Final Results...

Well, the day finally arrived... I will use this post to describe my day, and then the next one to thank everyone for their support.

 

I got up around 6:00 AM Sunday - my usual wake-up time most Sundays - and started getting things ready for the day. I pulled out my brand-new suit and went over it twice to make sure I had no leftover threads, price tags, or all the other stuff they sew onto new clothes. This may not sound like a big deal, but for the last five months, I have been wearing hand-me-downs and Goodwill clothes to church. Slipping into a new suit with plenty of room was a wonderful way to start the day!

 

I had asked my dad to teach our Sunday School class this week, because I did not know what all this day would hold. Information about our finale has been on a need-to-know basis, and apparently they didn't think we needed to know anything until the last minute. It turned out to be a good decision, because as I noted earlier, I have been battling a nasty cold all week long. By the time the finale rolled around, I had nearly lost my voice. I have to confess that after addressing my Sunday school class briefly, I used the rest of the hour to gather my thoughts for the day ahead. I knew that Sunday afternoon I would have about 30 seconds to say everything I wanted to say, and I wanted to put some thought into it and choose my words carefully.

 

When the service was over, the family and I jumped into the car and headed downtown. They let me out at Ft. Discovery, and Brenda took the kids to grab a burger for lunch. To avoid replaying the entire day, I will hit the main things I noted in bullet points:

 

    * They had us arrive at 1 PM, but we basically did nothing until 2. The girls fussed with their hair, their makeup, and all that sort of stuff.

 

    * We knew seating was limited, but I had no idea exactly HOW limited until we got into the theater and saw how many seats had "reserved" signs on them. I immediately began texting everyone I had a phone number for to tell them that their chances of getting a seat were pretty slim. As it turned out, everyone who wanted in got in, but there were people standing and sitting in every aisle. Even with my repeated warnings at church that seating would be limited, nearly fifty of our church family came to cheer me on.

 

    * I regretted not eating lunch, because they brought us a tray of sushi backstage... ugh. By the time I got to leave after 4 PM, I was starving!

 

    *I am very glad the show wasn't live, because we started 15 minutes late.

 

After the beginning acknowledgements, they began bringing us out one at a time. I'm not sure what determined the order, but the red team went first, and we went in the following order: Tammy, Charles, Bronnie, me, Lisa, and then Nandy. Each person's "package" - the one-minute video clip they put together to introduce us - featured clips from our initial audition interview, and then from our "halfway" interview. Obviously there was a big difference in everyone's face from one clip to the next, but I distinctly remember a very visceral reaction from the crowd when my face changed from the "before" shot to the "after" shot. I don't remember if it was "wow" or applause or what, but it was a very pronounced reaction. My "after" was taped in late March, when I had already lost 113 pounds. It was the day Nandy and I went on TV with our old clothes to show off how much we had lost. They brought me out, and the crowd was pretty boistrous (might have something to do with the fact that we stocked the crowd with all those Lumpkin Road people!). I think Mark, Donna, Rob, Barry, and Johnnie were standing - not completely sure. They showed my "before" photo, and then put my stats up on the screen. The only question in my mind was, had I done enough to push that scale under 200 pounds? They showed my starting weight of 342.8 pounds (which also got a reaction from the crowd), and after a three-second delay, the ending numbers popped up. Jackpot! 199.4 pounds for an ending weight; total weight loss of 143.4 pounds.

 

The only real suspense of the day was this: Nandy, or Laycee? Nandy had taken off with an early lead in the competition, and had led by double digits (in pounds) at times, but Laycee fought and scratched her way within a pound of the lead, less than one percent back, several times during the course of the six months. Both of them worked incredibly hard, but in the end, Nandy had prevailed with a winning margin of 4.4 pounds, or 1.46%.

 

When they announced me as the winner, I thanked my wife and kids, my mom and dad, had my church family identify themselves, and then I said this: "Finally, I want to thank the Lord Jesus Christ for changing my life. Anyone can change their diet; anyone can change their exercise; but only Jesus Christ can change your life." I may have been imagining it, but I felt a little "Okay, that's enough... give me the microphone back..." from Liz... who knows. I know we were on a time crunch, and it might have been just that.

 

The rest of the afternoon unfolded pretty much as expected, although the post-show session wasn't nearly as long as I anticipated. We posed for a few pictures, and then they let us go. I had arranged to be away from church Sunday night, but I got home in plenty of time for church. I went ahead and let Ron Crouch lead singing - as I mentioned, my voice was shot.

 

I received a note from Charles' brother Michael late Sunday night, saying that he was sorry that he had to miss the afterparty at T-Bonz. If any of my fellow losers happen to read this, I didn't stand ya'll up - I did not know there were plans for after the finale. After the photos, I heard Tammy ask if we were free to leave, and somebody told her we were, so I got my family and left. I said "bye" to Mark, Donna, Nandy, and Barry, and no one said anything about dinner. So if dinner happened, I apologize for missing it, and I will go eat a steak in your honor!

 

 

Starting weight: 342.8 lbs

Ending weight: 199.4 lbs

Total pounds lost: 143.4

% of body weight lost: 41.83%

Starting waist size: 59 inches

Ending waist size: 36 inches

Total body inches lost: 74 inches