And The Media Frenzy Starts...

Got up this morning early and hit the hospitals to visit our sick... I got up with my wife... it was so nice to get ready and spend a little time together in the morning. Before losing my weight, I was hard-pressed to get out of bed in the morning; during Augusta's Biggest Loser, I was leaving at 5 AM (4 AM during "crunch week"). So it's nice to be on the same schedule with her every now and then, even if I still plan to hit the gym early some mornings.

I got into the office around 8:30, went to program some changes into our digital sign. Couldn't connect to the sign... lovely. Nearly an hour of tinkering, and I finally got the computer to talk to the sign. This, after half a Monday of the piano totally flummoxing our tuner with a loud squeak. We had our staff meeting, I did some more work, and then had an appointment at PHC at 12:30.

Mark, Donna, and the usually-missing Patricia were there today (Patricia is their nurse who is spread around quite a bit). For the first time EVER, Donna was happy to see that I had GAINED some weight, because my finale weight was a little light for me. (For those of you keeping score at home, yes, I am totally aware of how drawn and thin my face looked - Donna told me some of you were complaining at the finale!) Anyway, Mark had sent me an email Monday night and told me that they wanted to take my "after" pictures on Tuesday. "Yeah, let us eat for a week, and THEN schedule our "after" pictures", I thought. But they probably came out better, because the sunken face has filled back out just a little with re-hydration. What he DIDN'T tell me was that these pictures were not for my file, nor for the bulletin board in the foyer... they were for the new PHC ad in the Yellow Pages... yes, my ugly mug will be gracing homes all over Augusta for the next year! The main purpose for my visit, ostensibly, was to get the specifics on stabilization and maintenance. This is the part of the program where, for the next six weeks, they gradually add more food selections back to your diet, in very specific quantities, and help you learn to eat like a normal person should. After six months of "thou shalt not", I'm finding that I am already bucking against "it's okay"... six months of avoiding certain foods like the plague, I now have to establish a new relationship with them. The philosophy for maintenance is this: three pounds above your desired weight, and it's time to start back on the heavy work again to get it back down. Seems logical to me: three pounds is not an unmanageable amount. I have a feeling that most people would set their "danger weight" a bit higher, like 10 or 15 pounds. The problem, though, is that it never stays at 10-15 pounds - it usually grows to 20, then 25, then we're buying larger clothes again, and before you know it, we re-gain everything PLUS a few more. My mutually-agreed upon weight is in the 205-210 range; therefore, at 213, I will shift back into weight-LOSS mode instead of weight-maintenance mode. I would guess that those people who successfully keep it off go in and out of that mode quite often. After six months, weight-loss mode is second nature to me now. One of the things Pat had me do today was write a list of all the foods I have missed... I really had to think hard, and those that I wrote down, I put question marks beside them. I can't really say that there's anything much that I miss. I thought of burgers and pizza, but as I mentioned, I had some pizza, and it made me sick, and it just seemed like a slab of grease on a hunk of cardboard.

I went back to work after my PHC appointment, and two hours later, my phone rang. It was Tina Terry, a reporter from NBC Augusta, who was on a mission to get some fresh material to air on the evening news tonight. She gave me the choice of her coming over to the church, or me coming down to the station. I had somewhere to be tonight, so I told her I would go to the station, lest we waste half an hour finding a suitable background with suitable lighting, etc. So I hopped in the car, headed down to the TV station, and let Tina ask me questions about my experience. She was not as impressed with what I had done, because she had never seen a "before" picture of me. I guess by the time she finished putting the story together tonight, she probably had gone into the archives and found my fat pictures - the station has a couple on file. One little tidbit: when the reporter IS the cameraman, you have to do a little bit of misdirection to make everyone think you are talking to someone off to the side of the camera. If you're watching an interview on local TV, and you don't see the reporter, the subject is looking at a spot away from the camera and, usually, away from the reporter. I've done a couple of these now, and it's a weird experience.

After the interview, I met a few guys from the church at Rhinehart's 'Orshter' Bar (I can't help it, that's how the owner, Amy, pronounces "oyster"). I'm not much of a seafood eater, but I told myself that I go back into weight-loss mode tomorrow (that three-pound thing), so I will enjoy a dinner tonight of not having to watch every little bite. I told myself I would eat the fish, but not the breading, where I thought most of the grease would live. Wrong. EVERYTHING I put in my mouth was saturated in grease. I gave away about a third of my fries, left some on my plate... didn't finish the fish... I was supposed to go to a shooting range with them, but by the time everyone was done eating, I was sick. Not throwing-up sick, but violently-cramping sick. I had to excuse myself and go home. One of the guys said, "I guess your stomach isn't used to real food." I didn't give it much thought at the time, but later it crossed my mind that "real" food is what I've been eating for the last six months - lean meats, veggies, fruits, whole wheat, lots of protein, little fat - and the stuff on my plate tonight is the kind of stuff that helped pave the way to 342 pounds. (Incidentally, each Biggest Loser contestant got a gift certificate to Rhinehart's... and I won't even begin to address the irony in THAT.) I got home, and they had just started airing the ABL finale. I arrived just in time to see my "after" video, and me standing on the stage and watching my numbers be revealed. Brenda's phone started ringing - old co-workers were watching, and reporting in. I tossed back a triple dose of Maalox (something I had not needed since starting the competition), and watched everyone else's part of the show.

After our show went off, the network aired the live finale of the hit show, "The Biggest Loser". About half an hour in, I got a nice note from Kristy Youngblood. She said that she noticed that so far, I had done better than the at-home participants in the national show. Eventually, they did get to some who had done better, but my 41.38% ranks right up there near the top. 20 more pounds would have had me beating Daris, the third finalist. As Johnnie pointed out, we didn't have the benefit of 6-8 hour a day guided workouts; we had our trainer for one hour a day, three days a week, and the rest was up to us.

I'm struggling to stay awake for the 11 PM newscast; I want to see what Nandy said to Tina Terry today, if she got interviewed. Then off to bed; and tomorrow, getting serious again about the weight. I haven't gone too far off the rails (with the exception of tonight); I look forward to getting back in the groove. I'm already fully-stocked on fruit, chicken, stir-fry veggies, tuna, yogurt, fat-free cheeses, eggs, and the other foods that helped me bid the old me a fond farewell.