Jill Woods’ wake up call came when she struggled to squeeze into a size 20 uniform.
An A&E nurse revealed her own trauma after landing a new job, when she swapped scrubs for a posh new uniform but, at 18st, was too fat to squeeze into the size 20 ensemble, leaving her feeling like a “stuffed sausage.”
Shamefaced, mum-of-two Jill Woods, 38, of Comrie, Perth and Kinross, Scotland, vowed to finally overhaul her lifestyle once for all, signing up for a special diet plan and dropping to a slender 11st 6lb size 12 in just nine months.
But 5ft 3in Jill admits that during nearly 20 years working in hospital casualty departments, the hypocrisy of advising the public about their health, despite having a body mass index (BMI) – used as a gauge of healthy weight – of 43.3, compared to the NHS recommended level of 18.5 to 25, was not enough to make her slim.
Jill, whose husband Barry, 37, is a joiner, said: “Working shifts for nearly 20 years left my diet in an absolute shambles, I would stuff my pockets full of sweets before leaving work to make sure if I missed any meals I could get my energy fix somewhere.
“But trying on my new uniform, when I took a new job as a nurse practitioner at a private GP’s, after wearing baggy scrubs my entire working life, I realised something had to change. I didn’t want to be a chubby mummy at 40.”
Ironically, it was joining the NHS in 2000 that saw Jill, who had been comfortable with her weight through her childhood and teens, balloon in size.
Blaming her 12-hour shifts in A&E, Jill, who has two daughters, Amber, five, and Callie, two, said: “Unfortunately, as a nurse, what I was eating was at the bottom of my priorities and as I progressed through the ranks, I made less and less time to plan for proper meals.”
On a “good day,” Jill would kick off with a Starbucks latte and pastry, before having a pre-made pasta for lunch and canteen pizza for dinner.
But it was the constant snacking in between meals that she holds responsible for her expanding waistline.
“My meals throughout the day were far from healthy,” she admitted. “How on earth they fit so many calories into pre-made pasta I’ll never know, but it was the constant snacking that truly saw my weight soar.
“As a nurse, or any A&E worker, you never know when you’re going to be able to squeeze in that next meal and I’d prepare for that by filling my pockets with custard creams and ginger biscuits, wolfing them down whenever I had the chance.”
A self-confessed crash dieter, Jill did make attempts to shed the pounds – swinging between 12st and 14st for “most of her adult life,” until she gave birth to her second daughter, Callie, in 2017.
“That’s when my weight really spiked and this time it just didn’t want to shift,” she explained.
“I’d always seen getting pregnant as an excuse not to lose weight, as I knew I was going be getting big again anyway.
“With Amber, the weight came off fairly quickly and I was roughly 14 stone, but with Callie, it showed no signs of going – I just kept getting bigger.”
Then, in August last year, after being headhunted for a nurse practitioner position at a private GP surgery, Jill saw an opportunity to escape the manic shift work of A&E and spend more time with her young family.
“I’d never thought of becoming a nurse practitioner, I’d lived and breathed the trauma unit for most of my working life, but as you get older you start to realise what is important and, for me, that’s family,” she added.
Given the option between wearing her own clothes and a uniform, Jill opted for the latter to help patients recognise her position in the practice, but little did she know how much that decision would change her life.
Requesting a size 20 tunic – “just to be safe” – Jill was left mortified when the uniform arrived, and she could barely squeeze into it.
“It was just terrible. I’d ordered a size 20 thinking it would be extra roomy, but it was so tight I could hardly move,” she explained.
“I went online that very night and ordered a size bigger out of my own pocket. I couldn’t face letting work know I was too big for a size 20 and needed a size 22.”
Despite her wounded pride, Jill loved her new role, but finally, the hypocrisy of giving health advice when she was so overweight hit home.
“At the back of my mind all I could think about was my role as a nurse practitioner – helping people with their day-to-day problems, a lot of which are lifestyle related – and thinking what a hypocrite I was,” she said.
In October last year, realising she had to help herself if she was going to help her patients, Jill signed up to The 1:1 Diet by Cambridge Weight Plan, and has not looked back.
Swapping her diet of snacks and “quick and easy” food for two protein shakes a day for breakfast and lunch, a high-protein meal of chicken and boiled eggs for dinner and high-protein bar before bed worked miracles.
“My calorie intake now is roughly 1,000-a-day. It doesn’t sound like a lot, but I was surprised how easy I found it to stick to,” she said.
Losing almost a stone a month, by August this year, Jill’s weight had dropped to an incredible 11st 6lb, making her a trim size 12.
“It’s changed my life completely – friends, family and colleagues have all noticed the difference,” she added.
And it is not just her health that has improved, her confidence has too, with Jill starting a master’s degree in advanced nursing practise at Stirling University through work this week.
“I never thought I’d had the confidence to go back to university at my age but, two days into the course and I’m already loving it,” she said.
She continued: “Before my weight loss I was always hiding behind baggy clothes, but already when the lecturer asks for a volunteer my hand is the first to shoot up!”
But, since her weight loss, Jill has seen the most improvement in her home life.
“My weight completely affected my mood and I didn’t even realise,” she said. “If I wasn’t working, I wanted to crash out.”
She continued: “To me, a day with the kids was slouching on the sofa with a takeaway and a movie.
“Now we’re out and about, doing proper things as family, going on adventures around the local area.
“Amber’s even asked for a Lycra outfit to match ’Mummy’s.’ Now there’s something I never thought I’d be saying!”