Incredible transformation of a woman who dropped five dress sizes

Emma Apter has gone from a size 12 to a size four/six and is so proud of her ripped physique, she has competed in her first bikini competition.

The 35-year-old career woman has even juggled her strict weight training regime and diet plan around commuting to London and a busy work schedule.

Rather than make excuses, Emma wakes up at 4.30am to eat her first meal of the day before getting to the gym at 6am and she makes sure she takes a handbag full of prepared meals to work to last until she returns home at 7.30pm.

“I am really proud of myself,” she says.

“I think that’s why I don’t mind getting on stage in a tiny bikini because I am proud of my body. If someone had said to me this time last year I would be a size four to six and competing in physique competitions, I’d never have believed it.

“I feel the fittest, healthiest and most comfortable I have ever felt, which is a really big thing for me.”

Emma, who has suffered from knee problems since she was nine and has undergone several operations, says it is the first time in her life she has body confidence.

“I’ve always hated my body shape. I always felt very uncomfortable, very self-conscious. I always felt chunky and because I was short, any weight showed and I had trouble finding clothes that fitted properly.”

Emma, who weighed 10st 5lb for her 5ft 1inch frame, said she used to binge on coffee, chocolate and sweets and lacked any energy.

She began completing bootcamp exercises at her Southampton home last May. Spurred on by the results, she signed up to Winning Health Solutions in Shirley and enlisted the help of personal trainer, Tom Hibbert, to change her eating and exercise habits.

She cut out bread and pasta and began eating food which is not processed and drinking at least four litres of water every day as well as going to the gym regularly.

Despite being so petite, Emma even takes part in weekly modified strongman sessions as well as her personal training sessions, where she can now lift nearly double her body weight.

“There are mixed reactions – it’s quite a conversation starter!

“When I first started doing it, a lot of my family were really worried I was going to get big and bulky and I was going to become one of these really muscly women. I haven’t bulked up and become masculine but the opposite.

“Mum was really worried because she thought I was really dieting when she saw I was dropping dress sizes quickly. My brother was too, they thought I was starving myself but mum changed her mind when I stayed with her for a week and saw how much I was eating.”

Emma, says she tucks into six healthy meals every day including eating high protein exotic meat including crocodile, ostrich, zebra and kangaroo and now weighs 7st 7lb.

The communications manager says she is so proud of her transformation, she decided to begin posing lessons and enter a bikini competition Miami Pro to show off her new muscular frame.

“I’ve never really been the outgoing one so when I said to all my friends and family I am going to get on stage and compete in a physique competition on stage in a little tiny bikini, they said ‘what?!’’ “I went to the competition on my own and I loved every minute of it. The minute I got off stage, I wanted to get back up again.”

Emma is now preparing for her next competition WBFF this Saturday and is following a gruelling regime to look her best.

In the lead up to the competition she eats fish and leafy greens six times a day before adding in brown rice and meat for the final two days.

On the competition day she will eat steak for breakfast, peanut butter, jelly babies and honey to make her muscles look more defined.

Emma, who says she loves venison and nuts for breakfast, says: “It took a while to get used to it because I was a classic cornflakes kind of girl, or I’d skip breakfast and get a cake on the train to London or at the station.

“It is all about being prepared. I take a handbag full of Tupperware pots in my handbag up to London!”

But Emma says she wouldn’t have it any other way.

“I feel really proud for what I have achieved and how I have changed my body and feeling much better in myself.

“I love my body now, really comfortable and confident. That is why I have stayed so focused, it’s the confidence.

“Not everyone gets it, they don’t get why you would be so strict, but this is something I do for me and it makes me feel good.

“It’s about what you want. If you want to see the results you can’t make any excuses, just put everything into it. An hour a day isn’t very much. Most people can fit it in.”