Nicola Ellery from New Mill is the West Yorkshire Slimming World Woman of the Year 2010 after losing a staggering nine stones in weight. How did she become half the woman she once was? Hilarie Stelfox found out

IT’S no mean feat to shed a whopping nine stones of surplus weight which is why slimming club leader Lynda Thwaites calls the newly slimline Nicola Ellery “our star and an inspiration to others.”

Nicola, 40, who lives in New Mill, was so overweight when she joined the Slimming World class in Holmfirth 17 months ago that she was experiencing potentially serious health problems.

“I got out of breath going up hills and my asthma was getting worse,” said Nicola. “I got repeated chest infections, aches and pains, dizzy spells and terrible heartburn. My blood pressure and cholesterol levels were both high.”

Although she didn’t know it, Nicola weighed 19 stones 6lbs.

“When I went for the first weigh in I asked them not to tell me what I weighed,’’ she said. “I never weighed myself. I was worried that if I found out it would seem like a long road with no end in sight and that I just wouldn’t be able to do it.’’

All she knew was that she was wearing size 26 clothes and no longer wanted to be an overweight mum.

She set herself the target of shedding four stones before Christmas 2009, two stones before a school reunion in May 2010 and then another two stones in the run-up to her 40th birthday in August.

She met every target and surpassed them by losing another stone. Today she weighs just over 10 stones, the weight she was more than a decade ago.

“I feel wonderful now,’’ said Nicola who has two children, Adam, 16, and Tyler Jane, 10. “All the health problems have gone, my blood pressure is fine and I’m doing everything I can to get my cholesterol back to normal,” said Nicola.

Nicola has been a model slimmer, sticking carefully to the club’s eating plans, attending meetings regularly and encouraging others – but she has also taken the initiative.

After losing the first few stones she discovered, as many do, that the weight loss was slowing down. “I decided that I needed to exercise,” she said. “I’ve got a dog and I used to walk it every day, although the dog would get the exercise while I just stood and threw a ball.

“So I started walking much longer distances, going out seven days a week.”

Then Nicola was joined by three friends – Michelle Tracey, Ruth Graham and Maggie White – who had becoming Slimming World members after witnessing her amazing weight loss.

The foursome formed what they call the Holmfirth Walking Club and go on regular two or three-hourly treks around the Holme Valley.

“Nicola’s really good at keeping us going,’’ said Michelle who has lost four stones. “She always includes a big hill in every walk and makes us run the last bit. But it’s good fun – we have a chat and a bit of a laugh.”

Ruth has managed to shed 1½ stones and Maggie 3½ stones.

“I will always walk as far as I can now, “ says Nicola. “Walking is great exercise. It’s free and you get to see the countryside and wildlife. We have been to places in the Holme Valley that we’d never seen before.

“Not everybody likes gyms, I find them intimidating, but I love walking.”

Nicola, who is a housewife, can trace her weight problems back to the days when her daughter, Tyler, was a toddler.

She said: “Tyler was two when she was diagnosed with Nephrotic Syndrome – a disease that affects the kidneys – and she’s had to take quite a high dose of steroids ever since.

“When she was small we had to be careful that she didn’t get infections and I stayed in quite a bit. I think I got depressed and began doing a lot of comfort eating. I’d buy a bar of chocolate and hide it and eat when nobody was about. I was addicted to all the wrong foods.”

Although she has always made home-cooked meals and eaten a lot of vegetables, Nicola says it was the extra foods – the Kit Kats, cakes, pastries, crisps and pies – that helped the weight to pile on.

“I’d skip breakfast and then eat four sandwiches for lunch with a bag of crisps because I thought it would balance out,’’ she said. “Now I know that it’s really important to have breakfast.”

When she gave up smoking three years ago Nicola’s size really ballooned.

And it was shortly after that she made the decision to join Slimming Word.

“My daughter was being name-called at school,’’ she said. “Kids were saying she was fat which she isn’t – it’s just that the steroids have affected her – and then pointing to me and saying ‘you’ve got a fat mum, that’s why you’re fat’.”

She added: “Then we’d been on holiday and my son asked me why I’d never been swimming with him and I felt so guilty.”

Nicola says she has adopted a whole new lifestyle. She’s given up chocolate altogether and saves her treats – the ‘Syns’ allowed by Slimming World – so that she can have a glass or two of wine.

“I eat tons of vegetables and loads of fruit, particularly berries, which are a good slimming food,” she said. “I have got rid of all the processed snacks and pastry but I still allow myself a treat now and again because that’s healthier than depriving yourself totally and falling off the wagon.”

Her health and fitness levels are so much improved that she completed this year’s charity Race for Life in just 26 minutes.

“I was very pleased with myself because I hadn’t done any running since I was 15,” said Nicola.

Today, Nicola is literally a shadow of her former self – so much so that old acquaintances pass her in the street not recognising her slender and more stylish figure.

“I care about what I wear now,” she said. “I feel much more attractive and more confident. I can walk with my head held up high and I’m not trying to cover up any more.”

Nicola has been chosen to represent West Yorkshire in the national heats of the Slimming World Woman of the Year competition. On October 10 she’ll be travelling to the company’s headquarters in Derbyshire where 10 finalists will be chosen to appear at a gala evening in November.

Nicola’s club leader Lynda Thwaites said: “Nicola has said that she won’t be disappointed if she doesn’t win. She’s just happy to have got there. We are all really proud of her. Nine stones is a huge weight loss. I’ve never had anyone in any of my classes lose so much.”