CELEBRATE!

Tonight was our banquet to celebrate the end of the 100-day Heart Challenge and to find out how we did. I think we all could have just hung out and chatted all night long. The heart doctors from the hospital told us how impressed they were with our progress. They like this program because it's about prevention and they hope that we will take what we've learned from the challenge and share it with our friends and families. I know there are people who have followed my blog and it has been fun talking about my ups and downs with them. I sure hope other people benefit from what I've learned.

The climax of the night, of course, was the announcement of the results. As Traci talked about each lady and her progress, it was amazing to see how well every participant did. I could see a difference in how each of them looked. We all stressed so much over losing pounds and yet amazing progress was made in cholesterol, blood pressure, blood glucose, and body fat. Several ladies battled the scales during the 100 days and were frustrated with low weight loss. They were amazed to find they made dramatic reductions in body fat percentage, which is much more important. I'm very happy with how I did and it was very exciting to hear Traci announce my victories. There were some very big surprises in the results tonight. Carma wasn't able to be at the dinner, but Traci shared her remarkable results. We had no idea how precarious her health was when the challenge started and we couldn't be prouder that she has come so far in improving her health. She ended up coming in 2nd. Barb took the top prize with dramatic improvements in all areas and an amazing 10% loss in body fat. She looks incredible! At the final weigh-in, she was frustrated that her blood pressure had gone slightly up and thought that knocked her out of the competition. It just shows that some of the most impressive results are the ones we can't see or easily measure. Tomorrow is our Race for the Red and our final event together. I kind of wish we could keep this going for the rest of the year...