About Siobhan (Slimming Eats)

My Story

Hey there! I am Siobhan the creator of Slimming Eats and the person behind all the recipes you see here on Slimming Eats. I develop, test, cook and photograph every recipe you see on here.

I was originally born in London, but have also lived in Ireland, various places in England and now live in Ontario, Canada with my husband, two children and two cats.

I have tried many diets in the past and while I was successful at losing weight. I often found it was hard to maintain in the long run and went from losing weight to gaining weight, to losing weight to gaining weight again. The things I’m coming to realize is if it feels like a diet it will not be maintainable. If you want to loos weight and keep the weight off, it has to be a lifestyle change, one you can maintain for ever.

I was pretty slim up until about age 16, but an unhealthy life of too many takeaways and unhealthy choices saw my weight gradually start creeping up and up.

Fast forward quite a few years of yo-yo dieting and then getting married and having my son (first child) in 2006. I fell under the misconception that you can eat what you want when pregnant (well you can but not without consequences) and the weight piled on massively.

Then I had a pretty traumatic birth experience and afterwards looking back now, I think I most definitely had some PND and with that saw even more weight going on, which in turn made me feel even worse about myself. Catching glimpses of pictures of me with my son would make me feel quite depressed as I looked so unhealthy.

The before pic you see here is me at my heaviest and at a time when I was very sad and miserable despite having a beautiful little boy.

A few months after that picture, I once again embarked on another diet. Which was thrown into turmoil with a move to Canada and well you can imagine how that went with the changes in food. Getting used to all the different foods and somewhat bigger portions was really tough, not to mention settling into a new country and being far away from friends and family.

It was catching a glimpse of myself  in a photograph of me holding my son on a day trip out to the lake near where we live in Canada (you can see that picture below in my before and after pictures below) , that made me decide enough was enough and that I had to do something to get myself healthy, not just for me, but for my son.

The Start of Slimming Eats

A good friend of mine back in the UK had mentioned Slimming World to me and how she was doing really well with the plan and so I decided to give it a go.

Living in Canada, however, there were no meetings to go to, so my only option was to sign up online. I was sceptical at first with the plan. I mean how on earth could you eat all those delicious free foods and lose weight? but I trusted the process and couldn't believe it as the weight started to come off. I knew this was the plan for me, as I felt it was something that could be maintained long term, not a short-term fix I couldn't stick to. Slimming World teaches you how to naturally balance your plate, so you never feel deprived of any of the foods you love. It really helps you to re-assess the way you look at food. When it comes to any weight loss journey it’s about finding what works for you. For some it might be calorie counting or another plan, but for others that constantly having to count calories and weigh food etc is just not maintainable. Neither are right or wrong of course. But whatever plan you choose to follow, ask yourself can I stick to this way of eating full time? If your answer is no, then you know it’s not going to work.

In 2010 and much much much slimmer, I fell pregnant with my daughter. There was no way I was going back to how I was before, so I stuck to eating balanced healthy meals all through my pregnancy and only gained a total of 12 or so lbs and was back into my pre-pregnancy clothes a week after she was born. I felt the healthiest I had ever felt in so many years, a very different story to my pregnancy with my son, where I was hugely overweight, had high blood pressure and just felt generally unwell.

On my journey I felt I needed a place to stay accountable as well as have somewhere to share my recipes. One thing I found was that most “low calorie” recipes were tasteless and far too restrictive or just not inspiring especially for a family and the last thing you want to do especially with a busy schedule is to have to cook separate meals. So for me it was important that my family could eat the food I cooked too.

That there was the motivation to start my blog in 2009 and what soon became:

Through this I found I had a real passion for cooking (which is probably one of the reasons I became overweight in the first place). I am not a trained or experienced chef by any means. I just a mum who likes to cook and with that I also love the challenge of trying to convert my all time favourite meals into much more healthier versions that the whole family can enjoy. But the best thing of all has been sharing them with other people, so they get to enjoy them as much as I do. The support I have received back from you my readers has been amazing.

Slimming Eats has over 900 delicious healthy recipes to help you on your journey.

Since starting on my journey back in 2009, I have completely changed my eating habits - no more restrictive diets, just good balanced healthy food.  I try to avoid eating too many artificial or processed foods. It's all about a healthy balance. That's one of the reasons I use "real" ingredients in the majority of my recipes. 

Below you can see a before and after pic of my original Weight loss journey

How am I doing now?

In 2018 I had to deal with loss of a parent from dementia. I had already been dealing with the stress and upset of a having a parent with this awful illness years before, made even harder by living so far away too. With dementia you actually grieve the loss of that parent twice. First to the illness and then again when they pass away. It was a very upsetting time in my life and one no one can ever be prepared for . Then towards the end of 2019 I started to feel quite unwell, very lethargic and fatigued along with many other symptoms. It was horrendous and I just didn't feel like myself at all. I have also always struggled with Anxiety and Depression, but this was probably the worst I had felt in a long time.

After a visit to my family doctor and various blood tests, ultrasounds and appointments. I finally got my diagnosis of Hypothyroidism along with the Autoimmune Disease (Hashimotos), this was on top of the PCOS I already was diagnosed with years before.

Then just as I am trying to adjust to new medication and work on making myself feeling better, we get thrown into the Covid Pandemic of 2020 and various restrictions and lockdowns.

I am not at goal yet, because honestly I am not perfect and all those things have seen a few lbs go back on and off here and there.

I’ve also realized too especially with in the last few years that being healthy is not about what a number tells us on a scale, it’s about how we feel about ourselves overall. At times In the past I would completely obsess over that number on the scale, weighing myself several times a day and if you suffer with emotional eating it can be really unhealthy, because that number can really effect your motivation. Yes, it’s nice to see the number on the scales going down, but it won’t always be that easy or simple, it can fluctuate for a whole heap of different reasons. There is nothing worse than having a really good week and then stepping on those scales and seeing that number go up, it can make some resort to comfort eating for the next few days and then undo all that hard work of the previous week.

I always say to take one day at a time. Don't compare yourself to others. This is your journey and we are all human and things happen. Just embrace healthy eating with sensible portions and make this a lifestyle change. It doesn't matter if you take the slower scenic route, we are all after the same goal, which is to get healthy.