As Matt Penzer donned his work uniform and looked at his reflection, he was unhappy with what he saw.
“I looked in the mirror and pushed my love handles up, and thought ‘What would I look like if I didn’t have these’?,” Matt, 27, told The Mirror.
Always being fairly slim as a teenager, Matt reckons he started to pile on the pounds after marrying his husband Brett in 2015.
“It wasn’t his fault or anything, but I just got comfortable and I became less mobile. I’d always been quite active at school and in college, but I just got lazy,” he recalled.
After getting married, Matt lived with Brett and his mum and was out of work for a while. During this time, he says his weight started to balloon.
“I’d get up and have glasses of coke and fizzy drinks. I love Kettle Chips and wouldn’t really have a proper breakfast. I’d just eat a whole bag and not really think about the calories.
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“Living with my mother-in-law, she’d cook big fry ups with spam, eggs, sausages and then make sandwiches with four slices of bread. This was all before dinner!
“Then for dinner I’d have a large meal with chips and mayonnaise. Maybe pizza or a takeaway.”
Over the course of a day, Matt, from Birmingham, estimates he ate between 3,500 and 4,500 calories - without really thinking about the nutritional content of his food.
Towards the end of 2019, however, he decided it was time to make a change. Now working in security, he hated how he looked in his uniform and knew he had to start eating more healthily.
So as the clock struck midnight on 1 January 2020, and weighing 15st 12lbs, he vowed to eat better and get active.
“I thought, ‘This is it, I’m going to do it’. I had my belly hanging out and thought, ‘I don’t want to be like this forever’.
“I went in 100% and knew I needed to change something, no excuses.”
Instead of following a particular diet plan, Matt swapped his old go-to meals for healthier alternatives.
He said: “I cut out bread and started researching foods that were bad for you - some of them came as a surprise.
“I stopped eating crisps and biscuits and drinking fizzy pop. If I wanted a sandwich for lunch, I’d swap out bread for rice cakes. For breakfast, I’d have an apple and a banana.”
He also cooked all his food in low-calorie alternatives to oil, which he still uses to this day.
Matt also tracked his daily calories using MyFitnessPal to keep on top of how much he was eating.
By March 2020, Matt had already lost two stone and was over the moon with his progress. But when lockdown hit, he was terrified he’d slip back into old habits.
“I worked for a week before I got put on furlough and I was so scared I’d go back to how I used to be, and maybe even put on more weight,” he said.
With gyms closed and admitting he’s never been the type of person to go for a run, Matt worried about how he’d stay active.
But a purchase he and Brett had made before Christmas proved to be his saving grace - the Nintendo Switch games console.
The pair had bought a Ring Fit Adventure game for the console, which gets people moving while they play.
“I’d get up six days a week and go on the Ring Fit for an hour. I made sure I did it every morning, with one day off,” Matt said.
“It was great entertainment as well as a good fitness game. It really helped me to lose weight because it was tough and actually tired me out.”
After three months of a strict lockdown, with little else to do other than play Ring Fit Adventure, the weight had fallen off Matt.
And he realised just how much progress he’d made when he saw his mum for the first time as lockdown eased.
“She said she saw me walking up the street and didn’t know it was me at first. She was amazed, it took her a minute to register such a massive change in such a short period of time,” he recalled.
As he met up with more family and friends he hadn’t seen for months, Matt was showered with compliments over his appearance.
By the end of July, he’d reached his goal weight of 8st 12lbs and was so pleased with the progress he’d made.
Eighteen months on, Matt has maintained his goal weight with healthy eating habits - but he admits he’s barely used the Ring Fit since.
“My job is quite active and I do a lot of walking and lifting, so I have exercise in my everyday life,” he said.
Have you had an incredible body transformation? Email jessica.taylor@reachplc.com
Looking back on his incredible weight loss, Matt says anyone else can achieve the same if they are motivated enough - even if they don’t have all the tools.
He said: “I’m proof that you don’t even need an expensive gym membership to lose weight - you just need a Nintendo Switch.”
