A Diamond Is Forever

Everyone reading this blog should be super jealous of the photo opp that happened to me last night. Amongst a sea of cotton tops, America's # 1 Neil Diamond Tribute Artist, Rob Garret, picked little ME to have his picture taken with.

Check out the mob scene...

...and I really don't blame them. It was a hot show.



That got even hotter when the sun went down...





Do you feel the magic?????????

Well I did. To a degree. After looking closely at our picture together, I realized that some of my not-so-deep seeded contempt for the replacement Neil made its way out. But I know it's only a matter of time before the real one comes along.

Trisha says the only way you could tell it wasn't the real Neil Diamond is because of the stage constructed of 50's vinyl records. I say it's not enough sparkle in the shirt nor tightness in the pants.

Trisha and Me representing the 20 somethings in the crowd:

Nonetheless, here is a taste of what can only agree with the statement so boldy printed on my tee, "A Diamond Is Forever."

P.S. As I was putting the final touches to this blog, "Coming to America" began playing in my playlist. This song happened to be what the King of Diamonds opened AND closed with, my friends. Coincidence?

I'm not scared.

Dropping it Like It's Hot

I'm not sure if it's due to my semi-continued dedication to working out, my extremely strict diet, the esophagitis brought on by GERD, or just plain luck...but whatever it is, I'm fine with it since the pounds keep coming off. Well, fine with everything less the death-fearing chest pain that accompanies the health condition. Regardless, I've made it through over 6 months of weight loss and feeling, as LD would say, 'prettaaaaaay good' about it.

NSU Biggest Loser Program ended the first week of May. There was a closing ceremony, during which we all got to check out our "before and afters", final weight loss numbers and other areas of health improvement.

Here is my terrifying B&A

I improved in a lot of other areas besides the weight loss, which totaled 22 pounds in the program.

Here is a chart of the stats

I ended up winning a grand prize for losing the most Body Fat %age - 8.6%. The prize was $50 gift card to Whole Foods. I spent it a long time ago. :)

The entire Yellow Team took home a majority of the prizes, winning (of course) the Team Losing the Most Pounds (Percentage Weight Loss). Our team prize was/is 12 free training sessions as a group. This is a fantastic prize - especially when you consider the cost savings for such training. We just had our 4th team training session and it's going great! NSU has posted a summary of everyone's results, so please check them out if you're interested!

Since I won (in some form) all 4 of the team challenges, I was able to cash in my $100 gift card toward training packages at the University Center. I start with another trainer this week.

Writing this blog, I am exhausted thinking about all the work and energy myself and my team put in to see the changes. It was so worth it. Yesterday I saw Perla, one of the Yellow Team members (she was just shy of taking home the ultimate grand prize of most weight lost). She started in at over 250 pounds. She now weighs 189. She is literally about half the size she was in January. It really is amazing to see how much change dedication to yourself and your health can bring.

All of the participants in this program should feel blessed to be able to have been a part of such a successful program. With the prizes we are able to continue (at very little to NO cost) to become more healthy.

Since May 7th, I've lost another 7 pounds, down to 151. I was a size 12, down to a size 6!!! If anyone is donating size 6 clothes, holla. I've got nothing.

So now people ask how I've done it...how my teammates have done it...

Ask me anytime. I'm happy to talk about it - but I'm pretty much done writing about it. As for all my peeps out there that I know are working on losing their weight, MUCH LOVE and I wish you SUCCESS!!