Morag Dunbar knew it was time to act when she realised she could barely breathe while walking around her local golf course.

It was 2017 and Dunbar weighed 177 kilograms, having turned to food as a source of comfort after a series of personal problems. Combined with a sedentary lifestyle, it was having a terrible effect on her health.

She told The Agenda with Stephen Cole: "I was basically on my knees and I thought, I can't continue my life like this. If I don't do something about it, I will end up in a grave and it's as simple as that.”

The first step on her weight loss journey was to pay for a gastric sleeve operation that was designed to reduce her desire for larger portions of food.

She added: "With the gastric sleeve, they cut away the majority of my stomach and left me with a stomach the size of a banana. 

"Now, the stomach is a muscle – so if you overfill it again, once you start eating properly, it will grow again. So the key for your gastric sleeve is that it helps with your portion control."

For the first time in years, Dunbar felt full after meals and her smaller portion sizes saw her weight drop from 177 kilograms to 133 kilograms and enabled her to begin exercising again.

"I started running during lockdown," she said. "We started climbing mountains during lockdown. I do things that I never dreamed I could ever do."

She then enlisted some help. "I had my man come in – Chris, my personal trainer – and that really helped me," she recalled. "I had the right help, but without him, I would never have got down to the weight that I've got."

Her fitness regime has helped her weight drop to 83 kilograms but despite her success story she admits it's been the toughest battle of her life.

She said: "It's an addiction, food is an addiction, but unlike any other addiction, you can't cut it out of your life, you still need it. It's unlike alcohol or gambling or anything else – you can cut that out of your life. Food, you still need it to be able to survive. And that's why it's really hard."