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CENTRESPREAD: Well Being

by Conrad Astley
7/ 4/2005

A NEW course designed as a step-by-step guide to transform your life is starting in Manchester this week.

Organisers of the Body Confidential programme boast it is the UK's first complete makeover course, looking at everything from health and nutrition to what you should wear, whether you should whiten your teeth, and how to bag the perfect partner.

The course, taking place in the city centre's Harvey Nichols store, claims to provide the tools to let participants turn their lives around in under three months.

Its creator Lindsay Cessford, from the ManchesterConfidential.com website, said the programme was different from other lifestyle courses which tended to focus on one specific area such as weight loss.

It is also different as clients will be able to get constant support via e-mail.

During the 12-week course, they will be put in touch with various experts who will be able to give them one-to-one advice during sessions, but extra help will also be available.

Lindsay said: "The idea is we're going to give people all the information they need but we're not just going to run off and leave them with it.

"It won't be a case of them coming to us on a Monday night and us not speaking to them for a week. There's a big support network around it. I'll be there working away and we guarantee if anyone e-mails us they'll get a response within 48 hours."

Clients will also be able to track their progress on a website, keeping a diary of what they are eating and what exercise they are doing.

There will even be a prize given to whoever has made the most progress, but Lindsay stresses this will be about much more than merely losing weight.

She devised the course after going through the programme's various steps last year, and says as well as losing 17lbs, her life was completely turned around.

She said: "I was in my early 30s, my mother had a recent skin cancer scare and I realised I needed to do something about myself.

"I wasn't living a very healthy lifestyle, so I decided to go through the whole process. I got myself a personal trainer who I used for 12 weeks and spoke to a dietician about what I was eating.

"I recorded all this while I was doing it, and kept a diary of what I was eating and drinking. It was a massive change, but because it was spread over three months it didn't seem that much."

More than 100 people have signed up for the course, beginning this week.

The clients are aged from early 20s to 50s and although the majority are women, Lindsay insists that men will be encouraged to attend future courses.

The programme kicks off with a health screening session in which professional nurses monitor clients' weight, blood pressure, and lung capacity to see how much work is needed for them to get fit.

The second week's session will be held with dieticians who will be able to give advice about what they should be eating, and will be able to arrange allergy tests.

Week three will feature fitness experts from a city centre gym who will look at clients' individual profiles, suggesting exercise programmes including things they could do without having to join gyms.

A fashion and style night will put clients in the picture about what they should or shouldn't be wearing, and personal shoppers from Harvey Nichols will be able to give one-to-one advice.

Another session will deal with the importance of getting some quality relaxation time, and will feature 10-minute massage demonstrations.

This session will also feature expert advice from sleep experts Nick Littlehales, who advises professional footballers on the secret of a good night's sleep, and Professor Chris Idzikowki, based on Harley Street.

Another session will give advice from columnist Flic Everett about spicing up your love life, while another expert will give advice to singletons about finding the right partner.

Other sessions will include advice about hair and make up, skin care, and cosmetic operations such as teeth whitening.

This will feature Surinder Hundle from Face by Lund Osler, who recently appeared on reality TV show 10 Years Younger. At the end of the programme, clients will get another health screen and will also be asked to write about how they have benefited from the experience. These articles will also be featured on the website, and a prize will be given to the client who has made the most progress.

Lindsay said: "This won't just be a prize for who's lost the most weight over the course, but it'll be who seems to have got the most out of it.

"When the 12 weeks are up we want to make sure they've got all the tools they need to say `this is how I'm going to live my life.'

"We'll keep in touch with them and we're also planning to have regular refresher sessions over the next few months."

It is still possible to sign up for the course in time for next week's session.

Call Lindsay on 832 8031 or email: lindsay@bodyconfidential.com

A very peculiar practice

A NEW way of getting rid of fat involves nothing more strenuous than lying on a couch for half an hour.

Proponents of the new Eporex mesotherapy targeted fat reduction treatment say it is much less extreme than surgical alternatives like liposuction, does not require any time to recover, and is about a quarter of the price.

The patient simply lies on a couch while a special gel is placed on the parts of their body where they want to lose weight.

They are then wired up to the Eporex mesotherapy machine which passes a light current through the body - which feels like a slight tingle - ionising the gel and directing a special blend of ingredients into the skin.

These amino acids and other chemicals are naturally found in healthy diets and help control fat levels, but people's bodies become less efficient at doing this as they grow older.

Peter Beard, from Skin Genesis off Great Ducie Street, which has been offering the service for several months, said the treatment was a way of giving nature a helping hand.

Mr Beard, managing director of the centre, added he had tried it himself and was amazed by the results.

He said: "It's a method of targeting fat that you want to lose. In my case most of my body was okay but I had a bit of a beer belly - or wine belly.

"In the past whenever I've tried to get rid of this I've ended up with chicken legs because the last place I lost fat from was the stomach. This treatment metabolises the fat so if you watch your carbs a bit the fat that you target is the first to go.

"I got the results I wanted after three treatments, and went from 37ins to 34 in about two weeks.

"Three months before that I'd bought a home gym, I'd been working hard at it, but then I started this treatment and it just melted away. I know that wasn't the exercise or the dieting.

"I personally would never consider liposuction, but this is such an easy alternative.

"You just turn up, fill in a questionnaire to make sure you're not allergic to anything, lie on the couch, then you're ready to go back on the street."

Profile: Pauline Turner

CLAIMS of Pauline Turner's abilities to heal the sick and let people know their destinies using a pendulum could make many people sceptical.

But the Morecambe-based healer says she understands this as she was once the world's biggest sceptic.

Pauline, who went to North Manchester High school and lived in New Moston before moving to north Lancashire, uses a method called auric healing in which she uses energy from her body to help relieve people's physical, mental and emotional stress.

She also helps her clients by helping them get in touch with their seventh sense - something even deeper than sixth sense, which comes from within.

This involves dangling a pendulum and asking it questions, getting "yes" or "no" answers by seeing which way it turns.

Pauline says she was first put in contact with this practice during her original job - teaching and designing crochet.

A Scottish woman was teaching in the mid `80s told Pauline about it, and encouraged her to have a go.

She said: "My first reaction was to tell the lady she must be mad, and I set about trying to prove it was wrong.

"I didn't want it to exist, and I got quite scared when I found it did. I started asking the pendulum questions I knew the answer to, and it was always right.

"One morning I asked if my daughter was coming for coffee. It said no, although I knew she was due to come around later that day. I was quite happy about this, but then my daughter phoned, said she was ill and wouldn't be able to come over."

More revelations about her own abilities were made in the early `90s, when a group of Swedish industrialists wanted to enlist her psychic abilities for reassurance about their country's economic future.

The wife of one of the businessmen had an incurable problem that one of her feet was larger than the other.

Not able to speak any English, the woman put her foot on Pauline's leg and simply said, "Heal."

The bemused Lancastrian put her hand on the leg, and was astonished when the woman emerged on the next morning with two feet the same size.

A few years later, after developing a reputation throughout Scandinavia, she was invited to speak to the daughters of a woman who was dying of abdominal cancer at Copenhagen Hospital.

The woman asked Pauline to put her hand on the tumour, and it disappeared shortly after.

Now, after developing a better understanding of her abilities, she now carries out consultations with people around the world, but says her scepticism has helped her.

She said: "By not wanting this to be true I've probably got the best schooling to help other people, because I can see where people are coming from, and I can understand what makes them not want to believe in it, because I've been there."

Contact Pauline at cosmic-laws.co.uk. She will be appearing at this year's Mind Body and Sprit Festival to be held at the G-Mex