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For Bridgett Moore, losing over 200 lbs wasn’t a cakewalk, but she did it for her father. It was her dying father’s wish, and how could she not?

Moore was diagnosed with diabetes at 27, three months before learning her father, James, had terminal pancreatic cancer. She had struggled with her weight her entire life, but this time, when her father, who was on hospice care, pulled her aside and told her to "get healthy," she knew it was time.

A promise was made

Moore weighed 385 lbs when her father, who was saying a final goodbye to her, spoke to her. "He specifically told me, 'Bridgett, get healthy. I don't want you to be sick like me. Do whatever you can to take your health back.' I said that I'd do it," Moore, who is now 40, told People.

A resident of Birmingham, Alabama, Moore took a couple of years to fulfill the promise, but she eventually did. "I began to feel bad because, even after he had passed, I made this promise to him, and I felt like I was breaking the promise by not losing the weight," she told the outlet.

Turning point

The real turning point in her weight loss journey came at the age of 30. "I had been miserable in my twenties, and that's your prime. That's the time of your life," Moore said.

She was diabetic, taking medication, and was getting sicker. "It was like, I don't want to go into my 30s, into this new decade, feeling sick, unwell, getting even more diagnoses of other chronic diseases. I wanted to get healthy."

That’s when a friend from her church group suggested she use MyFitnessPal to track her weight. "I was like, well, this is pretty easy. And honestly, I've just stuck with it ever since."

She used the app to track her meals and eat right. That’s when Moore realised how some of her favourite meals were high in calories. "I remember eating a slice of cheesecake after a meal, and I looked the cheesecake up, and it was 1,200 calories. That's some people's daily allowance to eat!"

When she started to track her food, she began to learn how to pre-plan meals. "I kinda already know what I'm gonna eat for the day, and I love that."

After a year of eating right, Moore underwent gastric sleeve surgery. "I got approved really quickly because they saw all of the work I had put in," she said. In February 2024, she underwent surgery and did something she never thought was possible — hiking in a rainforest in Belize. "That's something I could have never done at my heaviest. I would have been winded just walking. Just being able to fly on an aeroplane without a seatbelt extender — all those things have been just wonderful experiences for me," she said.

Moore is now 200 lbs and plans to go down to 185 lbs. A mother, she now wants to set a good example for her daughter, Amiyah, 7. The promise that Moore made to her dad is what keeps her going. "You don't want to break a promise to someone, and they're gone."