That's Life Magazine

Barbara Woodhams story of her body lift in Tunisia
April 29th 2010

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A few weeks ago, I opened my copy of that's life! and read a story that totally infuriated me.  It was by size-eight Charlotte Sutton, preaching about how any overweight person can shift the pounds by using just willpower, diet and exercise.

Well, that's rubbish!  I'm sorry, but it really is.  In fact, big people should listen to me.

Diets are a waste of time and money.  Anyone with weight to lose should do what I've done — pay a surgeon to chop it off.  And I'm talking blubber here, not just a bit of loose skin.  Get those rolls hacked away!

Size 12 but hate your thighs?  Go for lipo!  Dont even think about hitting the gym.  The results from plastic surgery are much more guaranteed.  And I know — I'm a nurse.

I'm also someone who spent too many years in a body I hated, and it kills me I suffered like that when there was a solution out there all along...

Aged 19, I wore a size-24 dress when I married Tony Woodham.  A year later, after having our son Scott, I decided to lose some weight.

I still shudder when I recall how I ate just cheese and an apple once a day and only drank water.  What a boring, miserable life!  I lost seven stone, but guess what?  When I thought it was safe to go back to three proper meals a day, I put it all back on — plus an extra two stone on top.

And one day I woke up and found myself aged 46 and weighing more than 20 stone.  Beyond diets by then, I decided to get my stomach banded.

It cost £5,500 from my savings and I had such high hopes.  But after two years of living with the band, I still hadn't lost any weight.

I dont really know why — I just found the pounds didn't shift as I thought they would.  So now it was time for the knives to come out.  I decided to get my fat cut off.

I knew it would be hard to find a surgeon prepared to operate, given my size and the ethics involved.

The risks of anaesthetic didn't bother me, so I found a cosmetic surgery adviser, Linda Briggs, on the internet.  She located a surgeon in Tunisia who was prepared to do what I asked.

But Tony and Scott, who was 28 by then, weren't happy.

'You could die on the operating table,' Tony warned.

He'd never minded the size of my figure.  But it did affect our lives — because I hated it.

'I'm not doing this for you,' I replied simply.  'I'm doing it for me.'

I loved my family and didn't want to worry them, but for once something else mattered more.

'You'll see how all our lives will change when I do this,' I told them, and Tony knew I wouldn't back down.  So he flew out to Tunisia with me three weeks later.

I was on the operating table for seven hours while the surgeon gave me a tummy tuck, a breast reduction — taking me from a 40H to a 38DD — and an eyelift.

Instantly I lost a whopping two and a half stone.

Pause there.  Think about it.  Thirty-five pounds of fat just gone!  I went to sleep one size, woke up much slimmer.

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