Family aspire to healthier living

BY SHIRLEY WHYTE IN TE ANAU

A Te Anau family is enjoying the benefits of being on the losing side.

The Knowles are losing weight.

Registered nurse and mother-of-two Jackie Knowles, 37, said after two children, 40kg heavier and trying every diet around, the next step for her seemed to be a stomach-stapling operation.

Her life-changing moment came on August 10 last year when she watched Close Up on television and saw the Aspire for Life weight-loss programme.

It turned out to have changed her life dramatically.

"I signed up at 1am that night and immediately set myself two goals.

"First goal was to lose 30kg by New Year's Eve. Second was to swim the 1.9km across Lake Te Anau. Both I succeeded in achieving."

Mrs Knowles has lost 39kg, husband Jeremy has lost 17kg and their two daughters are reaping the benefits of healthier eating.

"Don't get me wrong, I love my food – it's my passion," she said.

"Now I am always saying food is my friend, not my enemy.

"I believe I'm on a journey. While I'm only halfway there, I'm making it any enjoyable experience"

Mrs Knowles does casual work in the children's ward at Southland Hospital, in Invercargill, and has a real interest in helping people with their general wellbeing.

She is only too happy to pass on her understanding of the principles of the Aspire for Life programme and her new healthier lifestyle.

Her next goal is to get her total weight loss up to 40kg by Easter and compete in the Real Women's Triathlon on March 21 at Queenstown.

That's a 3.5km run, 10km bike ride and a 1.5km run.

Her fourth goal is to lose 50kg by Christmas so she can fit into her wedding dress again, followed by a plan to run the Kelper Grunt mountain race.

The beauty of the Aspire programme is doing it online with a one-on-one personalised food plan, your own private nutritionist, activity coach and recipe consultant.

Aspire for Life has a good basic food pyramid, understanding label reading, good nutrition and low-fat cooking methods with foods that give you satisfaction for longer periods, with emphasis on portion size.

"I now flavour up my foods with herbs and spices instead of fats and sugar but I do understand that good fats are necessary for a balanced diet," Mrs Knowles says.

"My nursing background helps me out here."

Exercise is a vital part of the programme and must be sustainable, fun, without pain and strain as well as optimising fat-burn.

"When I first started I could only walk for 15 minutes; now I have built my exercise up to 150 minutes a week of whatever I enjoy the most."

Since losing the weight Mrs Knowles says she sleeps better, her skin is healthier and she can keep up with her kids more easily.

It's not all hard work – people on the programme are encouraged to have three treats a week.

Mr Knowles said he was proud of what his wife had achieved.

"It has been amazing to watch the changes in Jackie.

"She is training for five or six days a week now and achieved things that she would have never been able to do before," he said.

"She has gone from being very large to a very reasonable size now."

Being a supportive husband has been easy since Mrs Knowles went on the Aspire for Life programme, he said.

"I support my wife in everything she has done, especially since she has been on this diet as I've seen her on all the other diets that she has tried and by now she is usually sick of them."

He eats whatever is put in front of him but admits he suffered from heartburn and indigestion.

"The good thing about the Aspire diet is that we all eat the same food and within three weeks of Jackie being on the programme, my heartburn disappeared and my general health has improved significantly – I've never felt better," he said.

Aspire for Life was developed by Plant and Food Research (formerly Crop and Food Research), a Government-owned research institute.

Plant and Food project manager Dr Tim Lindley said Mrs Knowles had responded to the advice of their professionals so well she was one of their champions.

"Jackie gets it. She understands how and what we are about," Dr Lindley said.

"We are really impressed with what she has done and, with her nursing background, she has seen the clinical cost of obesity first hand.

"We're not just all about weight; we're about a healthy diet and active lifestyle and getting people to enjoy their food again."

The programme came out of six-year study Lifestyle Food for Energy Management funded by the Government, at $3 million a year, conducted by Plant and Food Research and proven to work in clinical studies by the University of Otago department of human nutrition.

Otago University investigated whether a diet high in commonly available energy foods that make you feel full for longer, combined with exercise, would lose weight for 100 overweight people from the Otago region.

Over 18 months the results were comparable to a traditional low-fat diet.

Aspire for Life promotes the use of fresh, unprocessed, whole foods.

The objective is to eat mostly plant-based foods such as fresh fruit and vegetables, lentils and beans with a small amount of meat, poultry, fish and dairy produce added in.

- © Fairfax NZ News