Episode 2: From Fatty Shaz to Freedom
Welcome to the Why Weight podcast. I'm your host, Sheryl Takayama, qualified nutritionist, emotional eater, and weight loss coach who walks the talk. I've maintained my 30 kilo weight loss for the past 23 years following a low carb plan, and now I coach other women online so they can do the same. It's my mission to help women get off this crazy diet wagon and find a way of eating and a way of thinking that works so you too can lose your weight for life. Join me each week for lots of practical advice, tips, and motivation so you can start now.
Welcome back to the Why Waste podcast and thank you so much for joining me today. I hope you have had a chance to listen to the story of how I was so successful at weight gain that I was able to gain 20 kilos in a year. Today, I want to talk about just what it was like for me living as this person, as I fondly call her "Fatty Shaz" because I was her for about three years before the next journey in my life began.
During those three years, after I'd gained the weight while working, I was overweight and only continued to get bigger. When I look back on that phase, I call her "Fatty Shaz." The reason being that often that was what my head would say to myself if I was going to eat something, and then I would think, "Oh, I probably shouldn't because it's bad for me and it's gonna make me gain weight." The thought that always came into my head was, "Ah, fk it, who cares?" I should go for a walk. "Ah, fk it, can't be bothered." So that was what always used to come into my head—"fk it." That's why I call her "Fk it Fatty Shaz."
Now, Fatty Shaz was good at eating, but I have to say she wasn't particularly happy. Although I might have appeared happy on the outside, I was most definitely not happy on the inside. So today I just want to talk through a little bit about what it was like for me at that time.
I'd finished university, gained the weight, and then at the end of that year, I got a boyfriend. He was someone who was quite thin. As it's like in a new relationship, we loved eating out. I'm in Auckland, there's lots of nice restaurants, and Fatty Shaz was having a great old time eating out and drinking. It was wonderful—except the only problem was we would eat out, he stayed skinny, and I just kind of continued to gain weight. Once those wheels were in motion, my body was very good at gaining fat, and so I just slowly crept up in weight.
It wasn't like I had any area that was particularly huge, although I did hold quite a lot of my weight around the middle. I was just an all-over larger person, but I did not enjoy my life. Being 169cm tall in my late teens and early 20s and over 90 kilos—it did not work for me, especially the time that I was at a party and I was asked out loud when my baby was due.
How embarrassing. I wanted to die on the spot, and other people were around who heard. At the time, I just laughed. "Oh yeah. Oh no, I'm not pregnant." It was all funny, funny. The person felt very awkward, but oh my goodness, inside I wanted to die. I was so embarrassed. As a little side note, I've always learned from that occasion, and I never ask somebody when their baby's due, even if I obviously know they're pregnant. I'm very delicate when it comes to that topic because I know how it felt for me. So I always think, if in doubt, shut your mouth, Sheryl.
That was not particularly fun. When I would go walking—because I tried to exercise—it was very difficult because I'd go walking and I would get such chafing between my legs that it would bleed. It would bleed on the top of my thighs, under my boobs, my arms, where my arms would rub against my body. It would be chafing. It would start bleeding. It was so uncomfortable.
I hated shopping. I did not enjoy anything that involved buying new clothes or getting into a changing room. I avoided it at all costs. And of course, this was many years ago. It's not like we had the option of online shopping. There wasn't even the internet, so it was very difficult to feel that way and to live and not be able to buy nice clothes, especially at that age, because a lot of my friends were shopping. We were in our early 20s, working, starting to get money. But they'd want to go shopping, and I just couldn't think of anything worse. I would just wear those same clothes all the time.
If I wanted to go out somewhere nice for dinner or for an occasion, or even to go out to a bar, trying to think of what to wear was not exactly fun. I didn't exactly enjoy the thought of going out. My first thought was usually, "Oh shit, what am I going to wear?" That's not a good feeling.
So for me, being overweight at that time of my life was not fun. And while I was always quite confident and bubbly on the outside, inside I was very unhappy. Usually that unhappiness just led me to eat more food, drink more alcohol, and then shove a few chocolate chip cookies in my gob. So it was a very emotional time. Not that many people would have known it because I didn't talk about it.
I remember one time that was probably the worst situation for me—a real low—was when I applied to do a show because I'm actually a singer. I love musical theatre, and Auckland Music Theatre was doing a show, so I auditioned and I got in. It was really fun. It was all about World War Two, and I was enjoying the show, although I didn't love being on stage and having any attention on me because I wasn't very comfortable in my own skin. But I love performing, so I did it anyway.
It was always going okay until it came time to get our costumes. I have such a clear memory of going, "It's my turn. I have to go and get fitted for costumes," which I was dreading, of course. I went into the costume room and the ladies were measuring me up, and I just wanted to die. Then they were talking, and I could hear them saying, "Oh yeah, it might be a bit more difficult to find a costume. I'm not sure what we have," or "We better go and have a look out back." Meanwhile, I was just standing there, and I wanted the ground to open up and swallow me whole. It was my worst nightmare.
In this particular show, there were another couple of girls who were a similar age to me, a little bit younger, and they were the dancers. Of course, they all got to wear beautiful costumes and they're doing the dance scene. I would stand there looking at them, and I just wanted to be that dancer so bad. I wanted to be wearing the cute costume. I wanted to be the person who was looking forward to costume fittings, because that's one of the funnest things about doing theater—performing, getting dressed up. But I tell you what, for me, being overweight and unhappy, it was not a fun part at all.
These are the memories that I think back on now. While it was a long time ago because I've maintained my weight loss now for 23 years, it may have been many years ago, but I remember the emotions so clearly. And just as a side note, as a weight loss coach, when I've got clients sitting in front of me who feel this way, this is why I just have so much empathy for them. Because I know exactly how it feels to be so uncomfortable in your skin, and it is not fun.
So I'd done the show, had a real great embarrassment, but I did it anyway. Then came the turning point for me, which was when I applied for a job in Japan to be an English teacher. That's how I ended up with my Japanese surname. I'm sure I'm going to share that story in a future show.
I applied for this job in Japan, and as part of applying for this job, we had to do a medical. That was what got me on the scales, which was incredibly humiliating because I hadn't been on the scale for quite some time. When I got on the scales and I saw the number had gone past 90, I probably had tears in my eyes. The poor doctor, he looked at me, wrote my weight down on the form. Anyway, luckily that didn't stop me getting the job because I was successful.
Then I had a few months between getting the job and actually moving to Japan. And of course I had a little situation because I had no nice working clothes. I was going to be going to Japan in the summer, which I knew would be hot. Oh no, my worst nightmare. I'm going to have to wear shorts and t-shirts. This is going to be horrific.
So I went shopping, doing a thing I absolutely hated. I remember seeing a skirt. It was about a size 18 or 20. I went into the changing room, tried it on. I'm there in the changing room and I'm trying to get the zipper done up. And I broke the zipper. The entire zip busted. Oh my goodness, I was so embarrassed.
I went up to the counter. I didn't have the heart to tell them I busted the zip, so I just bought it. I thought, "Too bad, I'm gonna buy it." So I bought the skirt that I didn't even like that much, but it was the only thing that fit. And even that didn't fit because I busted the zip. Anyway, I took it down to my mum. My mum's great at sewing, and I said, "Mum, can you please fix the zipper for me?" So she did.
So off I trotted to Japan with the skirt that was probably way too tight, and just crossing my fingers that at least I might be able to wear it and not bust the zip while I was teaching. So that was me at that phase of life before I took the next stage, which was when I moved to Japan.
That's what I'm going to be talking to you about in the next episode. That is really the fun part, because what I'm going to talk through is the trigger that changed everything for me. That got me completely out of the zone of Fatty Shaz and put me on the path to losing 30 kilos in a year. I cannot wait to share that part of the story.
Thanks so much for listening, and if you want support in your weight loss journey, I would love to help. You'll see the links in the show notes for my socials, as well as my fab freebie, a five-day low carb meal plan, and five delicious dinner recipes. You'll also see the link for my four-week Foundations of Fat Loss program. This is the program I've designed specifically for the fat-burning needs of women over 35.
Remember, the only thing that's going to stop you reaching your goal is if you quit. Never, ever give up.
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