Herbalife

Just try and eat a balanced diet, and try and avoid ready meals, or at least the ones colour-coded as high in fat and salt. Saturated fat is the worst kind of fat, but some fats are good for you, for example the fat found in oily fish, nuts, and olive oil.

Try and cook using fresh vegetables, but you can also buy nutritious tinned food, and make a tasty pasta sauce using tinned tomatoes as a base, with other veggies thrown in. Use wholemeal pasta instead of white, and use wholemeal bread. White and refined products elevate blood glucose levels, and excess glucose gets turned into fat.

There are ways in which you can eat cheaply but healthily at the same time.

I was unemployed for over a year during the last recession, 1989-91 time. I tried to cook sensibly, buying cheap meat down the market, shin-beef for example, disgusting. I also walked a great deal to combat the boredom.

I didn't lose much weight.

Recently I've had to get my weight down. I did it by walking a lot more than previously and avoiding the big fat content things. I looked into but didn't try the herbal and pill popping options, or strict diets. The trouble is being retired now I'm counting the pennies, and most publicised solutions cost money - often a lot of money.

I wonder whether, when you are tight for money, a lot of what is cheap to buy is high on fat.

Is this something your GP surgery can advise on? Some surgeries have someone on the staff, one of the nurses, with dietary knowledge.