My name is Sabrina Simmons, I am a weight loss specialist from Portsmouth UK and I created the 'Lose For Life' system to help women change their lives just like I did.

My own weight struggles started at a very young age. From childhood I was overweight and developed emotional attachments to food early on in life, which developed into a binge eating disorder that nearly cost me my life as I became morbidly obese and struggled with health issues including recurring blood clots as a result of my weight and immobility.

I was deeply depressed, hated the way I looked, and especially hated the way that I behaved around food, but felt powerless to change, which meant that my self-worth was non existent, as was my self-belief. So I resigned myself to always being unhappy and overweight. 

I found myself locked into a vicious cycle of self-destructive behaviour, deeply resenting myself for not having the willpower or courage to take control of my life.

I would go through intermittent periods of trying to change, and was a reoccuring member of a well-known slimming club which was my 'go-to' solution. But all I ever got from that was heavier and more depressed. Because although I would always start off well, and lose weight with their plan, I could NEVER maintain the results, and always ended up back at square one, feeling frustrated and defeated and disgusted with myself yet again. 

But I still kept going each week hoping that one day it would finally 'stick'. Which it never did. ,Br>
And I knew deep down that nothing ever would change unless I changed my mindset, because I had been told this enough times by all of the PT's, Slimming Group consultants and weight loss coaches that I had paid for over the years. But I can hand on my heart, honestly say that not once in over two decades of hearing that from the coaches and consultants I visited was I actually ever given any sound advice or genuine guidance on how to achieve it.

And so every time it was preached to me again I would find myself switching off or getting annoyed, wondering if it actually was such a key factor in weight loss, then why weren't any of these "experts" actually teaching me how to do it?!

And eventually this bothered me so much that I raised that question at my slimming club meeting. 

I sat and listened to the consultant talk about the importance of changing your mindset, and that in order to achieve our goals we are required to ‘let go of food guilt, change our relationship with food, and become more positive’.

And then I sat patiently waiting for the consultant to deliver follow up steps to that ‘call to action’, but that was it. That was the full extent of her advice. She told us what we needed to do, but gave no advice or instructions on how to actually do it.

And at this point I was fed-up, losing faith and struggling to stay motivated and so I found myself just blurting out "How? How do I actually do that?". And once  again, she reeled off all of the things that I needed to do, but gave no inclination of how I could do that. And I think she could see the frustration I was experiencing in that moment, because she then added "you just have to want it enough".

I honestly wanted to just say "oh f*ck off Linda!", because I knew that I wanted to lose weight more than anything in this world. I didn't want to keep sabotaging myself. I didn't want to hate myself so much due to my constant intrusive thoughts and inability to eat like a "normal" person that I became reclusive to hide the shame, and after suffering from multiple blood clots in my legs over the years due to my weight and lack of mobility I didn't want to eat myself into an early grave. But I didn't know how to break free. It felt as though my mind was my enemy, and I was constantly at war with myself.

I can honestly say that I was deeply depressed and absolutely desperate for even a moment of of peace and freedom. So it was insulting to suggest that I "just didn't want it enough". Because I  100% wanted change, I just didn't know where to start. 

So I went home feeling embarrassed about my outburst as well as disheartened, and frustrated because I was still none the wiser on how to change my mindset.

A few more weeks passed of me attending groups, and my motivation levels started to drop down as my weight started to creep back up, with the all too familiar- "where do you think you're going wrong?" questions every time I stepped on the scales. 

And at this point I knew that if I wanted to change my mindset, I would need to learn how myself, and so I did, and this was how-And at the point I was on a downward spiral, and had started to believe that I was just a hopeless case that would never lose weight unless I did something drastic, and out of desperation and despair I made a very reckless choice. I foolishly ordered diet pills that I had seen advertised online. And to be clear, we aren't talking legitimate weight loss medication from a pharmaceutical site, we're talking about unlicensed pills that I bought off of Facebook from a random person in a weight loss group. The advert had promised "rapid results", and that was all I wanted in that moment, because my mental health was at its lowest point and I felt worthless, useless and was desperate to get rid of this weight.

And at first I was fine on the tablets and losing weight fast, but after about six weeks I began to feel unwell suffering from extreme stomach pains and swelling in my abdomen. I tried to ignore it (because I was a pro at avoidance) and crack on with my life and mum duties, but the pain rapidly worsened and I began vomiting violently with the pain becoming so severe that I fainted.  

I was rushed to hospital and after scans was diagnosed with a bowel obstruction, which transpired had been caused by the diet pills as they had contained guar gum (a thickener) which had formed a gel-like mass in my digestive tract. I needed to undergo an intestinal obstruction repair, and was told how lucky I had been, as it could have been fatal.

This ended up being a tipping point for me, because the worry and concern on my loved ones faces finally meant I had to take accountability for the choices I had been making in being  negligent with my health. I realised that although I was using food in an attempt to self-sooth and manage my struggles, I was  instead intensifying them and harming myself because of the health consequences that ensued. 

At this point in my life I had reached the heaviest weight I had ever been making me morbidly obese, and I was struggling to perform even simple daily tasks. Which is a huge issue when you're a mum. 

So I knew I needed to change my ways before it was too late, but I also knew that for the entire two decades so far that I had been trying to lose weight, I had failed. So those ways categorically were not working for me. And all I kept coming back to was the advice that if I changed my mindset I could change my life, and I knew that I had to stop focusing all of my time and energy on changing my body, and instead focus it on changing my mindset.

So instead of returning to my slimming group I took my monthly membership fee and instead brought a book called ‘The brain that changes itself: Stories of personal triumph from the frontiers of brain science’ by Norman Doidge.  And this began my journey into studying neuroscience, nutrition, biohacking and weight management.   

And after years of feeling so helpless, I began to see a light at the end of the tunnel. Because the more I studied these fields, the more light bulbs went off in my head and things began to finally make sense to me.

I learnt about Cognitive Behavioural Therapy and Neuro Linguisting Programming, and how they can both help you to rewire your brain from a 'failure mentality' to a 'success mentality'. I began to understand that my lack of success so far was never because I was ‘born this way’ or incapable of ever losing weight. It was because I needed to do far more to lose weight then control my calorie intake, I needed to reprogram my mind and reset my biology, which meant that I needed a different kind of weight loss system to the ones I had been using. This also meant that I wasn't failing at weight loss, the commercial systems that were touted as "the best solution" were failing me due to how insufficient they were.

But sadly, I couldn't find a system that covered it all, so instead along with lots of self-help books, and YouTube tutorials I had to save up enough money so that I could see therapist, dieticians, health practitioners and coaches to help me change.

I learnt about Neuroplasticity- (the brain's ability to reorganise itself to adapt and change old behaviour, and to create new neural pathways to implement new habits and behaviour), as well as learning that you can alter your brain chemistry by changing your thoughts, experiences, diet, activities and implementing various behaviour modification and health practices , and gradually my mindset started to change, as did my body. 

And all though this was overall a positive experience for me, it was very costly and time consuming, so the whole time I was on this journey I found myself wishing that a weight loss system could have existed that offered all of these practices, tools and teachings in one place. I guess as a "one stop weight loss shop". And as I continued to work on myself, and change my life that idea stayed firmly in my mind. 

I was able to lose 129 lbs throughout that journey, but for me, that number wasn't even the biggest achievement. The biggest achievement for me was the fact that after two decades I overcame my emotional and binge eating patterns, because the self-loathing, guilt and regret that always followed a binge felt like emotional torture. I also stopped continuously sabotaging my efforts so became more consistent, and learned how to manage my emotions better which led to healing past traumas, and I started to aspire to achieve more from life as I became more confident in my abilities to achieve things, and I improved my mental health so significantly that I was finally able to come off of the anti-depressant tablets that I had been on most of my adult life.  

Another unexpected benefit was I no longer tolerated toxic behaviour due to low self-worth, and after years of only ever being in toxic relationships I finally found myself in a healthy and happy relationship. 

I felt happier and more in control of my life then I had ever felt. I had achieved complete emotional and physical freedom, and that was because although my objective was to transform my mindset to lose weight, it transformed my mindset in EVERY way.  

And this clearly became apparent to others, because people around me started to pay me compliments on these changes, and some even began asking me to also help them achieve the same, which I was more than willing to do because I had developed a real passion for the process.

And the more people that I helped the more I realised that I hadn't been alone in this struggle, there were so many people struggling to lose weight due to the exact same reasons as my own. 

And once again the idea of a "one stop weight loss shop" came into my mind, and I knew that if a weight loss system like that existed,it would transform the lives of so many people. 

And so I decided as it didn't exist, that I would create one. I was going to create a commercial weight loss system that encompassed all of the areas needed for deep-rooted change, and so to do this I would need to gain some accreditations. So I began studying to gain qualifications in all of the science based practices and fields that I had used on my own journey. Which I funded by working as a health trainer, because as a single mum from a council estate on benefits, I didn't exactly have the capital to build an empire. But I had passion and purpose, so I  made it work. And after five years of studying I gained all of the necessary qualifications and started my own coaching business delivering my system to groups and in 1-1 sessions with amazing results, before finally developing it as the online system you are now currently using.

And so when I say this system can achieve huge life transformations, I'm living proof of it. And If I could change my life, anyone can.