New You

Grainne's story

Hi, I’m Grainne O’Driscoll. At the end of August 08 I approached New You on the advice of a friend. I was an overweight, unhealthy ,out of shape mother of two boys and my vitality was at an all time low. Walking in for my first assessment to New You was difficult as I weighed 14 stone 8lbs, had a waist measurement of 42 inches and my health was a worry having steno sis of the renal artery, hypertension, high blood pressure and ankle oedema. My self confidence was at a low and my energy levels were rock bottom.

Walking out 4 months later was easy especially as I had lost nearly 4 stone of body fat, with a 29 inch waist, having reduced it by 13 inches. My hips were down from 43 inches to 35 inches and I am now fitter, tighter and more toned than I was 15 years ago. I really feel I can stay the way I am now, proud of myself. It is difficult to explain how much this has affected me not just physically but emotionally. I feel better than ever, it has changed my shape and changed my life. I have been so empowered by this experience that I really wanted to share it with other people, so this is my true story.

I first made contact with New You towards the end of August 2008, on the advice of a friend who had attained some great results with New You a few years ago. Even though I had seen what he had achieved I was still sceptical about my own capabilities as I had tried every diet and exercise regime under the sun and I got little or no results. I was a member of various health clubs, but nothing had worked.10 years ago, I was a slim, highly active, estate agent who replaced meals with cigarettes, I never thought I would develop a weight problem. I gave up work and cigarettes when I became pregnant and I stayed at home with my two boys now aged 6 and 10. Since then, my weight has constantly fluctuated up and down, spiralling from 10 stone 7lbs to 14 stone 7bs. Along with the increase in weight came deterioration in my fitness and health. I was left feeling tired and very fed up.

Having got to the point of no return I was driven to make the call and set up an appointment to have a chat with John Kavanagh in New You. The conversation was both inspirational and eye opening. He explained in detail how their system worked and the important correlation between Exercise Nutrition and Recovery and the way it would affect my physical condition. It all seemed to make a lot of sense but it bore no resemblance to what I had previously thought was the way to lose weight and get in shape. He also allowed me to understand why I had deteriorated so much. He explained why dieting makes you fat and why intensive resistance exercise and proper nutrition was the key to not only losing fat but staying lean. I hadn’t realised that the constant starvation and unstructured aerobic workouts were stripping my body of muscle and slowing down my metabolism.

Having read Colin Duffy’s story and spoken to various people who had attended New You, I had a vague idea of what was required and John had emphasized how results orientated the system was and that my frame of mind and attitude was as important as the New You system itself. He explained that most people tended to contact them when they had got to the point where they were fairly distressed about their physical condition and they new they had to really do something about it. They got to the point of associating more pain to being in poor shape than to the possible pain of having to take action.

If I was to be successful I needed to be very clear about what results I wanted, why I wanted to achieve them and to really believe I could make some significant changes that would really make a difference to my life. I wondered how motivated I really was but when I really thought about it I could think of many reasons why I needed to do what was necessary. John explained that in order to safe guard clients and the New You reputation I needed to do a simple psychological evaluation to determine my state of change. Basically how motivated was I. John explained that to attain the best possible results I needed to adhere to the programme 100%. Getting it 70% right didn’t necessarily mean getting 70% of the results, it could mean ending up way off the mark.

On the 3\09\08 I had my first screening with the Nurse at New You, there were some positives and negatives. On the positive side my state of change was 4 out of 5 so my motivation and focus was fine. However seeing the results of my physical condition in black and white was even more disturbing and very frustrating. The Nurse, Ruth, reassured me that being frustrated wasn’t a bad thing as it would help propel me into action that would achieve great results.

I certainly needed action as my body fat was over 30%, my body weight was 93.4kg and my waist nearly 42 inches. Ruth explained I was 10 inches into what they call the Red Zone, this meant I would be prone to developing a whole list of cardiovascular and blood sugar disorders to add to my medical problems, which were already associated to my poor physical condition. Ruth completed a full physiological assessment, history of exercise and nutrition habits and evaluation of the medication I was on. I was nearly ready to start.

The next day September the 4th I met my personal trainer Andrew Spraggon, a retired New Zealand Professional Rugby player whom Louise Cullen Director of New You felt would be the best available trainer to help me attain my results. She said Andrew had come with an excellent CV from New Zealand where he had also worked as a personal trainer. Andrew definitely practised what he preached. Right from the start I realised how passionate he was about his work and how much he cared about me getting the results I had to achieve.

My first day started with Andrew mapping out my Training Nutrition and Recovery plan. He explained how precise it was and emphasized the importance of following the system to a tee. He prepared me for the various hormonal changes that would occur as a result of coming off all the rubbish I was consuming. Everything was mapped out and meticulously planned so there was no ambiguity with regard to my eating and training habits.

Andrew called my food intake Optimum Nutrition as it was not based upon calories, it was structured on my body composition. I was actually shocked at how much food I was able to eat and the regularity of the meals. Starving the body was definitely not on the agenda. It was all about giving the body the energy giving foods it required to allow the body to complete intensive workouts. supplying the building blocks so the working muscles had the components to recover properly after training allowing my metabolism to speed up and burn fat. I had to eat 5 times per day eating a balanced diet of complex carbohydrates, lean proteins and essential fats.

I found the first 2 weeks hard enough due to the lack of junk food, caffeine and alcohol. I did feel instantly better with regard to energy and vitality but I could feel the toxins for want of a better explanation leaving my body. Andrew did explain that wasn’t quite what was happening but I hung on to the thought anyway, it was getting me through it.

The workouts were incredible, I never experienced anything like it before , nor the ability of Andrew to be able to bring the body to the limit without really noticing the pain. There was certainly a euphoric feeling for hours after training and after just 2 weeks I was really starting to feel sensational. However, I had a family wedding and was going away to England for the weekend. I was freaked I would undue my good work. Andrew told me to chill out and use it as a day off to charge up my metabolism.

At the wedding friends could already see a significant difference in me which was only 3 weeks after starting in New You. They were right I had my next assessment on the 24/09 3 days after the wedding and 21 days after starting with New You. I had already lost 15lbs, my waist had dropped an incredible 6 and a half inches and my body fat had come down from 30% to 27 %. I really felt inspired. I now had the momentum to get where I wanted.

At this point I was training 5 times per week and I had another assessment 2 weeks later on the 7\10\08. I was down another 9 lbs to 181 lbs or 82kgs. This was 25lbs in one month. I had copied Colin Duffy’s story from the New You website, I was reading it to help me get over difficult days, it really did keep me very focused and along with the encouragement from Andrew and everyone at New You I was well on my way. I couldn’t believe how I was feeling and looking.

On the 18/11/08 10 weeks after starting I had my next assessment. I was now down another 17lbs to 164 lbs and my waist was now at 29 and a half inches from an original 42 inches and my body fat was down to 24%. At this stage I was not only burning fat and losing inches I was getting significantly stronger and fitter. As a result the intensity of the training was increasing so I actually needed to train less and have more recovery time as Andrew explained so we reduced the training to 4 times per week.

With each workout I continued to get stronger, fitter, leaner and smaller while my energy and vitality had soared. My next assessment was 13/01/09 and even despite getting through the festive season I had lost another 9 lbs, my body fat had dropped to 23%, my waist was down to 28 and my hips were down from an original 43 inches to 35 and my lean tissue has increased from 66% to 75% so my metabolism is significantly faster than when I started.

I have to say that the over all experience at New You was fantastic not only has it changed my shape it has changed my life in so many ways. I have much more energy to enjoy the things I love doing, I have more energy for my two boys and their eating habits have improved drastically. I’m happier and I now have the knowledge and ability to keep myself feeling great forever. I would like to thank Andrew for his massive contribution in guiding and motivating me over every hurdle and to everybody at New You for their very caring attitude, the support and encouragement really made the difference to me.

The Dress

About three years ago I bought a black size 10 dress in Debenhams, when I was actually between a 16 or 18. I had some mad idea that if I bought it I would be spurred on to get myself into shape, lose some weight and get in to that dress. I will never forget carrying the dress up to the till where I pretended to the sales girl that the dress was a present for my cousin because they only had it in small sizes.

The first day with Andrew he delved to really identify what my motivations were and I told him that getting into this dress would be a huge achievement for me. From then on, every couple of weeks or so Andrew would ask me “How are we doing on that dress?” At first I could just about squeeze it up to my hips, then a little further up my back. Andrew helped me visualise that fitting in to it comfortably, was just around the corner. I began to really believe we could achieve it. Gradually week by week I was getting closer. The day I zipped it up all the way was a real thrill.

The Dress now fits me fine and it’s the black dress you see me wearing on the New You internet site.

Grainne.