{"id":648876,"date":"2026-06-20T12:08:14","date_gmt":"2026-06-20T12:08:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/648876\/"},"modified":"2026-06-20T12:08:14","modified_gmt":"2026-06-20T12:08:14","slug":"i-weighed-21st-aged-12-but-an-nhs-clinic-changed-my-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/648876\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8216;I weighed 21st aged 12 &#8211; but an NHS clinic changed my life&#8217;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Ibbie was not alone in her home city in suffering from the effects of excess weight gain. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The government&#8217;s National Child Measurement Programme data found that in 2023, around one in four children in Doncaster started school classed as overweight or obese. By the time they were 11 years old, that number had risen to one third &#8211; or 33%.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Among adults in the city, 74% are overweight or obese.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Ibbie&#8217;s weight dropped to about 15st (93kg) and her health dramatically improved. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;I no longer need a liver transplant because of the amount of weight I&#8217;ve lost.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;I&#8217;ve got no diabetes, no underlying health issues. My mental health is the best it&#8217;s ever been. I&#8217;m a lot more confident in myself.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">She loves going on days out and walking the family dog, and has enjoyed trips to Doncaster Racecourse.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Ibbie&#8217;s mother Andrea said the support they received as a family had helped them all to become healthier without being judged for her parenting.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;I really do believe through all this journey I&#8217;ve learned that as a parent you have to take responsibility.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;Children are not going out there and they&#8217;re not buying the food &#8211; you are.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;I realised that we all needed to change our ways.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Andrea herself lost 9st (57kg) and Ibbie&#8217;s father shed 2st (13kg).<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;You can&#8217;t help a child and support that child unless you go through that journey with them,&#8221; she said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;Ibbie is still the beautiful girl that she always was.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;She&#8217;s grown in confidence tremendously and I just am so proud of her now.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Ibbie is now considering career in the NHS to help other children like her.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;It&#8217;s changed my life.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">If you have been affected by any of the issues in this story, help and support is available at <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/programmes\/articles\/1NGvFrTqWChr03LrYlw2Hkk\/information-and-support-mental-health-self-harm\" class=\"ssrcss-1e0jzsh-InlineLink e1kn3p7n0\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">BBC Action Line<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Listen to highlights from <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/sounds\/curation\/p0cjdy2n\" class=\"ssrcss-1e0jzsh-InlineLink e1kn3p7n0\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">South Yorkshire on BBC Sounds<\/a>, catch up with the latest <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/programmes\/b006mj5m\" class=\"ssrcss-1e0jzsh-InlineLink e1kn3p7n0\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">episode of Look North<\/a> or tell us a story you think <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/articles\/mailto:yorkshirestories@bbc.co.uk\" class=\"ssrcss-1e0jzsh-InlineLink e1kn3p7n0\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">we should be covering here, external<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ibbie was not alone in her home city in suffering from the effects of excess weight gain. The&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":648877,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[96,59,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-648876","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-entertainment","tag-gb","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/648876","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=648876"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/648876\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/648877"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=648876"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=648876"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=648876"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}