Josie Gibson weight loss – how the I’m a Celeb star shed 6st in a year
THIS Morning anchor Josie Gibson is one of the stars set to appear in the hotly anticipated return of I’m A Celebrity…Get Me Out Of Here!, as revealed by The Sun.
Josie, 38, has graced our screens in some form or other since she won Big Brother in 2010 and is now preparing to enter the jungle and tackle stomach-churning bushtucker trials.
A staple of daytime telly, the much-loved host has never been shy to talk about her body and weight, and how both have changed in the last decade or so as she juggled presenting and motherhood.
Here’s everything you need to know about her journey.
‘I shed 6st over a year’
When she entered the spotlight over a decade ago, Josie was a size 20.
But after exiting the Big Brother House, she decided to embark on a massive weight loss journey.
She told Closer magazine in 2021: “I first embarked on a weight loss journey in 2013 when I shed 6st over a year with a combination of healthy eating and exercise.”
She dropped five dress sizes, from a size 20 to a size 10.
Around that time, she released two workout DVDs, 30 Second Slim and Josie Gibson‘s 21 Day Fat Burn.
In 2014, Josie also published her book The Josie Gibson Diet, in which she described cutting out processed food and sugar to slim down and shared recipes and meal plans.
The anchor documented the tummy tuck she underwent in 2016, which removed 6lbs and 13 inches of loose skin.
Looking back at her extreme weight loss, Josie now says the lengths she went to would be unsustainable with her current commitments as a mum and host.
She told Closer: “I don’t want to be really, really slim because it just kills me to get there – it takes a lot of exercise.
“I used to cycle to the gym, do two HIIT sessions back to back and then cycle home again. I was so fit, but how can you do that with a two-year-old? I’m a mum with a job so it’s not do-able any more.”
A gentler approach
Josie welcomed her son Reggie in September 2018 and – as many mums do – gained weight (around four and a half stone).
She set about slimming down and eating healthily again, but much more gently this time.
“I managed to get back on track after being warned I was at risk of developing type 2 diabetes, but I fell off the wagon again,” she told Closer in 2021.
She added that that her aim was to ‘overhaul’ her diet and fitness to ‘reach a healthy size 12’.
Josie decided to set herself smaller and more manageable targets, like sorting out her sleeping pattern, drinking enough water, doing 30 to 45 minutes of exercise at least three times a week and switching to a healthy diet.
She shared in an Instagram post that same year: “It’s been the most giving weight loss plan I’ve ever been on and there has been no pressure just lots of love from WW [Weight Watchers] coaches, consultants and the community.”
She told the The Sun: “I was eating a lot of stodge before, but I can’t tell you the difference it’s made to my energy.”
Speaking to The Sun exclusively in 2022, Josie shared that she’d slimmed from a size 20 to size 14.
But she added that she wasn’t a fan of fad diets, preferring kinder solutions she could stick to.
Confident in any size
Speaking to The Sun, Josie added that she felt more body confident and sexy after having her son.
“I think after I had Reggie, my little one is four-years-old now, I was instantly more body confident because your body has done something so spectacular, you can’t do anything but love it.
“It’s made a lovely little boy for me, and you can’t help but love it after because it’s so brilliant that my body was able to do that. After I had Reg I was always more body confident anyway whatever size.
“I think I honestly came into myself when I had Reg, more confident, I view myself more as a woman, and my career started off when I had Reg.”
In an Instagram post from 2019, she said she was “incredibly proud” of her body, even with ‘saggy boobs’ and ‘cellulite galore’.
“I’m not great to it sometimes but its always been good to me”, she said.