Dee Takacs-Chan tipped the scales at over 400 pounds before winning two significant weight loss battles in the last ten years. (submitted/Dee Takacs-Chan)

By Alex Rawnsley

BIGGEST LOSER

Parksville woman drops 104 pounds in second major weight loss victory

Sep 6, 2020 | 7:44 AM

PARKSVILLE — Dee Takacs-Chan is now 2-0 in her battle with the bulge.

After using the Atkins diet to shrink from 409 to 285 pounds several years ago, Takacs-Chan doubled down on a healthy diet and regular exercise to reach her current low of 183 pounds.

A move to Parksville in 2018 after retiring was both a curse and a blessing for Takacs-Chan. More time on her hands to cook and new restaurants to visit saw her return to an unhealthy state by the end of the year.

“I thought, come the new year I was going to clean up my act and make this my job. I wrote everything down, I counted every single calorie, if we want to any restaurant I’d Google the restaurant nutrition first, decide what I was having.”

Discipline played a huge role in her second weight loss journey. Takacs-Chan lived on 1,000 calories a day, walked five kilometres and swam laps almost every day of the week.

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She said she’s been able to maintain her weight comfortably below 200 pounds for almost a year, but still closely manages her diet.

“As soon as I (gain more than five pounds) that’s the red light saying I need to smarten up and I get out to walk twice as much or whatever it takes to get it back down again. The maintaining is the hard part…honestly the losing was the easy part.”

To help in her journey, Takacs-Chan joined a local chapter of the support group TOPS (Taking Off Pounds Sensibly).

Through 2019 Takacs-Chan lost the second most amount of weight of any TOPS member in her division in a calendar year, consisting of people with a starting weight between 250 and 300 pounds.

“The group is very supportive. We weigh in, we discuss whether we’re up or down, any challenges we’ve had, any new recipes we’ve found,” Takacs-Chan said. “Every Monday, when you know you have to face the music, it’s almost intimidating especially after a weekend.”

There are nearly 200 TOPS chapters across British Columbia.

alex.rawnsley@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @alexrawnsley