In common with millions of women in Britain these days, I have tried GLP-1s – first Ozempic and then Mounjaro. I lost weight quickly on both – about 3st in three months – but I was plagued with side-effects.

On Ozempic, I felt sick if I drank any alcohol. On Mounjaro, I always felt flat: my energy dropped, my hair thinned and then I got shingles.

Although my doctor assured me they were unrelated, lying in bed, I promised myself that when I got better, I’d sort out my health.

But jabs were off the menu – I didn’t want to splurge £200 a month on drugs – and I was sick of all the fad diets I’d tried over the years, from Atkins to LighterLife. I wondered if I should try something truly radical: healthy eating.

Instagram suggested the solution – meal boxes.

My algorithm, perhaps attuned to my diet-curious mind, kept spamming me with meal delivery service ads. The bright, fresh plates of food looked rather nice. Instead of grim meal-replacement products, such as milkshakes or bars, this is real food, ready to cook.

I chose Mindful Chef, a recipe box scheme. Although the meals are not designed as a prescriptive diet or weight-loss plan, they deliver portion and calorie-controlled meals – taking the guesswork and decision-making out of dieting.

Dietitian Sasha Watkins tells me the binge/starve cycle I’ve got into on the jabs is ‘incredibly common, especially among busy women’ and encourages me to see the delivery boxes not so much as a diet but a way to help build a better relationship with food.

She makes me a plan – for three meals a day plus snacks to average around 1600 calories per day, a deficit of 400 calories less than the average woman needs.

A two-person box of five recipes a week costs approximately £80-90 including delivery (£5.99). Adding in £15 a week extra for snacks and breakfast, my cost for the month will be £425.90.

The plan isn’t cheap, but is a lot less dear than forking out for the fat jabs, plus meals out and shopping.

Sasha encourages me to drink more water and less coffee, not eat after 9pm and incorporate resistance training with weights three times a week. So far, so easy – I have nothing to lose but the weight.

Week one

Weight: 15st, size 18

Six huge blue-and-white boxes arrive on the doorstep containing all my food for the week: an ice box of protein (salmon, chicken, prawns) and five numbered brown paper bags, each containing the precise raw ingredients – sachets of oil, sprigs of herbs, a few stems of broccoli – for my meals. I have decided to order five two-person meals and eat one portion for dinner, and the second for lunch the next day.

Although Mindful Chef does one-person meal packs, too, I reason that this way means less cooking.

For breakfast, I can choose between Bircher muesli, pecan and coconut granola and kefir. For easy lunches when I’m on the go, there are prepared Nourishment soups.

I hit my first challenge when I come to make dinner. I find cooking mind-numbingly boring, so never do it.

On principle, as a feminist, I shun anything domestic; mostly living on cheese, toast and being taken for dinner, which is how I got so fat. My first proper meal is a satay chicken stir-fry (604 calories), which I choose mainly because it only takes 20 minutes to prepare.

There are step-by-step cooking instructions designed for even a chef as clueless as me and I muddle through despite lacking the basic equipment Mindful Chef assumes I have (a sieve, a grater and two saucepans).

Because the ingredients that come with each meal are so precise, it is impossible to snack while you cook – perfect for a dieter. It leaves my labrador, Bear, used to being fed bits from my plate, unimpressed.

The first thing that strikes me as I divide the dish into two parts (one for tomorrow’s lunch) is how much smaller the portions are than the meals I usually eat. I clearly know what I should be eating, but have lost all sense of how much.

Nevertheless, I’m pleasantly sated after dinner.

During the week, I dine on everything from chorizo and black-bean stew to Mexican-style shakshouka eggs, and relish them all.

The only downside is how tired I am. Perhaps it’s the carb-heavy breakfasts or the sudden drop in calories, but in the afternoons I feel foggy and exhausted, and often it feels even more effort to have to cook. Still, I power on.

Week two

Weight: 14st 10lb

I am mildly shocked, and ashamed, to realise how easy cooking is. How have I made it to my 40s still eating like a student? The washing-up is beginning to grate, but I’m thrilled that my ability to graze has been eradicated overnight.

Working from home, I spend all day wandering to the fridge – but now I only have my Mindful Chef provisions in the house. Since I live in a cottage in the middle of nowhere, giving in to my cravings would mean getting into my car and driving to the garage.

Sometimes between meals I am tempted to snack, but luckily Sasha has built in some treats.

The Bio&Me cocoa and blueberry bars are so disgusting I don’t touch them again. But the Forest Feast Salted Dark Chocolate Almonds (£3.70) are so dangerously good I eat a whole family-sized packet out of pure greed. I get invited on a dinner date, too. A girl’s got to live!

I keep my food fairly modest but finish half a bottle of champagne and several glasses of wine. The next day, I eat a whole two-person meal plus the gnocchi from another meal kit, meaning I’m short of a lunch that week. Still, because I’m mostly sticking to the diet, I am getting slimmer and have lost 4lb so far.

Week three

Weight: 14st 4lb

I am loving my diet! Instead of starving myself all morning, then desperately grabbing anything and beginning a roller-coaster ride of sugar highs and crashes all day, I enjoy eating three regular meals. My energy levels no longer peak and trough. My body is starting to feel different.

Meanwhile, it’s such a novelty to cook I dedicate time to it, putting on Radio 4 and trying to enjoy the experience.

Sticking to the diet does take organisation. I make sure to leave the house with a water bottle, snacks and my prepared lunch – an unprecedented level of administration for me.

My energy has also peaked and people start commenting on my glowing skin, too. I am surprised how little I want to snack.

A lot of the meals pack in a surprising element of sweetness – a teaspoon of honey, a few slices of pear – which seems enough to satisfy my usual sweet tooth. There are clever carbs, such as brown rice noodles and lots of beans, that make dishes filling.

My sleep habits change. I’m eating earlier and going to bed earlier, too, and start waking up at 7am, rather than 10am. I’m not missing booze, either. Sometimes, I do want to cheat – one night I go through several Deliciously Ella bars on a binge, and another time I am craving a pack of Rolos so desperately I drive to the garage and buy a family bag.

But on the whole, I’m eating so wildly healthily, my odd naughty binges don’t seem to matter.

Week four

Weight: 14st, size 16

Over the course of just under five weeks, I have lost over a stone and feel fantastic.

In the final run of my diet, it’s my birthday. I decide a cheat day is in order but, astonishingly, I have almost no inclination to eat cake. I’ve also gone off greasy food – instead I’m craving fresh tiger prawns with mango, and peanut chicken.

I’ve also saved money. The plan puts me on an automatic food budget, so I can’t waste money picking up extras I pass in the supermarket aisle. I no longer have the excuse to pop into the local farm shop for steak and chocolate biscuits. I’ve hardly eaten out, and I have almost no food waste either.

The problem now is how I will hack it in the real world without all my meals measured out... and working out where I can bulk-buy those chocolate almonds.