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| Bob and Jillian - Complete shock and horror?? |
Some of the contestants who returned for last night's finale looked amazing. Tumi stands out most for me. She lost a ridiculous amount of weight and looked good - really good. She looked happy and more importantly, she looked healthy. Tumi was hardcore from the beginning and I am so glad she won the "At Home" prize.
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| Tumi - Biggest Loser - Looking amazing. Good job, girl. |
But when Rachel walked on to the stage, I was shocked and perhaps a bit sad. As you can see from the photo of Bob and Jillian - they were pretty horrified as well.I immediately thought - "She is way too thin". I am not even trying to take away her months and months of hard work, discipline, tears and resolve.She, like Tumi, worked super hard and lost a great deal of weight - 155 lbs to be exact to end at at 105 lbs, at a height of 5' 4". However, I felt she did not look healthy - she looked almost anorexic. What do you think?
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| Rachel Frederickson, Biggest Loser 2014 - From one extreme to the next? |
And this compared to what she looked like before the season finale. Not saying this is her ideal weight but she looks worlds better at this weight than she does now. She was not even this small when she was a state championship swimmer - an athlete!!! C'mon...
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| Rachel Frederickson - after her Biggest Loser makeover |
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| Rachel Frederickson last night - pretty girl but she looks so gaunt. And she is only 24. |
I was really conflicted about who should win after seeing her. On the one hand, I felt she did not represent healthy weight loss. She looked incredibly frail and even when she tripped on the way to her final weigh in, I thought she would break. I felt like this perception of weight loss should not be rewarded.
On the other hand, she worked hard - not denying this, but more worrisome, the self-image issues seem to be very real, and I wondered if not rewarding her hard work would make her somehow think she was not the biggest loser - not as small as she should have been to win.
The Biggest Loser last night sparked a lot of reactions - but I think one thing I took away from it is that the show and the whole concept may need to be tweaked a bit. It has to be more than simply losing a whole heap of weight, especially if it becomes too much weight. Perhaps the participants should be set a target weight as someone suggested on Twitter - a healthy target weight. It should not be getting so thin to the point of looking frail, just to win money!
There were a lot of mean comments on social media which are not constructive. No matter what side of the weight spectrum one is on, hurtful comments never contribute anything meaningful or positive. I just hope that Rachel gets some support as she resumes her life.
