Teen loses 200 pounds on his own, shares No. 1 tip for weight loss success

By the time he was 15 years old, Nicolas Garratt already weighed 400 pounds.

Bullied at school, he says he hated himself and felt like a “freak, a monster.” It was 2020 and he welcomed the lockdowns that came during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“I was happy. I was relieved when COVID happened because I didn’t have to leave the house,” Garratt, now 19, tells TODAY.com.

“We had to quarantine, and I was relieved that I could just stay in and not have to see people. I would only go out in the nighttime when it was dark.”

Four years later, he’s lost 200 pounds, exercises every day and is an aspiring fitness influencer on Instagram, showing his body to thousands of followers.

"I want to help people do what I did," Garratt notes.

But his weight-loss success came with lots of ups and downs, and a painful setback.

Food as distraction from pain

Garratt, who lives in South Wales, U.K., was always a chubby child, but his weight problems really started at 5 when he began eating lots of junk food and fast food, he says. Every year, he just kept getting heavier.

Other kids teased him so much that he refused to go to school and eventually dropped out.

Every time he was stressed, he would distract himself with food, estimating he was eating between 4,000 to 6,000 calories a day — “anything that I could get my hands on,” Garratt recalls.

His diet included hamburgers, pork pies and ice cream. He made bacon, Nutella and melted cheese sandwiches.

When Garratt reached 400 pounds, his highest weight, in May 2020, he could barely move.

“My mother had a rule that I had to go for one walk per day. She was trying her best. But just walking around the block, it would make me cry — the back pain was so bad. My ankles — so much pain. I just wanted to stay in bed all day at that point,” Garratt says.

He began drinking alcohol and constantly played video games to distract himself from how much he hated his life.

Weight loss and a setback

When Garratt went to see a doctor about his anxiety, the physician told him he was on his way to a heart attack.

The teen says he’d lie awake at night, thinking about where his life was going, and worried he’d end up like people he’d seen on TV who were so obese they couldn’t get out of bed. He was determined to change.

By early 2021, Garratt had lost about 140 pounds with extreme fasting. He warns others against trying this unhealthy approach.

Because he lost weight without gaining muscle, the teen still felt fat and still hated himself.

“I was very unsatisfied. I thought, 'I’ve done all this for nothing. What was the point? I lost all the weight and underneath it’s just this ugly person that I still don’t want to be,'” Garratt recalls.

He started drinking again, eating more and regained 50 pounds.

Weight loss success

Months later, the sleepless nights full of anxiety about the future returned, with Garratt thinking, “You can’t do this to yourself.”

He joined a gym in January 2023 and began lifting weights most days of the week. He started walking again, and now walks an hour a day on a treadmill and outside.

Garratt tracks his calories, aiming for 1,400 a day. He focuses on eating healthy food such as chicken breast, vegetables and complex carbohydrates, which break down slowly to provide long-lasting energy for exercise.

At 5 feet, 8 inches tall, Garratt now weighs 196 pounds, noting he’s gained a fair amount of muscle.

“I feel a lot more confident, a lot more optimistic. I feel like a completely different person,” he says.

“Now when I have problems, I never feel I need to distract myself with food or alcohol.”

The gym made a big difference for both his physical and mental health. He’s made friends and likes being part of a community of like-minded people who keep him accountable.

Garratt’s advice to others trying to lose weight is to start by counting calories. But his No. 1 tip is for people to work on their mindset and keep going despite failure along the way. He always tries to be optimistic about the future and considers determination to be more important than motivation.

Even when you’re not motivated to exercise, you can still be determined to go the gym, Garratt says.

“You’re going to fail 100 times, but it wouldn’t be a true journey without getting back up,” he adds.

“Determination is what makes you get back up.”

This article was originally published on TODAY.com