There have been many times when Ajay Rochester has been forced to dust herself off, take a deep breath and move forward. The bubbly blonde, who became a household name as host of The Biggest Loser has had more than her fair share of knocks along the way.
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Ajay was emotionally and physically abused by her adoptive mother. Tragically, just 12 months after she was reunited with her birth mother, she died unexpectedly.
"I am about to take the Australian Government to court to have my illegal adoption nullified and give me access to my original birth certificate as a legal document," Ajay said. "The illegal adoption ruined mine and my mum's life and I will not sit by and let them just say "sorry" and not do anything to fix the lives they destroyed."
Over the years, Ajay has turned to food to help ease the pain.
"I'll be honest. I use my weight to keep people away. I sabotage myself by putting on weight and I shut everyone out and use my weight as an excuse not to do so many things," Ajay said.
"I was so hurt by my past relationship that the thought of being that hurt just makes me terrified again. I think that's one of the main reasons I put on so much weight over the last few years. But also my whole life I have shut people out and I actually blame the adoption for that. The government recently apologised for the illegal adoptions from the `70s and I was one of those children and I think my weight gain relates a lot to the loss of my mother."
Ajay is extremely candid about the battle she once again faces in losing weight.
"As much as I believe we should not be discriminated against or hated for our weight and we should love ourselves no matter what weight we are, there is no denying that if I don't lose weight soon, I may well just be a heart attack statistic."
Ajay said society needed to realise that it is what in people's hearts that really matters.
"There is so much self hatred and public hatred/bullying about weight gain. We really need to understand that no matter what weight, shape, size, colour or creed we are, it's what is in our hearts that matters."
Ajay remembers when she was 12 her ballet teacher told her she was too fat to ever become a dancer.
"My mum put me on a diet then and there and to make matters worse, it was some crazy fad diet where you only eat apples for two days, then chicken for two days ... I can't remember what else but I lost a little weight and like any fad, put it back on and started what would be a lifelong cycle of crash dieting and self hatred."
Over the years Ajay said she had tried a number of extreme diets.
"I did the lemon detox, all egg diet, Bolivian army diet, seriously I have done every single diet ever known and some I made up myself," Ajay said.
To read more about Ajay visit www.findingmymojo.com