The issue of weight management is perhaps the most complex and challenging that the individual and the therapist will ever tackle. We do not have to smoke, gamble or take drugs to live but we all have to eat. We are out of the necessity to survive surrounded by the stimulation of food every day, at least three times a day.

I have been overweight since the age of eight when following a severe attack of mumps, I doubled my body weight in two years becoming the weight I should have been as a grown adult by the age of 10. I was referred to a specialist and told that I would be on a restricted diet for the rest of my life. Try telling that to a ten year old with a sweet tooth!

All of you with a life long pattern of diets, weight loss, weight gain plus, more diets, more weight loss, even more weight gain, will recognise the scenario. We become experts at weighing food portions, estimating calorie values, food combining, negative calorie foods, fat leaching drugs with unpleasant side effects and if like me you were prescribed amphetamines at age 17 in the days when this was legal, you also know what it is like to feel like a cartoon character in fast forward. ( I ditched them after day 2). I tried every diet known to man and almost every slimming club, all with short term success and long term increased weight.

Every diet works. Let's not fool ourselves. Calorie restriction combined with increased physical activity will lead to weight loss. It might not be the impossible five stones we all want gone in time for next year's wedding but there will be slow steady weight loss. Unfortunately, diets work but not forever. When we see ourselves as "on a diet", we immediately programme ourselves to believe there will be a time beyond the diet where "normal eating" can resume. It is our version of  "normal" that got us into this mess in the first place.

What I can offer you is what has worked for me. I was and still am very obese  but I am steadily losing my excess weight without struggle. This Christmas I put on precisely one pound where normally it would have been between seven and ten. That extra pound was gone by the 7th January. I ate what I wanted and when I wanted. I stopped eating when I had enough and I enjoyed every mouthful.  On holiday this year I lost 3lbs where most people gain.

What made the difference?

I have programmed myself through hypnosis and EFT to eat only when truly hungry, to stop when I am comfortably full and to eat only what I truly enjoy. I eat slowly and I make sure that I get full taste value out of every mouthful. I am physically more active than I have been for many years. I drink lots of water and I have rediscovered my body's natural rhythms of eating and the signals that tell me I have had enough have been rediscovered.

Of course, if you are not ready to throw away the diet books, the calorie counters and the weekly humiliation of the dreaded public weigh in, then I can and will support you in adhering to the excellent eating programmes and psychological support offered by organisations such as Weight Watchers and the many others out there. When you are ready to wean yourself away from allowing others to dictate what you should or should not eat, then I can help you to transition into taking back control of your eating permanently.

Whether you require support in losing a particular craving, such as chocolate, or reinforcement of your commitment to a diet or exercise programme, I can help. Above all, when you are ready to be in complete control of your body, then I will support you in doing so. It's over to you now.

Maria Doherty - 01698 458670

or e mail me with your questions at achangeinmind@blueyonder.co.uk

Telephone and e mail support is available if you are unable to attend in person.