South Side Couple Loses 109 Pounds

Photo: Before and after photos of Dave and Nancy McMorran, a South Side couple who lost 109 pounds between them at Kelly Devine Rickert’s nutrition class at SXU.

By Kelly Devine Rickert, MS, RDN, CSSD

Kelly Devine Rickert is a Registered Dietician from Tinley Park. Her company Devine Nutrition provides nutritional services to families, individuals, companies, coaches, amateur athletes, health clubs and schools around the Southland. Contact Kelly at devinenutrition@hotmail.com.

Through the Devine Nutrition/Saint Xavier Weight loss class, I have met hundreds of people trying to change their lifestyles and to lose weight. I love following peoples progress not only through the 8 week class but afterwards as well. Two “students” from my winter class Dave and Nancy McMorran, at Saint Xavier University have kept in touch, emailing me and letting me know how they are doing from time to time since the class ended in March.

Dave is now down 69.6 lbs. He has shrunk from a 54R jacket to a 44R jacket, and a 42” waist to a 36” waist!

Nancy is down 39.5 lbs. She has dropped 4 pant sizes, and 5 shirt sizes!

That would be a total of 109.1 pounds lost since January of 2015!

Since something clearly “clicked” with Dave and Nancy, I invited them to my current weight loss class I am hosting in Tinley Park, to talk to the participants about what worked for them and what challenges they faced along their journey.

Here is what Nancy and Dave had to say:

Where we were…

Unhealthy breakfast… if at all

Next meal was dinner… and a giant portion.

Eating was always reactionary and need based

Snacking didn’t exist unless it was comfort food

Forget about nutrition

As a result… We had no energy, sitting in front of the TV was all we did.

No exercise

No motivation

Overall… Miserable

Then we met Kelly …

First we set goals – which were challenging but achievable – 5 lb/10 lb. We also set reach goals…. 30 lbs/35 lbs. and really reach goals 60lbs/70lbs.

Then we cleaned out the fridge/pantry

Took the time to read the labels of the items we were getting rid of to understand what we had been putting in our bodies.

Then we booked 2 hours and went to the grocery store armed with a list of some healthier options.

The trip was eye opening – we wandered the aisles noticing products that were never even on our radar previously. We found healthier alternatives for a lot of the things that we liked to eat. We planned our meals for the week. We bought lots of zip lock bags to pre-portion some of the bulk items, like popcorn and granola. We kept our meal planning simple as we both work full time and have minutes typically to prepare a meal. Planning ahead really helped.

Read the rest of Dave and Nancy’s weight loss journey on the Devine Nutrition blog.