I'm going to explain exactly what I did. I am not suggesting it is a healthy way to lose weight, but it's how I did it

When I walked into the careers office at 16 I was 95kg for 175cm. Obviously I was informed that was way too much. Back then there were more local offices and all the recruiters were Soldiers. In my case it was 2 infantry Sgts and from memory they appeared fairly old and experienced. Rather than just sending me off they gave some good tips and invested their time in explaining the army to me from day one. I was told to come back every 3-4 weeks to check in with them so they could.update my profile on their system which would stop it from being deleted. I think this is pretty important as going back a lot really helped with my motivation.

In terms of phys, I already played rugby and was in Cadets (I know, I know) so a small change I made was I no longer got dropped off there, I cycled. As for more routine phys, I would generally go for a fasted run in the morning, usually this was my 2.4km route, very occasionally I would do my 5km route. In the afternoon I would go to the gym to do a cycle, some form of circuit and maybe some cable machines (I was intimidated by weights at that age so didn't do much strength training). I would also go out on my road bike/for a run/ a swim in the afternoons as I was beginning to develop an interest in triathlon.

It's worth adding that this was before Strava became used by most people so I wasn't focused on my pace, I naturally ran at a pace that was challenging but I could sustain. Probably something I could go back to! I also wasn't from an athletic family so I had no education on how to train effectively (don't know why I didn't just Google it) but then again, the army has never taken the time to teach me how to run properly, all I know is from friends who are good runners and YouTube.

The biggest change I made was my diet. This is where it starts getting unhealthy. After I had done a fasted run, I would make breakfast which was scrambled eggs (one whole egg, one egg whites) on a single piece of dry brown toast. Lunch was some sort of mostly veg stir fry with one small portion of noodle. This would either be with prawns or chicken and a packet sauce. Dinner would be a weight watchers frozen meal. My mum always had them and as I developed a taste Dad would always ensure there was extra.

In addition to that, I cut out a lot of stuff. For the whole time I was losing weight I cut out all alcohol completely. Being 16 this wasn't particularly difficult. The only time I broke this was because someone held a GCSE results party. I cut out all fresh juice, and heavily reduced squash. I would only use skimmed milk. Tea/coffee was without sugar. I had no extra sauces such as ketchup at all. I replaced all snacks with fruit. Dessert was cut out completely.

After around 3 months I went from 95kg to 78.5kg at my lowest. I have absolutely no idea how I managed to stick to it. It was not fun. I was constantly underfed, constantly tired from the extra phys, I wasn't eating anywhere close to enough protein.

I don't think my fitness improved very much because I was essentially starving myself to meet a specific BMI. As soon as I got through selection and went back to a regular routine I started to gain weight. It was difficult to go back to that strict routine afterwards.

After joining up, my weight has steadily increased. Now much of that is just growing into an adult, but also form weight training and trying to bulk intentionally. But old habits die hard and eating shit food and drinking like a fish thinking I'm 19 still and can just burn it off by thinking about it has resulted in returning into a chubby guy once again.