'I lost 5 and a half stone in five months, I'm still in awe of myself' - Portlaoise man

Mark met up with Dermot that January and he made good on his promise to help him make a diet and fitness plan, kickstarting his incredible weight loss story.

"My drive is unbelievable. I'm a completely different person than I was three years ago. I'm so proud of myself and how far I have come."

Mark said that he does fitness training seven nights a week after his 12-hour shifts at the hospital in Portlaoise and eats a very clean and healthy diet now.

"I'm not running any gyms down now but you don't need to spend hundreds of euros in gyms. I did a lot of this at home. I got a Turbo Trainer and hopped on the Turbo Trainer. 

"I started off at 15 minutes. Dermot just said to me, you know, start slowly and I did. So I went from 15 minutes to 25 minutes. Now I'm adding up to a hundred kilometres now on the bike."

Mark recalls a terrifying moment for him at the start of his journey, in January 2023, when Dermot asked Mark to send him a picture of his body to show his starting weight.

"I was in the room and I was contemplating, I was like, no, no, no, no, no, I don't want to.

So I called my partner, Bernie and I said, Bernie, will you take a picture of me? So she took a picture with me, of me. And  I couldn't even look."

Mark did end up looking at the picture that was being sent to his personal trainer and he said that he started crying when he saw it.

Another factor why Mark wanted to lose the weight and be healthier was because his dad sadly passed away 20 years ago "with a massive heart attack."

"So that was kind of in my head, like the tell tale signs to me was I was prone to chest infections, I was always sick. I was always coming down with colds."

Mark even said going up the stairs was a challenge for him at the time, leaving him out of breath.

Since losing around 6 stone altogether, Mark's life has flipped around with so many positive changes thanks to his new lifestyle.

"If you see a picture of my face, my face completely, completely changed. My posture was really bad, the picture of me sideways, I was hunched up".

Mark has also paid tribute to his wife Bernie for her constant support throughout his weight loss journey and emphasised the importance of having a good support system to help you through the hard days during your journey.

"The support Bernadette gave me was unbelievable, because with my food, I have my own food each day and so Bernadette had to kind of adjust to that as well. I used to say to Bernie, 'look I have my bit, you don't have to do this,' she was very, very supportive."