Winning the battle with the bulge

Are you still struggling to lose all that weight that you gained during the last holiday season? I’m tempted to say that there’s no need to panic, but truthfully, you should really start worrying. However, you need not lose hope because I know somebody (and you will get to know her now) who lost 44 lbs. and was even crowned the female winner in Slimmers World’s Great Bodies competition. Her name: Christine Hermoso of the Pasay Road branch. She’s 24 and works as a content development officer for Viva Films (she basically takes care of the company’s website.)

During the contest held only less than three months ago, my co-judge, Polo Ravales, and I immediately noticed her very lovely face. Although she still had to develop her abs that time, I had faith that she could still improve that area. After all, as the titlist (along with Pasig branch’s Christian Tan as the winner in the male division) Slimmers World is now her playground. True enough, only a few weeks later when we met up for this interview, she was already a lot slimmer and definitely sexier.

While not exactly a dead-ringer for Kristine Hermosa, the actress’ name is always brought up when she has to introduce herself to people. “They always ask me where Jericho Rosales is,” laughs Christine.

Of course, she takes pride being associated with somebody as divinely beautiful as Kristine and isn’t exactly put in an embarrassing situation because she is very pretty herself and is confident about her looks. But that had not always been the case all her life. Hers was the classic ugly duckling story, except that her face was not ugly and her body was not of a duckling, but more of a plump fowl that Chinese cooks would chase after and turn into a delectable Peking duck.

Of Hispanic stock (her father has Spanish blood), Christine is undeniably mestiza (but minus the sharp features). At 5’2”, she is a bit on the petite side and says that her weight was normal from infancy till about she was 12 when she started ballooning to, gasp, 120 to 130 lbs. People mistook her for her mother’s mother (ouch!) and she didn’t feel any better when some thought she was her mother’s older sister.

Her sudden weight gain obviously came from bad eating habits: Rice with viand for breakfast, lunch and dinner and for snacks she had chocolates and all the junk food available at home. She particularly loved anything with mozzarella cheese on it.

High school was spent in Poveda, but during summer breaks the family would travel to New York and California and she stuffed herself with Lay’s, popcorn, Snickers, pizza and more rice during vacation time.

Back in Manila, she would try to lose all the weight she gained abroad — yes, she did make the effort — only to regain everything when the family started traveling again.

In her teens, she swears she was never sexy — and even wore unflattering eyeglasses. She always cried herself to sleep at night and, worse, became what she describes as “emotional eater.”

One time, she lost a considerable amount of weight and had a boyfriend. When they broke up, she went back to binging again.

Her mother, a lifetime member at Slimmers World, then decided to bring her to the fitness center to start her on a weight loss program. Around this time, she was in third year mass communications at Assumption.

 When Christine went to Slimmers she was at her most gargantuan at 150 lbs. By lifting weights and joining aero classes regularly, she began to steadily lose weight. She also started watching her diet: Six small meals a day of mostly grilled dishes, lots of fruits and vegetables. In lieu of rice, she had whole wheat bread.

In late 2008, she was down to 106 lbs. and became confident enough to join the Mr. & Miss Slimmers World competition. The contest was uneventful for her and was luckier last year in the Great Bodies event. 

Today, her face and body appears in the Slimmers World half page ads in this paper and her success story is no fable one cooked up by some advertising wiz.

It’s a true tale of how a woman who was depressed over her weight beat all odds and went on to be crowned as one of the country’s sexiest.