was losing weight and it was time to fulfil them
properly by booking myself on a flight to Canada. The
time I flew to Ireland with Dr Chris had been my first,
but I needed to experience it properly on a long flight
in a proper big plane to actually say I'd done it. The
other flight had been an exciting experience, but I'd
had meals that had lasted longer and Canada certainly
wouldn't be a blink-and-miss-it flight. It would be
packed with passengers going on holiday rather than a
toy flight across the Irish Sea.
It was just like walking really. Once I could walk I
wanted to do it more and go further and it was the
same with travelling. Not that I turned into Alan
Whicker overnight, but just to do something I'd never
had the chance to do, being up in the air as a normal
passenger, was achieving something else I'd longed for.
For me to even set foot on a plane in the past would
have put me on the bill of the in-flight entertainment
for all the wrong reasons. I'd have been the butt of all
the cruel jibes and one of the stories the holidaymakers
would recall to friends and family on their return. And
I'd have felt a burden because there'd have been
consequences of sitting for too long with my comfort
and circulation, assuming I could sit in the first place.
So Canada it was. For a day. I knew they'd speak
English in Toronto and that was what I wanted. I flew
out on a Monday, spent Tuesday there and was back in
Manchester on the Wednesday! All I took was an
overnight bag; everyone at the airport was baffled.
'How long are you staying in Canada, sir?'
'Just a night, thanks.'
I don't know if I was offending them, come to think
about it. I stayed in a hotel that I'd booked separately

from the flight, and of course it turned out to be
situated in a rather rough suburb of Toronto. The room
wasn't up to much and I got in, sat on the bed,
switched the TV on and wondered what the hell I was
doing there. You know when you get somewhere and
there just aren't the home comforts you're used to and
it's a bit of a letdown? It was a bit of a 'We've gone on
holiday by mistake' Withnail moment, but at least I'd
only booked to stay there for a night. I went out for a
walk, forgetting that cars drive on the other side, and
was nearly roadkill within five minutes. When I
recovered, I walked to a bus station so I could suss out
how to get to the city centre the next day.
I was quite the tourist, doing the CN Tower, going
on a sightseeing bus trip and didn't go to Niagara
Falls, which I wish I had done now. On my way back to
the hotel on the bus, I noticed a bingo hall, so when I
got back and freshened up, I had a walk up there for a
couple of games.

As soon as I was home, my focus was on the London
Marathon for April the following year. Mark and I were
back in Thursday training. My flight landed in the
early hours of Thursday morning, so we kept our
regular Thursday evening date. Mark knew by doing
the runs with me that he was helping me to keep the
weight off. He'd helped me try to lose weight in the
past and, knowing that he hadn't been part of the big
journey, he still said he'd help me out in whatever way
he could.
In December that year I reached my weight loss
target and got down to fourteen stone, meaning I had
lost thirty stones in twenty months. Give or take the
odd pound, my mission was complete. This was the real
journey for me. This was the one I'd always set my

sights on, although I missed the camera crews and
everything that went with it because they'd been with
me literally from day one. To reach my goal alone was
the right way to do it though. It was a personal journey
after all and I'd got to where I wanted to be. I had such
a sense of achievement and still do when I think about
it. I'd gone from, let's face it, the brink of death to
getting down to a size that is associated with 'normal
living'.
I was in touch with Dr Chris throughout this, still
meeting up with him for walks and chats and picking
his brains on a few things. I hit a low ebb soon after
this, despite the fact that I was doing so much more
with my life. As I said earlier, I believe those thoughts,
feelings, emotions, depression, and dark, desperate
times will always be there, I just needed to have coping
strategies in place. I don't know what was fuelling this
particular bout because life was good at the time and it
just shows that it can hit you however well you are
doing. I think that my defences were down from the
whole process coming to an end, regular social contact
with those from the show and the film crew was over
and the routine of it all was gone, never to come back.
I'd always look at it in a negative way, rather than a
positive. And of course, there was the financial aftermath
of a lifetime of eating to deal with. So, although
my life was getting back on track and I was able to
start living like everyone else, it seemed I had to pick
up the pieces from my former life and there was still
much to resolve.
Dr Chris always knew the right words: 'Charlie, if you ever feel low, just keep thinking of what you have
achieved and the encouragement and help you must
have given to thousands of people with weight problems.
You have been an inspiration and a great

example of what can be achieved once you put your
mind to it. Your story has been one of great personal
motivation, self-discipline and success. Sorry to go on,
but I really am so very proud of you, and you should
also feel proud of what you have achieved - well done!'
I was back on This Morning at Christmas doing
Charlie's Choices and was so involved with the show
that I bet Phillip was secretly worried. I did Charlie's
Choices a few times on the show. It was all about low
fat ready meals, what to look for, what to look out for,
that kind of thing. The Christmas one was looking at
cutting down on fatty foods over the season, what not
to snack on, differences in cooking oils, and even
discussed not having gravy on Christmas dinner and
cutting down on alcohol because it leads to snacking
when you get a false hunger. Controversial or what?
It's nice to get asked back regularly; it's like visiting
friends every few months. It always gave me a lift and
kept the connection. To say that being on the show has
transformed my life is a slight understatement. If I'd
known the positive effect of Lucy writing that letter, I'd
have told her to do it much earlier. No one could have
predicted the results or the response. Since being on
the show, I get recognised all the time and it is always
in such a positive way that it makes me proud to be
alive. The best thing about it is being able to help
others. No matter how corny that sounds, I'm now in a
position where people look to me for help, much in the
same way I looked to Dr Chris.
I get e-mails and phone calls from people wanting
advice or just wanting to say hello and wish me luck.
It's that kind of contact that keeps me on the straight
and narrow and reels me back in any time I might be
straying from eating well. It sometimes makes me
wonder about all those idiots on the street who used to
shout abuse. Do they remember me? Did they watch
the films? Did it affect them; did they learn something
about me? And I suppose the irony is that I ended up
skinnier than most of them anyway. I bet they felt a bit
sick about that. Especially the Bolton fan.
By now, I should have been prepared for a big low to
see the high off. And boy did it come in grand fashion. I
had massive stomach pains towards the end of 2005
and went to the hospital, because I could feel a lump in
my stomach. I was told it was a deposit of hard skin
because of my weight loss, was given some antibiotics
to last that day and was due to go back the following
day for more. I was in too much pain. The next day I
went to see my doctor. He told me to go home, lie down,
not do anything and he was going to send an ambulance
round immediately. It turned out that I had a
strangulated hernia and went in to have an operation
on New Year's Eve. What a way to see the New Year
in! I was very lucky though because the hernia had
turned gangrenous and I'd have been in a serious
condition if I'd just taken antibiotics. It was caught just
in time. So, the first year when I could go out and enjoy
myself, I was stuck in hospital. I was asleep well before
midnight, exhausted, and laid up for a good few days
before, during and after. While I was in there, This
Morning was back on TV and they wished me well and
sent a bunch of flowers. It was nice of them and created
a bit of a buzz in the ward. Of course, when the doctors
came round to check that I was OK, they said they
could have sorted out all my loose skin while they were
on with my hernia. I was so tempted to tell them to
knock me out there and then and do it.
I'm certainly not in any rush to have the loose skin
removed now. I know these days that my weight does
fluctuate and any weight that I do put on goes straight
to where the loose skin is. In fairness, it would take a
lot of surgery to put it right and I'd end up looking like
a patchwork quilt for a good while. So, I've never been
at a point where the time has been right or I've
definitely wanted it done; I'm happy as I am for now.

I was conscious not to let being in hospital put me off
my training for the London Marathon. This was one of
those obstacles that could have escalated and become a
life issue if I dwelled on it; the perfect excuse to stay
indoors, the perfect excuse to revert to old ways, seek
solace and fall off the wagon. I didn't let it happen.
Once I was able to, Mark and I went back to our 10k
training routine. He wasn't around to do the run itself,
but still helped me train for it. Then in April 2006, just
over two years since starting my weight loss plan, I
completed the run in six hours and forty-five minutes.
This was one of my greatest achievements ever; the
biggest goal on my list. I mean, if you are driving or
boarding a train or a plane to go somewhere and you're
told it will take nearly seven hours to get there, you
don't want to go. Then to do a trip of the same duration,
but having to run it - it's just mental. Doing a 10k
and a thirteen-mile run were big enough achievements,
but as Ray Winstone would probably tell me, doing a
marathon is the daddy of all running achievements.
Before, I couldn't have lived without eating for that
length of time: now I could run it.
Again, I was put up in a nice hotel the night before,
and the following day I made my way to the bus to get
driven to the start line. I was in the same hotel as all
the elite runners and was given a pass to board the
same bus as them. Looking slightly out of place, I
checked my pass and it read 'Charlie Walduck: Elite
Runner'. It could have got embarrassing if any of them

questioned me, so I just kept schtum until we got to the
start and joined the rest of the runners. I saw the
group G4 (XFactor, 2004), Andrew Castle, Jade Goody
and, of course, I was filmed by This Morning throughout.
I
felt on top of the world after doing the marathon;
it is one of those defining moments in my life. I was
back on the show the day after the run, and this to me
was where the real weight loss story ended. I pretty
much knew I was the only one who remembered me
even saying I'd do the London Marathon on that first
day of filming. They all thought I was joking, but I
wasn't. It was my overall goal - lose thirty stones and
get fit enough to do the marathon. And there it was.
Done.
In my capacity as Traveller Charlie, I took a five
week break in Australia soon after this. It was a
bit of a mad adventure. I received an e-mail from
a guy called Mick Organ inviting me to visit,
having seen my story on YouTube. He wanted me to
come out and inspire some of his clients at the Mudgee
Weight Loss and Lifestyle Services in New South
Wales.
It was a great opportunity, but could I do it? Could I
meet a complete stranger and spend a whole month
living with him and his family? Was this an opportunity
too good to miss? Going to Australia had always
been a dream of mine and it would tie in with my
travelling goals, especially as it is the other side of the
world. Everyone told me I should go for it and my head
and my heart were on their side. Management at work
were not as keen, though. Five weeks, maybe six if you
add readjustment time, off work is quite a lot to ask of
an employer, but not if they are an ex-employer. So I
decided to quit my job. It wasn't an ultimatum or
anything as dramatic, I just decided to make a massive
change and take control of my own destiny. I waved
goodbye to Manchester and said g'day to Australia.
I had a brilliant time there and am pleased to say

that I made some great and wonderful friends. I
managed to help, encourage and support some people
to lose weight too. It was bizarre; I was now considered
to be a 'face' for change and turning an unhealthy life
into a healthy one. And not just on my own doorstep. I
didn't always see eye to eye with Mick's techniques. I
think shouting at people to lose weight is the wrong
approach, but it's horses for courses, isn't it? He may
think that my technique of listening, understanding,
relating and encouraging is too much of a softly-softly
approach. But shouting does motivate people too. I just
think you need the balance of someone who understands,
like a good cop.

I have seen quite a few charlatans set up their own
weight loss camps over the years and even got involved
with one of them for a while. Dr Chris and I went along
to this 'fat camp' until we realised the bloke who was
running it was full of what he talked, if you get what I
mean. It was terrible. OK, you don't need to be
medically qualified to give advice, but you owe it to the
people who are paying you to at least know some facts
and be able to give them something tangible.
There are so many slimming clubs around now too. I
knew a lady who lost thirty stones going to a slimming
club: it was the same stone thirty times. This is the
problem with most of the clubs; you go along lose
weight, lose interest, put it back on and then go back
and try again. I'm not knocking all of them, just like I
wasn't knocking all gyms. They all work for some
people, or they wouldn't be able to stay open.
The social aspect of going to a club can never be
disputed and, if you can get the support you need to see
you through, then it may just well work for you. Just
bear in mind that some of them don't encourage

exercise and are held in pretty miserable surroundings,
and some don't offer an ongoing support network,
which I think is vital.
My Auntie Doreen used to go to one and still might
for all I know. They would all go to the chippy afterwards
to celebrate their weight loss, safe in the
knowledge that they had a whole week in which to lose
those extra pounds again. It always used to make me
laugh.
Other people wrote into the show asking for the
same kind of help I received too. They saw my transformation,
and being in a similar position, wanted This
Morning and Dr Chris to save them. There was a
woman called Sheila in Bath who wrote a letter and we
went to see her and offered her all the support we
could. I've helped anyone who has contacted me
because I love being able to help others. I know exactly
how these people feel and I did honestly feel that after
going through it myself I knew many of the answers
they'd be searching for.
I visited Sheila twice getting a coach down to see
her, all out of my own pocket, and it seemed like a
complete waste of time. It's not like a bus to Bath was just round the corner either, but I said I'd go to help
out and see how she was getting on.
Her husband was the main problem in her life. He
came out with such gems as 'Maybe you won't love me
anymore if you lose weight.' He was a big guy himself
and it never looked like there was commitment from
him or her to achieve what she wanted. Her heart
wasn't in it and he didn't appear to be supportive, so
there wasn't really a goal. It was a complete waste of
time and felt like she was just curious to see what
might happen if she could be bothered, rather than
wanting to change her life in any way.


I think because people saw me lose such a vast
amount of weight over the course of five days on their
TV they thought it was easy. Sheila probably wanted a
quick fix. It was easy to get the impression that a
miracle cure had occurred for me from watching it on
the show, but we know it was a lot of hard graft over
the course of many months. There wasn't a magic
wand.

Being so busy while in Australia, sometimes I didn't
get the opportunity to take a step back and realise the
enormity of what I'd done. I had a bit of The time'
during the visit and was able to appreciate my
achievements. I'd come a long way. Literally. I
appeared on Channel 9 TV as well as doing the Mudgee
Fun Run, newspaper interviews and spent a lot of time
with guys there who were on a weight loss programme.
I was proud to be able to take a lad called Sam around
on his first-ever fun run and it was such a great
achievement for the guy. Being asked to go over there
to help people was unreal and it was nice to do the run
as I missed doing the Manchester 10k while there.
It was amazing getting recognised by people even in
Australia. I was in a cafe in Melbourne and was
approached by a woman who did the old 'It's Charlie
from This Morning I was also recognised in Mudgee
by an English woman. 'What are you doing here,
Charlie?'
I also sampled a local delicacy. Kangaroo. I can't say
I enjoyed it too much; I kept looking over my shoulder
to see if Ant and Dec were going to give me a gold star.
Kangaroo is low in fat with a very strong ... er ...
kangarooey taste. I'm not that into rare meat either
and this was so rare it was practically hopping off my
plate. I like getting recognised, but at the same time, if

I'm recognised in somewhere like a cafe, they'll talk to
me and be looking at my plate. And there are people
out there who will comment, just like the ones I've
mentioned within these pages. For every ten positive
people congratulating me, there'll always be one
negative: 'You can't have that, can you?'
Maybe I should have been conscious that I was out
there practically in a different world but, in my own
world I'd left behind, I was jobless. But I really wanted
to take the opportunity to see as much as I could
because it isn't every day you get to travel to a place
like Australia. I have always been a big worrier too, so
I thought if I was to plan and execute a massive trip it
would either kill me or cure me of my fears. If I could
go on such a journey, then I might not worry about
little things in the future.
In 2008 I returned after another invite from Mick. It
was a second chance-of-a-lifetime opportunity and this
time I saw a lot more of the sights, going to Sydney,
Adelaide, Perth, Melbourne, Tasmania, Darwin, Cairns
and Brisbane on train, bus, ferry and plane. I even
went snorkelling in the Great Barrier Reef. And when I
got back home, there was an e-mail waiting for me
from a man who thought he spotted me in Melbourne,
but his wife insisted it couldn't have been me. They'd
had an argument over it and he asked if I could put the
record straight.

Losing thirty stones in twenty months is just
nuts to even imagine. Dr Chris said that
there hadn't been anything like it ever
recorded in the UK to his knowledge, so it
made me an unofficial record breaker. To go from being
a fat bloke abused in the street to being known as a
'super slimmer' took a lot of dedication (and getting
used to), but here's one thing I maintain and something
you should always keep in mind too: losing weight isn't
rocket science. At the most, it is simple mathematics
and willpower. That's what it took - no special foods,
no expensive supplements or pills and no expensive
surgery.
The thing with doing this is that you don't have to
fork out all the time. I did it without having to join a
gym for hundreds of pounds a year and didn't have to
drink a dozen protein shakes a day and allow myself a
lettuce leaf and half a carrot for a special treat every
other. Simplicity was the way forward.
You don't need a gym membership if you have
streets and countryside when you open your front door.
Once I'd lost weight, I went to a gym just to see what
all the fuss was about. And, as most of you will know,
there are different kinds of gyms. There's the typical
old-school bloke's gym where you go to lift heavy
weights - full of grunting and testosterone, spitting on
the floor and chinning a punch bag. Then there are the
WAGs in Lycra and poseurs gym where no one seems
to do anything but look in the mirror. Last but not
least, there are plenty of people-friendly ones that don't
cost an arm and a leg. I'm not knocking gyms at all
here. It's just that my needs were completely different
from the needs of someone wanting to work out. You
can try out any gym in the land before signing up and
most of them will offer special deals, especially if you
go in January when they are trying to encourage new
members.
The one I went to wasn't top of the range and was
accessible to all. I was amazed, though: people were
still paying money to go on a walk or a run. Of course,
there are other exercises to do, but I just couldn't get
my head round it all. I didn't see the point in paying to
go indoors on a running machine, especially when it
was set to walking pace.
If you can formulate blinkered points of view like
mine above rather than paying money you think you need to spend, then you'll be saving your hard-earned
cash for more essential things.
There's one other snippet you always need to bear in
mind if starting a diet, and this is the most important
one: If Charlie can do it, I can do it.
Old wives' tales are very true too. I've never met one
of these old wives; I don't know how old they are or who
they're married to, but they must know everything.
Remember the old saying 'You are what you eat'? Well,
that was me. Pies, crisps, pizza, fry-ups, massive
portions, late-night meals ... I was all of that. Fat. That
was it. I didn't eat anything healthy and, as a result, I
wasn't healthy. And eating lots of unhealthy foods
made me extremely unhealthy. And guess what eating
fat made me.
Here's my massive weight loss secret: all things in
moderation. Another wives' tale, another simple
concept and one that works. It's about energy in and
energy out: consume less and exercise more. And here's
how I didn't lose weight:
Atkins diet, just drinking water diet, hip and thigh
diet, grape and melon diet, starving myself stupid diet,
the watercress soup diet, the Madonna uses this one (I
know because it was in heat magazine) diet, Beyonce's
diet, hypnosis, acupuncture, aversion therapy, aromatherapy,
hydrotherapy, regression therapy, drugs
(of any kind), protein drinks, fancy milkshakes, fancy
cuppa soups, meal-replacement food bars, stomach bypass
surgery, jaws wired up, locked in a dungeon.
There are so many diets out there that are just fads
and may work to lose some weight. If you consume just
watery stuff for a few weeks, you'll lose weight. If you
don't eat, you'll also lose some weight. It stands to
reason. Until you start eating again. Or you die of
starvation.
The diets in most magazines serve as quick fixes
and are marketed as 'bikini diets' for a reason. Don't do
one of them if you want to sustain weight loss: they are
just geared towards someone wanting to fit into their
bather and look a bit slimmer for two weeks while on
holiday.
The three golden rules I stuck to were: walk at least
10,000 steps a day (or build towards it), eat meals with
less than 3 per cent fat whilst keeping an eye on the
calories as well. There is a very important thing to
remember here and that is keeping one eye on the
calorie content and not eating after a curfew in the
evening. This is disputed by many but for me having a

curfew in an evening means I don't eat, don't consume
calories and don't have the problem of not exercising to
burn them off. My philosophy with weight loss was
that you have to look at three main areas: the head,
stomach and feet.
Head: Getting it right and being positive.
Stomach: What you eat.
Feet: Exercise and walking.
I mentioned in the half-time break that breakfast is
the most important meal of the day, and it is. Everyone
knows it these days. I was straight on to the cereal and
semi-skimmed once I started my plan. It's not clever to
skip it at all because you are just abusing your body in
another way. You've been sleeping for a fair few hours,
you've been resting and, once you wake, you need to
refuel. It's just like the basic mechanics of running a
car, I suppose. Fill it up and it goes, give it the right
fuel and it goes on longer, look after it, have it serviced
regularly by an expert and it will last a lot longer than
just carelessly running it into the ground. But while
you can just go out and buy a new car, you can't go out
and buy a new you. Once you cash your chips in, that's
it. Always eat to refuel via at least three meals a day as
well or you'll be running on empty and not performing
to the best of your ability.
Don't think you are doing something good and
healthy by not eating. It's the wrong way to think. It's
crazy talk. Mum always says eat breakfast like a king
and supper like a pauper. I'm not sure what you eat
like for lunch or dinner ... someone modestly well off
but keen not to flaunt it? Just within moderation will
see you right. I remember staying at a hotel in Milton
Keynes once and they delivered breakfast in a bag and
left it outside the room on a morning. I couldn't sleep
all night I was getting that excited. Every time I heard

a noise I would check outside the room to see if my
breakfast had arrived. It was like being tortured. It
was a weird system, but that's Milton Keynes for you.
I always lacked structure and that was the first
thing I was advised to introduce into my life and my
eating. If you don't have structure, you have chaos. You
need to have regular meals at regular times, not just
an 'I'll eat when I'm hungry or about to pass out'
attitude. Food isn't just fuel though. If it was, it would
all look and taste the same and we'd have no use for
Jamie Oliver. Food should be savoured and enjoyed
and chewed properly in comfort. My dad used to say
that I ate so fast he could see sparks coming off my
knife and folk, and if the truth be known, sometimes I
never even tasted the food. How sad is that? What a
waste. It's great to see kids enjoying their food. This
needs to be encouraged. It's the shovelling in and
rushing down of food that needs to be discouraged.
If you have the opportunity to sit down and enjoy a
meal with family and friends, make use of it. One
reason is that you are given comfort by sitting down at
a table! you're not hunched over a plate in front of the
TV. It also turns it into a social occasion, which is good
for you anyway. I didn't have that many friends and
didn't live with my family. I always made time to do
this once I realised the benefits, though. And if you
cook a meal for friends one night, it leads to them doing
the same and keeps it going, maybe even becoming
part of your routine. It is also said that overeating occurs less if you eat in company. In this case, make
sure to clean everything away so you aren't tempted to
pass by the table and pick at food. If you've got kids,
there is always the temptation to do the old 'If you
don't want it, I'll have it' at mealtimes. I'm not a
parent, but it is all about willpower, and I can relate to

that. You need discipline ... avoid leftovers by binning
them, avoid second helpings by cooking less, avoid big
portions by using smaller plates ... there's loads that
you can do if you just think a bit about it.
When you are full, leave it. It is better in the waste
than on the waist. My problem was always that I didn't
know when to stop, it was all about wanting more,
needing more - or thinking I did.
Don't just concentrate on food, though. We should be
drinking about six to eight glasses (1.2 litres) of water
or other fluids every day to stop us getting dehydrated,
but avoid drinking soft and fizzy drinks that are high
in added sugar. I'm sure we all know that alcohol isn't
that good for us by now. There's usually a medical
study every few years where a few hundred grand has
been spent to tell us that red wine or a glass of stout is
good for us in moderation, and the following week,
depending on what newspaper you read ... it isn't good
for you at all. We know that once we're hammered we
get the munchies. Takeaway shops are full on Friday
and Saturday nights because of this, not really because
everyone actually enjoys kebabs that much. And then
the following day it takes forever to get over your
hangover, you are dehydrated and have probably eaten
everything you can lay your hands on. It certainly is
the Demon Drink. You can actually get low-calorie
alcohol these days.

For many people, the longest journey starts with the
smallest step. My good friend and mentor Dr Chris
Steele told me that on the day we first met. I told you
he was good with words, didn't I? All of us are guilty of
putting something off, saying we'll do it tomorrow.
Imagine the productivity, all the things that would get
done in the world, the good deeds, the phone calls, the
DIY that would all be resolved if we just did it. I know
every excuse about putting something off. I've been
there, done it and couldn't even get a T-shirt in my
size. At forty-four stone I was probably one of the
biggest men in the UK and, yes, I had been on more
diets than you can shake a bread stick at.
When you weigh such a large amount it is difficult
to comprehend just how much weight you need to lose.
You have to take it in small manageable chunks
because, let's face it, Rome wasn't built in a day. You
know my story, have seen my progress and saw how I
went from practically crippled to running the London
Marathon in two years.
It is natural for the body to lose weight if you eat
less and do more. Every single diet plan in the world is
based broadly on this principle. It really is as simple as
this. It is important therefore to try and a find a plan
that works for you. Plan a diet and create a weight loss
plan. That's your next step. Simply saying 'I'm on a
diet' doesn't work. You cannot approach it in a halfarsed
fashion because you'll have given up within a week. That's all I used to do. I was never really
motivated, even when I knew my life was quite at risk.
Your plan needs to work for you. My plan worked
because it still fitted in with my lifestyle, but I still had
to change my lifestyle to fit with the plan as well.
I didn't have structure in my life, so introducing
that meant that I was adjusting the way I lived. I ate a
healthy breakfast whereas in the past I'd either not
had one, or had gone the other way and had a few fry
ups. Planning to have some cereal, with skimmed milk
rather than full fat, was making change in moderation.
Little changes like changing milks or changing to
sweetener rather than sugar if you can't cut it out
altogether are small changes that make big differences.

You need to write stuff down. You can only do so much
in your head; there's research to be done and figures
and menus to prepare. I was always typing details into
the computer and coming up with spreadsheets for
everything. That's just how my mind works and
processes information, but it doesn't mean you have to
go into such minute detail. Low-fat foods, creating an
eating structure and setting an eating curfew were
crucial for me as well. If I was at home and winding
down for the night, then I had no way of burning any
calories off if I ate a late meal. If you are concerned
about anything health-wise in preparation for your
plan, ask your doctor about it rather than the 'diet
expert' at work (unless you happen to work in a health
centre).
Portion control was very important to me; I knew if
I was cooking a big meal I would likely eat it in one go.
Having a low-fat ready meal sorted this problem out. I
didn't get any specialist meals from a health store;
these were just the bog-standard healthy choice ready
meals you can pick up from any supermarket in the
land. They aren't as bad for you as everyone once
thought and my weight loss is evidence of this. They
were also value for money and I was on quite a limited
budget. Just checking the label and seeing it had three
per cent in fat or less, it passed my test.
It's important that you get weighed too: what can be
measured can be managed. There is no point starting a
weight losing plan unless you get weighed first. This is
vital. You don't go out to buy something without
knowing how much you've got to spend, do you? In the
same respect, you can't plan to lose weight when you
don't know how much you weigh in the first place! And
as you have read, always weigh at the same time, on
the same scales, wearing more or less the same clothes.

If you start to obsess and weigh yourself every day it
will only lead to disappointment. Remember to tell
yourself on day one 'This is the heaviest I will ever be '

You've read my diet diary. Why not write down your
daily thoughts and feelings? Maybe write down what
you have eaten, what you have enjoyed and what
exercise you have done. I did a spreadsheet on the
computer and it was like my own personal weekly
magazine of my progress. It really did help and will
help you too. Just reading through mine for this book
brought back so many memories and feelings - good
and bad - but it stands as my journey, showing me
where I was, what worked and what didn't. It is just as
important to record the elements that don't work for
you as the ones that do. Dr Chris said that my plan
would have to be changed if the results didn't show and
that's why I think it is important to write it all down.
I also think it is important to set goals. I did. I
couldn't have done it without them. How do you know
what you are aiming for otherwise? Make a wish list;
write down everything you want to achieve in life and
focus on these things. Make sure they are realistic and
achievable. Not all of us can win gold at the Olympics,
in fact very few of us can. Make sure your goals are
SMART: Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic
and Timeable. It sounds like management speak and it
is. But it's also weight management speak. To say "I
will lose some weight sometime' isn't a SMART goal
whereas "I will lose five stones within the next six
months' is. It sounds dead simple because it is.
At the start of my plan, I couldn't even walk from
one side of the living room to the other. There'd have
been no way I could have lost so much weight without
exercising, though. Most people who rely on diet alone

get so far and stall because they're not prepared to get
off their backside to burn calories. I understand that
everyone has their own circumstances, and I didn't
mean that in a bad way, but you really cannot sustain
weight loss without moving around a bit.
Get a pedometer and get moving. It's just a small
device that fits on to your belt and records the number
of steps you make. They are so small that they are easy
to lose, sit on and drop down the toilet, so be careful.
Write down on a daily basis how many steps you have
done (put it in the diary) and don't worry if you don't
achieve the magic 10,000 on the first day. When I first
started I could hardly make 500. There's no shame in
just doing what you can and there's no need to injure
yourself. Just keep building it up. I had to walk before
I could run too. Vary your walking route if you get
bored easily, keep to the streets if you feel vulnerable
and get a friend to tag along if you need moral support.
Or join a gym for a couple of grand and go on the
walking machine there if you want, as long as you get
active. You need to move around to burn calories. If
you can jog, then do it, if you want to walk, then walk.
You can even get games consoles now to help you get
into shape; the key is to introduce some form of
exercise into your life that wasn't there before. If you
weren't burning the calories before, then a simple walk
around the block is a great way to start.
Going out for your first walk can be a bit daunting,
especially if you are anywhere near the size I was. So
... don't make a big thing of it, just get up and go. But
do choose sensible shoes because, believe me, blisters
are a nightmare and can easily set you back.
Try to have a small glass of water before you go but
not too much, as you don't want it swilling around
or want the loo within five minutes. It's important to

keep hydrated though. It's always best to do some
stretching, even for something as light as walking if
you aren't used to it. Check your watch, know when
you started, and, lastly, open your front door and put
one foot in front of the other ... easy!
Not everyone's boots are made for walking, so here
are a few tips:

Tell someone where (and which way) you are going and
approximately how long you will be.

Walk to a place where you can stop for a break. I walk
to a local supermarket so I can have a quick break and
use the facilities. I call this a pit stop. Going for a walk
isn't just an excuse for walking to the chippy or the pub
though - take it seriously!

Do a reconnaissance mission in advance. Measure set
distances and identify landmarks so you are going from
A to B in so many minutes. This is a great way of
pacing yourself and measuring improvements. At first
it took me eighty minutes to walk five kilometres, now
I do it in fifty-five minutes, and the improvement gives
me a real sense of achievement.

Warm up and warm down. It's kinder on your body if
you start off slow and finish off slow.

If you catch a bus to work (or anywhere), get on the bus
at the next stop along and get off a stop further away.
If you drive, park the car further away. At the shops,
park at the far side of the car park. It's a small
difference, but it all counts.

If you think you may get stuck, take your mobile phone
and store a taxi number in it. Or better still, ask a
friend to go with you.

Start off with a moderate walk near home and build it
up. That way you won't get stranded.

Stick to well-lit, well-used paths.

Book a place on a charity walk or run. It gives you a
goal to aim for and there are loads of these organised
every year.

Wear appropriate clothing. Living in Manchester, I
always have to wear something waterproof.

Exercise was the key for me. There was no way I could
have just taken to the streets for a jog even if I'd
wanted to. I was determined to walk, though, and there
are so many positives surrounding walking that you
probably don't even consider unless you are not
physically capable of doing it: you don't need to drive
anywhere to do it, you can walk at any time you want,
it is free, you don't need specialist clothing, it's low
impact, it is as gentle as you make it, you don't need to
announce to the world you are doing it, you can do it
with friends for company or use it as alone time or time
to catch up on phone calls. You can measure it, you can
do it in your lunch hour and you can stop for a break
whenever you want. If you have hills nearby, then even
better. Build up to it, even go halfway at first. Once
you get used to it and if it is safe to do so, have a go at
walking up backwards and feel the burn on your legs!
You'd think I enjoy walking the way I go on about it,
wouldn't you? At my size, walking was the perfect way
to start. Apart from all the benefits to your health,

getting out in the open air really makes you feel alive
and is good for the soul. Being in the Sunday Club
when I was a kid did that for me even though I thought
it was worse than torture at the time.
Once you have your plan, your structure and are
exercising, stick to it. If you start walking then give it
up, you are taking some of that structure away. All of
these elements are supposed to work in harmony, so
taking one of them away will upset the balance.
Importantly, you'll know you are cheating yourself.
Make sure the plan is realistic also. If your eating
plan involves six hours of preparation every day is it
going to last? If it involves eating foods you don't like,
however good they may be for you, will you stick to it?
The answer to both questions is probably a big fat no.
Healthy eating, walking and a positive mental attitude
are the best way for long-term weight loss. Try to
avoid silly faddy diets because they simply don't work.
Top celebrities can generally afford personal trainers
and surgery. If you can't open a packet of biscuits
without eating them all then just don't buy them in the
first place.
Nobody else can do this for you - it's all up to you.
Everyone is looking for an easy way to lose weight or
someone or something to blame for being overweight.
Ninety-nine per cent of people who are overweight eat
too much and do too little exercise. Some of us are more
prone to weight gain than others, and some will find
weight loss regimes incredibly difficult (I know I still
do). But for most of us, we control our own destiny. Set
yourself small weight loss targets and then treat
yourself when you achieve them. The treats should be
non-food, such as having a holiday, getting your hair
done or buying some new clothes. Break the weight you
need to lose into small manageable chunks. It doesn't

seem that frightening then.
And if you feel like giving up, look at your diary and
at old pictures of yourself and see how far you have
come. I had help, I had pressure, I made promises, but
I'd had all of that before This Morning had input. The
difference for me was that I didn't do anything the
right way until I reached the end of the road and did it
to save my life. But you: take it slowly, there's no rush,
you'll get there if you stick at it.

Setting personal goals gives you something to aim for
and a sense of achievement when you reach them. You
need to set ones that are possible otherwise you'll never
do it and you'll end up back where you started and
feeling like a failure. I made my own list that I could
print off and write in:
Mission accomplished

What I want to achieve
yes
yes
yes
yes
yes
yes
yes
yes
yes
yes
yes
yes

Have a bath
Wear socks
Catch a bus
Get on a train
Go to the supermarket
Wear real trousers
Eat out with friends
Walk to work
Do a 10k run
Fly on a plane
Wear a nice suit
Do the London Marathon

By setting realistic goals, I was able to accomplish
them all. They are simple, they may be things that
everyone takes for granted, but at the time I couldn't

do things that everyone took for granted. It worked for
me. It also worked for me because I was SMART and
had a realistic plan. It has to include a time by which
to do it and be something that isn't out of your reach.
Make sure that your goals are consistent with others
and fit with your immediate and long-range plans too.

When I returned from Australia, I found myself back
home and very much at loss as to what I would do with
my life. Before I left I'd had a friend, Tamir, staying at
my house and, whilst sometimes it was difficult as we
suffered with depression, it was great company and
stopped me from sitting at home overeating. Overeating
has always been a huge danger for me and a very
personal thing which I have always done alone. People
used to comment that they couldn't understand why I
was fat because they'd never seen me eat. This was
because I'd do it all in private. I couldn't eat in company
and still struggle with it.
Being back at home with the comedown of travelling
and the reality of no money, no job and no direction
was a dangerous position to be in. This was where I
could easily fall off the wagon. Without anyone there I
was also back in an isolated environment. It would be
like going back to square one if I didn't control it.

I had to think about what I could do in life. I knew
that I had a great skill for and enjoyed helping others
and I had an unpaid column for the North West
Evening Mail, but this didn't really offer me the
structure I needed. Or the money. I had my own show
on Manchester community radio station All FM to
provide some structure but this was also an unpaid gig
and with the media banging on about the credit crunch
every five seconds I needed the kind of gig that would
pay my bills.

I was offered a job running my own bingo club in
Hyde and, while it was not ideal, it would at least keep
the wolf from the door and offer an income. I started on
1 September 2008 and, typically, by then I still hadn't
invested in a crystal ball. It was a bad decision that led
to me spiralling into depression and falling off the
wagon good and proper. Tea breaks were three-hour
spectaculars from 3pm until 6pm and I was sometimes
left in the club alone with a kitchen crammed with food
calling me. It was a very dark time and, despite
making some great friends and enjoying some aspects
of it all, it was a terrible six-month episode in my life.
We do things like this to survive - we take jobs we
don't necessarily want and in our minds we tell
ourselves It'll do for now, just till I get back on my feet
and get something permanent sorted.
I was so depressed during this period that I even
stopped going out shopping with Beryl. This had been a
routine we'd kept to every week for the last couple of
years, apart from when I was away. When you start
letting the structures in your life just fall by the
wayside, you know something is wrong. That's if you
can actually see what you're doing. When I was gripped
by depression, I could let anyone down and not know. I
could be horrible, I could be nasty and I could be very
selfish. We all can if we put our minds to it.
Depression gave me a sense of diminished responsibility
and extreme paranoia. In December I was invited
to a party and, whilst I would normally have jumped at
a chance to go to a party, I was fearful that everyone
would see that I'd gained weight and this would be too
embarrassing for me to endure. I didn't want people
looking at me, scrutinising me, commenting on how I'd
let myself go, watching what I would eat. I wanted to
go to this party feeling like a million dollars and oozing

confidence and instead I went to it feeling like I was
down and out. I shouldn't have gone. This was the
same feeling I used to get in social situations. You
know, if I was out with a group of people at a buffet or
carvery, I'd always be the one sat there with the
smallest portion. I'd feel all eyes on me, I'd know people
would be nudging each other, pointing, whispering,
without even seeing them doing it. Why? Because,
unfortunately, that's what people are like. They'd be
watching me to see how much I'd be piling on to my
plate and to see how many times I went back for more.
I'd hate walking into a room because of the reaction I
always got. And it wasn't anything new, remember, I'd
had this all my life. In fact, the staring wasn't really
that embarrassing anymore, it was boring and tedious.
Sometimes I wanted to confront people. 'Yes, I'm fat.
Yes, I'm getting some food. Look ... there's my plate.
I've just got the same as you, a little bit less, actually,'
but what would have been the point?

So, it looks like I was right after all. You may have won
the odd battle, but I won the war. If I'm the outright
winner, what does that make you? Eh? Come on ... say
it!
It makes it even better for me to see all the media
coverage you had before piling it all back on. And it's
not just the odd pound, it's stones. What now, Mr
Healthy Eating expert? Bag of pies and a fish supper
washed down with two litres of coke? Look ... there's
the phone ... why not order a couple of banquets for
two? Pretend you've got friends again for old time's
sake, what do you reckon?
You know, Walduck, I was actually scared of you at
one point. You were unbeatable. I admired what you
were doing. How often can someone say that about

you? Once you got going, there was no stopping you.
Even when you slipped up a few times, I could tell you
were strong. You had determination. No one on the
planet had done what you did. You had it all and you
threw it away.
It was just a holiday, really. But hey, you got to do a
few things that you wouldn't have had a chance to, so
at least you got something out of it. You've got your
newspaper articles to look back on, you've got the
photos of you looking in good nick to bring you back to
earth and you've got all those clothes going up in size
that you wasted your money on to enjoy on your way
back up.

When I was completely under like this, I'd be so scared
in the build-up to leaving the house. I never used to go
out unless completely necessary. I lost all my confidence.
In the past this happened because of the way
people used to treat me and sneer. It's like walking
past a dog when it knows you are scared of it - it'll
sense that fear. I think confidence is quite similar.
People pick up on it and take advantage and bully.
I'd try not to go back to my old ways, as you know. It
was a daily fight, and I was gripped by depression and
barely treading water. One time I just thought that
was it and went to the supermarket to get supplies in.
Just thinking about it had me excited ... cheese and
bread and butter, pies, pasties and cake. I went and
bought a couple of bagfuls and when I was on my way
home a woman recognised and stopped me.
'You don't know me, but I've seen you on television.
You are amazing, and I'm so proud of you,' she said.
And as she said it, she leaned in and gently held my
face in her hand and stroked my cheek so lovingly. 'You
are a wonderful young man.'
Well, that was it. I had a tear in my eye as I walked
up the road and felt so bloody guilty that I was carrying
all that food. And then again - eating food isn't a
crime.

To an extent, it was only after losing weight that I was
able to interact sociably. Yes, I spoke to people at work
and had workmates, but when I was at work I was on
my chair on the stage, behind my calling unit, behind
my microphone and I was safe. I was isolated though. I
never really spoke to anyone directly and would be
there most of the time.
To go back to square one would be a million times
worse. I'd have had a taster of what 'normality' was
and I'd see it slipping away meal by meal. As an obese
man in the past, I knew there was never going to be
any chance of me copping off with anyone on a night
out. Socialising, drinking, smoking, sex ... the main
reasons behind a night out held no interest for me. I
was only interested in eating and I wasn't going to go
to a bar on a night just to sit and eat crisps or nuts. I
couldn't understand the rationale behind it. I wanted
to be at home eating, not in a bar.
There was one time I can recall that I did drink.
During a period gripped by depression, I wanted
desperately to lose weight and felt so alone. I wanted to
get out and meet someone. It didn't have to be a life
partner; I just wanted to find someone. I have needs
too and would have loved to be a bit daring and indulge
in a one night stand or two. It doesn't make me a sleaze
or anything; it's just a basic need in life that adults
have. And lacking in the confidence department, the
way forward (so I thought) was to drink alcohol ahead
of a night on the town.
I stopped off at the shop on the way for the bus and

215

bought the cheapest thing I could find ... a bottle of
sherry. Being an inexperienced drinker, I just went
down a backstreet and necked the whole thing in one
and ended up being a lot more confident than I ever
imagined. This kind of confidence isn't really that
attractive though. I was absolutely hammered. And it
only led to wanting to eat when I returned home. I
persevered with going out for around four weeks until I
gave up. It just wasn't to be. I was just drinking
because I couldn't cope with rejection and I thought the
alcohol would turn me into Superman.
That's one of the reasons why I've never had a
relationship. I certainly would never have the courage
to ask anyone out. There's always been low self-esteem
in the way too. I've never thought of myself as
attractive. I'm sure there's someone out there who
thinks so, and would like me, but the biggest hurdle is
always yourself. You've got to love yourself before
anyone will love you, and all that. It's a big regret to
know that Preached the age of forty and had never
shared my life with anyone. At all. I'd push people
away or get the signals wrong if someone was being
kind, thinking they were attracted to me.
In terms of sex I am not saying I am a person who
has no sexual experiences at all, but certainly nothing I
would want to write about here and certainly nothing
of any earth-shattering significance. I'd never been
with anyone, never been out on a date with anyone,
enjoyed a first kiss, a relationship and certainly never
had a one-night stand. Those first weeks and months of
meeting someone when life is brilliant, waking up with
someone on a morning and feeling secure, commenting
on how they look, holding hands in public ... it's a
massive list that I thought too great to bother putting
on my list of goals that I wanted to achieve. I've

struggled with who I am since being an awkward lad
and then going through puberty and becoming an
awkward teen and then an awkward man. I've wrestled
with so many inner demons, feelings and emotions,
decisions about who, where and what I am.
I think when I lost weight, I started to see myself
for who I am and started to like myself. I definitely
started to accept myself and that was one gigantic leap
for Walduck kind. I have had a lot of attention from
women because of the weight loss. I think this is an
attraction not necessarily of how I look, but because of
what I've been through. A lot of women have gone
through the same thing and can relate to it all. If I'd
been that kind of guy, I could have taken advantage of
my position like some rock star on tour.
As I write this, it's around three years since I
hit my target weight. I still look at myself
and there are so many things I don't like.
My legs are permanently scarred and will
always serve as a reminder of the abuse they endured.
I still have wobbly bits that I'll never be happy with.
My weight will always be up and down. I've had good
spells and bad spells, but I know I'll always keep going.
I know I'll always eat instant food if I have it in the
house, so I ruled it out of my life. The temptation is
always there, always will be.

The last few years have been amazing for me, this
goes without saying. I have now completed a journey
around the world, lost thirty stones, run four Great
North Runs, four Manchester Runs, the London
Marathon, climbed the Sydney Harbour Bridge,
snorkelled on the Great Barrier Reef, eaten kangaroo
in a restaurant in Melbourne, shopped in Singapore,
jogged in Central Park and lived my life to the full.

I'm still on All FM, have my own breakfast slot on
, I help out in the bar there
too, still get interviewed all the time about health
issues and am still a regular guest on This Morning.
My latest goal is to find employment doing something
within the entertainment industry that will pay my
way and serve as the ultimate SMART move.
It isn't easy at all to cope with addiction and come
through it. Anyone who says it is cannot understand.
Life is difficult enough without feeling excluded from
society just because of the way you look. I feel I've got
the added pressure of scrutiny all the time, like there's
an expectation that I'll fall off the wagon and there's so
many people waiting to say I told you so. Those people
will be around for you too. You cannot let them affect
what you are trying to achieve. The smallest and most
hate-filled comment can set you back, but why should
you let the words of some moron get to you? Remember,
there are more good people in the world than the
morons.

When I talk at length to people about my food
obsession they tell me it is typical addictive behaviour.
Being addicted to anything can turn even the most
honest person into a deceitful one. Telling lies and
deceiving people has never been something I have been
comfortable with, but at times I have found myself
doing it. For many years, food was in control of me and
I still have my moments now when the desire to
overeat and hide myself away and binge on food gets
the better of me.
I hope by reading this book you will have been inspired
that it is possible to turn your life around
however bad things get. I hope anyone needing to lose
weight will have found some tips and motivation in
trying to achieve that goal.
Whatever anyone else might say, reading a book
will not make you thin. Nobody can make you thin,
other than yourself. I was fortunate that I had some
great support around me, but I think that you will find

that family and friends will be supportive of you once
you show you are serious. In the past I had many
attempts at losing weight and, while friends had
probably tired of my many attempts, their support was
unquestionable once my efforts started to show even
the smallest signs of success. That's what friends do they
stick by you and support you.
I will always have a problem with food and I want
to be honest about that right here and now. I have
always said I may one day end up putting the weight
back on, but every time these fears resurface I will
read the words I have written in this book, think of the
bad times and think in a positive way about the future.
I will revisit my wish list and add some new goals. I
will keep a check of my food consumption, stick to my
golden rules and look at whether I am eating right,
cooking right and shopping right. In fact, I am living
proof that it works. At one stage in my weight loss
programme I got down to thirteen and a half stone, and
boy did I look terrible. I took it way too far and looked
gaunt, like a bag of bones. I looked ill. I was advised by
Dr Chris to put a couple of stones back on. And then
when I did, guess what the comments were?
With no other real vices in my life, the only one has
always been food, so it stands to reason that I'll go off
the rails on occasion. The thing is, now I am aware of it
and can control it. I think about food every waking moment. I used to dream about food when I first
started losing weight and I still dream about it now.
The temptation is always there, so there is always
going to be a battle in my life. I'd choose the best meal
in the world above the best sex in the world. I'd choose
it above anything.
At the back of my mind, I'm always worried that I'll
fall off the wagon. Every addict will always feel this,

and because I lost the weight in such a public way I'll
always feel scrutinised everywhere I go and with every
mouthful I eat. There will always be someone looking
in my shopping basket, always someone looking at
what I eat in a restaurant and always one of them
ready to pass comment and judgement.

As I got to the end of the writing this book I had to
think long and hard about what words to use to finish
it. After all, I want the message to be upbeat. I want
you to believe that you could go away and achieve
anything you want. I visited Barrow-in-Furness for my
Dad's seventieth birthday, and a lot of kids I grew up
with were there, including my cousins Russell, Philip,
Alistair, Nigel, Robert and Elaine. We had all grown up
together and everyone's lives had turned out differently.
As I looked around the room, I could see they all
now had families of their own and it really made me
realise what I had missed out on, not just through my
lack of confidence, but mainly because everything was
secondary to food ... my addiction, my Achilles heel, my
controller. It was great to see all the family and to see
my nephews and nieces, friends and family having a
great time. It was like looking back to when we were
kids, sneaking the odd drink from Mum and Dad, with
the world in front of us. At that time, none of us knew
what the future was to hold.
I wish I could turn back the clock, but I can't. Nobody
can, and as soon as you accept that you can move
on. Living differently through hindsight would be easy
though -- there's always someone you should have said
"I love you' to, a drunken night you regret, forgetting an
important date, letting someone down ... we'd all
change something if we could. Whatever your age and
whatever your circumstances, it is never too late to

turn things around. There is always light at the end of
the tunnel. Sometimes the tunnel is long and the light
is dim, but the journey must start somewhere and it
starts with that very important first step.

Thank you for reading the book and good luck in
battling your own demons, whatever they might be.

Charles


The End.


Acknowledgements

To Dr Chris Steele from This Morning, now a personal
friend, who helped to give me the strength and motivation
to achieve my goal.
To all the production team of This Morning (Steve,
Justine, Claire, Matt and Steve) who followed me on
my journey and who gave me so much endless support.
I would also like to say a special thank you to Fern
Britton and Phillip Schofield (the then-presenters of This Morning)', two wonderful warm people who were
especially kind and who helped allay any fears I may
have had about appearing on their programme and did
all in their power to help me feel comfortable and
relaxed.
To all my work colleagues, who shared my ups and
downs, frustrations and suffered my mood swings, yet
continued to stand by me. Undoubtedly, without their
help and co-operation, I would have been unable to
continue working.
To my dear friend Lucy, who was so worried about
me that she decided to write to This Morning and who
has always been there for me and still is. Many thanks
to my other friends, especially Mark and Beryl.
To Darianne Reay, who helped with the earlier
parts of the book. Thanks must also go to the following
for providing pictures: Jeremy Durkin, the Manchester
Evening News, the North West Evening Mail and my
good pal Gary Taylor.
To Dave Foran, Paul Ripley and radio legend James
Stannage for not just giving me the opportunity to
present my own breakfast show on Manchester Radio Online but also for giving me some great support and
friendship over the last six months. Also thanks to
Dannielle Porter and Paul Graham who have given me
endless opportunities in radio.
Thanks also to David and Nicola at the Great Run
who have been fantastic in getting me involved with
the Great Run series and treated me like a real
celebrity.
Finally, to everybody who has supported me
through e-mails, telephone calls and letters. The depth
of feeling and words of encouragement have meant so
much to me.
my sincere and deepest

To each and every one of you
thanks.
Charles

About the author

Charlie Walduck is a record-breaking slimmer who
lives in Failsworth, Manchester. Amongst his jobs, he
is most well known for being a bingo caller for several
years and now hosts his own radio shows, as well as
frequently commenting on obesity issues in the media.
He's currently looking for his big break in TV and radio
and can be found most days on the URL below.

http://www.facebook.com/charlie.walduck