AS in most areas of my life, I’ve been beaten to the chase.

I’ve written this book, see – it’s based on these WM columns of mine and to give it its full title it’s Diary of a Diet: A Little Book of Big. It’s out in September and is published by Accent if you’re interested (please God!).

But some other big bird with similar hair – and who is certainly more famous than my alphabet soup status – got there first me too it. And I’m gutted.

So there I was, wasting time on a day off watching Loose Women when the hens brought on Mikyla Dodd, who was on to talk about being big and being on the telly.

She was classed as “the fat girl from Hollyoaks” – also the title of her book – and on she strode in high-heeled baby doll shoes and the kind of fun-filled attitude I can only dream of.

I’ve read her book, and although her story has got loads of similarities to mine, the differences are glaring.

Her: Gorging on fast food and bingeing on alcohol and drugs.

Me: Penchant for cold pizza and Shandy Bass on a hot day.

Her: An abortion aged 13, a sexual assault and the death of her sister from bowel cancer.

Me: I had a nasty Shetland Pony called Shorty who suddenly went to horsy heaven one Sunday. (I later found out he was horse napped by some blokes from the Rhymney AFTER my mother paid them a fiver each to take buckaroo away.)

Her: She’s recently done a naked photo shoot for a magazine.

Me: I’m waiting for the call from the marketing folk at JCB.

Her: 24 stone at her biggest, she’s now 15 stone 6lbs and is trying to get down to 14 stone before her 30th birthday later this year.

Me: I was born 14 stone and my scales don’t register that light these days as I think they’re made by Reinforced Inc and start at not-so-sweet 16 stone.

Her: She played Chloe in Hollyoaks for nearly five years and went on to lose the most weight of any female contestant in Celebrity Fit Club.

Me: I played Nancy in a school production of Oliver! and my “celebrity” isn’t enough to get me a free gym membership.

Her: Mikyla’s mother would say that other kids were staring at her because she was beautiful; her father took a crueller stance, berating her for being overweight.

Me: The sun set in my eyes. While dark, Dad removed the remnants of a family-sized pack of Salt ‘n’ Shake from my hands as I slept.
It’s a dark read, Mikyla’s book, often tragic and desperate.
But it’s also inspirational I guess, because she does get a grip on her relationship with food.

I’m still writing this diet column, so I guess you’ve got to assume I still haven’t won that fight. And that’s what my book is about – the very ordinary act of living it large when it makes you feel kind of small for not being more than you feel you should be.

Remember the cabbage soup diet? The Atkins? The sucking a teaspoon of custard through a straw plan? Abject misery? You name it, the book’s about the diets I’ve loved to hate and not lost anything on.

It also covers my recent journey back to Fat Club, and the ups and plenty of downs of getting where I am today – dropping from a size 24 to a 22 (big bloody wow) since January and shedding a measly two stone to get there (rubbish rate and a huge amount for such a little return).

It’s the story about my struggle to commit to get fit, stick to a sensible eating plan or think, once and for all, bugger it, I’m simply fabulous just the way I am today.

Diary of a Diet, the tome that is, is an alternative diet book – so alternative in fact it won’t tell you what not to eat and I’ve broken it up into chapters that you can metaphorically nibble on in between pork-pie love-ins.

In fact I’m thinking of giving away pasties with promotional copies, but I’m fearful of having a house full and not enough stamps to lick to keep me busy.

It’s just a witty (well, I hope so at least), heart felt (certainly) and often sad (cow) study on living life in the fat – oops, sorry! – fast lane to self-acceptance.

It’s a book about me that just happens to have been written for women, whatever their shape or size, who’ve ever felt pressure to weigh out their self-esteem with their chips.

So that’s one thing the fat girl from Hollyoaks and I have in common at the very least.