The support they find at Monday night TOPS or Take off Pounds Sensibly meetings has been the key ingredient for many women to slim down and live a more healthy lifestyle.
“You have to come to the meetings and participate in your club and eat sensibly,” says Del Bremner of her success in keeping off 50 pounds of unwanted weight for 15 years. TOPS members who achieve and maintain their goals become KOPS (Keep off Pounds Sensibly) members. Bremner says she joined TOPS with some friends in the lower mainland in 1968 and transferred to the Williams Lake club when she moved here in 1973.
But it was only 15 years ago that she was able to finally lose 50 pounds and not regain it again.
“It’s not as hard to maintain it, once you lose it,” Bremner says encouragingly.
Long-time member Dorothy Broomfield agrees: “Nobody can do it for you. You have to do it for yourself.”
Rose Dickens joined TOPS about four years ago to lose some weight and has maintained her goal weight for three years.
She says she tried other methods and plans for losing weight but they didn’t work because they didn’t include the ongoing support she has found at TOPS.
“If I don’t come to the meetings I gain weight right away. It’s the accountability,” Dickens says.
“You get encouragement at the weigh-ins from all the other ladies. They don’t give you a diet to follow. They teach you very good nutrition. We encourage each other. We never bawl each other out. There is always next week.”
Brenda Bentley has been in TOPS for 20 years. She started with a group in Prince George and then joined the group here when she moved to Williams Lake a few years ago.
For many years she says she was unable to shed the unwanted pounds but coming to the weigh-ins kept her aware of herself and her weight.
Two years ago, she says she finally resolved to lose the weight after a family member died of weight-related health complications.
Bentley lost 50 pounds and says she has been able to successfully keep it off by eating healthier and swimming 120 laps at the pool four times a week.
“I had to get motivated and just get with it,” Bentley says. “I just decided that enough is enough.”
Evelyn Murray has been a weight recorder with the group for about 20 years.
She says she has never achieved her goal weight or KOPS status but coming to the meetings each week helps her to keep her weight in check when it starts to rise.