Kay Illingworth

Inventor's Story

A shattering life change caused me to balloon from size 12 to size 26. I hid behind the weight for a while, invisible to the world, until I finally reached the conclusion that if I didn't do something about my weight then nobody else would! However, once I had made the decision, I quickly realised that there wasn't any real help unless I looked for it directly.

Armed with that revelation I made an appointment with a dietician. After chatting for half an hour she passed me my diet on three sheets of A4. Foods I could eat freely, foods to eat in moderation and foods to avoid. I was instructed that the only true method of weight loss is to get the energy balance right, consume fewer calories and expend more energy.

The dietician told me it was really important to weigh my food, 2-3 ounces of protein and 3-4 ounces of starchy carbohydrates in my main meal, with the bulk of the food made up from the free list she had given me.

I weighed 18 stones (252lb) nearly. According to her sheet I should be about 9st 11lb (137lb). Think I would be a size 6 at that weight, but I digress. After three weeks on my diet I went for a follow up appointment, was weighed and then disappointed to have only lost 1lb. The dietician was rather dismayed with me and asked if I had, in fact, been following her advice?

I insisted that I had cut out all fatty/sugary foods and alcohol but admitted to not weighing my portions, which I though was an unreasonable request.

Having left her office, with a flea in my ear, that evening I decided on a quick weight check on my steaming pasta dinner. I guessed I was cheating. I thought the portion size looked more like 6-7 ounces not 3-4. Imagine my horror when it tipped the scales at 16 ounces. OH YES - I had a full one pound of pasta on my plate, enough, the dietician said, for four meals!!!!!

In a flood of tears, I shouted, "What does 3 ounces look like then?!?" That evening The Diet Plate ® was born. The world's first ever "Portion Control" plate. The rest, as they say, is history.

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