Super slimmer Val Coley has shrunk eight dress sizes after embarking on a life changing diet.

The Wednesbury office manager used to weigh 17 stone, but during the past 19 months she has shed five of them – and says life has never been better.

Now the 57-year-old is keen to hit the sales and finish off her transformation by overhauling her wardrobe.

She said: “I felt so uncomfortable. I was out of breath just climbing the stairs, and I had awful arthritis in my knees.

“I just thought, ‘enough is enough’, and I joined a slimming club and completely changed they way I live. I’ve gone from a size 22 to a size 14, and I’m looking forward to going out and getting a whole new wardrobe.”

Val, of Plantation Road, Yew Tree, says she was a “devil for cheese”, but now she has made fruit her nibble of choice.

“I will still eat a bit, but less and only when I really want it.  I am much healthier now, I eat fruit and vegetables which I really enjoy.

“Before I would eat everything, chocolate, cake, bread. Now I can’t eat anywhere near as much as I used to, and I just feel so much better.”

Val, who is the office manager at Sunlight Laundry, in Wednesbury, puts her success down to the support of her husband Malcolm, aged 62, and her fellow dieters at the Successful Slimming club, which meets at Moorlands Church, in Hydes Road.

She is one of their top slimmers of 2008.

Val added: “I’m still going to have a bit of a binge over Christmas! 

“I want to be able to enjoy myself and the thing is I know now that I can lose the weight again.  

“I know how to do it.”