{"id":9392,"date":"2025-07-20T22:11:10","date_gmt":"2025-07-20T22:11:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/9392\/"},"modified":"2025-07-20T22:11:10","modified_gmt":"2025-07-20T22:11:10","slug":"denise-welch-shares-how-she-lost-2-5st-after-becoming-addicted-to-food","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/9392\/","title":{"rendered":"Denise Welch shares how she lost 2.5st after becoming ‘addicted’ to food"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Loose Women favourite has been sober for over 13 years – but said she swapped alcohol for foodThe actor said she started binge eating after becoming sober(Image: Anadolu via Getty Images)<\/p>\n

Denise Welch said she has lost over two stone in weight, despite being ‘addicted’ to food<\/a>, after ‘completely changing her relationship’ with it. The Loose Women star has shared how she struggled with binge eating after ‘swapping one addiction for another’.<\/p>\n

The 67-year-old also recently saw her mental health worsen after a clear stretch of five years. \u201cSome people deal with diabetes, or MS or cancer – my thing is mental illness,\u201d she tells OK! in an exclusive interview, the Mirror reports<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Just before Christmas<\/a> the Loose Women<\/a> favourite was forced to pull out of an acting job, followed by time off from her ITV job, because of depression and anxiety.<\/p>\n

Denise Welch on Loose Women(Image: ITV)<\/p>\n

\u201cI live with it, and I enjoy the periods in between my episodes,\u201d she said. Denise has now been back on the panel for a few months, and it\u2019s very much a case of onwards and upwards – especially with some major changes on the horizon.<\/p>\n

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Denise, who shares sons Matty, lead vocalist and songwriter in The 1975<\/a>, and actor Louis, with her ex-husband Tim Healy, has worked hard on her confidence – but the starting point was giving up alcohol 13 years ago.<\/p>\n

By then she was a household name, thanks to roles including Rovers Return landlady Natalie Barnes in Coronation Street<\/a> and teacher Steph Haydock in Waterloo Road. She\u2019s now been famous for more years than she hasn\u2019t. \u201cI can\u2019t really remember a time before,\u201d she says. \u201cIt\u2019s just how it is for our family.”<\/p>\n

When Denise got sober, she admits she quickly became \u201cin danger of replacing one addiction with another\u201d – food. She was binge eating, she says, but signing up to LighterLife was about far more than shifting the extra two and-a-half stones. \u201cLighterLife was the only company talking about the emotional side of eating, and using Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) to completely change my relationship with food.<\/p>\n

She continues, \u201cI was very newly sober so many of the things that I was learning through CBT, I was able to apply to my sobriety also.\u201d The repercussions of giving up booze spread far wider than just herself, though.<\/p>\n

Denise on the Loose Women panel(Image: ITV)<\/p>\n

\u201cMy children, my marriage, everything, is down to my sobriety,\u201d she says. \u201cIt\u2019s given my children and my stepson, Lewis, the wings to fly without worrying about me. I\u2019m proud of the people I have created as a friendship group around me. That\u2019s got to be something down to me? That I still have the same friends I had years ago, and that they love me and they support me.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m proud of some of the things I\u2019ve done as an actress. It might sound big-headed, but it\u2019s the one thing I say I\u2019m f*****g good at. \u201cAnd I\u2019m going to concentrate on reminding everybody of that!\u201d<\/p>\n

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It comes after ITV announced it was merging production teams on three of its daytime shows in May, and cutting Loose Women and Lorraine back to 30 weeks a year.<\/p>\n

Although the channel insisted there wouldn\u2019t be any \u201cradical changes\u201d with the panellists, it\u2019s understandably prompted a few thoughts about what\u2019s next. For Denise, who joined the show in 2005, it\u2019s an opportunity to make a return to what she knows and loves best – acting.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m on television because I\u2019m gobby and opinionated, and I think people can forget what I really do, and what I\u2019m really good at, so I\u2019m going to make a concerted effort to go back to what I do and know.\u201d<\/p>\n

Denise, who celebrated 12 years of marriage to artist Lincoln Townley recently, says Loose Women holds a special place in her heart – not least because the average age of its stars is around 50. \u201cIt\u2019s the only show in the country that not only celebrates older women, but reveres and listens to older women\u2019s opinions,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

The 67-year-old recently saw backlash for posting pictures of her in a swimming costume on social media – something she wants to change the negative narrative around.<\/p>\n

\u201cMaybe I\u2019m out to empower women, but I\u2019m definitely out to say, \u2018F*** off, haters.\u2019 I\u2019ve changed the narrative from \u2018I\u2019m 67\u2019 to \u2018I\u2019m only 67\u2019. I\u2019ll wear swimwear if I live until I\u2019m 97. And if you don\u2019t like it, don\u2019t look at my pictures.<\/p>\n

Loose Women’s Denise Welch poses in swimsuit after dismissing hundreds of complaints(Image: Denise Welch Instagram)<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a lot of misogyny out there, too. So, there\u2019s an element of devilment in me as well, which is to say, \u2018Don\u2019t you ever tell any woman what she can and can\u2019t wear.\u2019 We had Christie Brinkley on Loose Women recently. She\u2019s 71 and looks unbelievable.\u201d<\/p>\n

Denise Welch is working with LighterLife, a leading weight loss programme which combines nutritionally complete diet plans with CBT to help people holistically transform their lives. Go to lighterlife.com<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Loose Women favourite has been sober for over 13 years – but said she swapped alcohol for…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":9393,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[64,63,447,11115,134,11116],"class_list":{"0":"post-9392","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-celebrities","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-celebrities","11":"tag-denise-welch","12":"tag-entertainment","13":"tag-the-1975"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9392","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9392"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9392\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9393"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9392"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9392"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9392"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}