For Suzanne Rainey losing weight is more than just slimming down. It’s another weapon in her arsenal to ward off her most feared nemesis — cancer.

Suzanne, executive director of Boys & Girls Clubs, doesn’t have cancer, but the disease stalks and kills her family members, one by one. She fears that one day it will catch up with her too.

“A couple of years ago, my uncle, the last of my mother’s siblings, was diagnosed with colon cancer,” she said. “My mother (Carolyn McGee) and all of her sisters have died of breast cancer. I knew I had to change my life because my grandmother had also died of breast cancer.”

And then in February 2009, Suzanne’s 58-year-old sister was diagnosed with breast cancer and in April her uncle died of colon cancer.

Suzanne said part of her life changes was in diet. She didn’t necessarily “go on a diet,” but she committed to eating more healthy foods.

“I bought a juicer and started juicing,” she said. “I wanted to do things that were good for us without necessarily going off he deep end.”

She also accessed an Internet exercise regimen, “Couch-to-5K Training.”

“This is for people who want to run a 5K but who absolutely do nothing,” she said.

Another factor in getting into running shape was that Suzanne, the youngest of five siblings, and her sisters formed two teams — one in Birmingham and one in Nashville — to run in the Susan G. Komen Foundation Race for the Cure, a 5K run.

“The slogan, ‘Race for the Cure’ played over and over in my mind and I realized that I'm at the age that I cannot wait for a cure,” said Suzanne. “I'm 46, have two young children, and just want to live to raise them.

“We have been ‘for the cure’ as long as I can remember from a young child. I do not believe it will happen in my lifetime and probably not in that of my daughter’s, but I just wanted to do what I could do for myself to stay healthy.”

She ran — “and walked” — the 5Ks in 2009, but said she felt she was “stuck” in her fitness program.



Met ‘Big Loser’



In August Suzanne met a Big Loser — Roger Shultz, first runner up in Season 5 of the television show “Biggest Loser.”

“I have watched Biggest Loser since it came on,” she said. “But sometimes I didn’t believe it and wonder what goes on behind the scenes. I wondered, if they really lost that much weight.”

So when she met Roger Shultz, she said she had “a thousand questions” to ask him.

“I asked him, ‘How do you lose so much weight in a week?’” she said. “He said he exercised five to six hours a day and stuck to a 2,200-2,500 calories a day. He said he wore a Body Bugg, a monitor that tells how many calories you burn in a day.

“He said he set a competition goal of losing a pound a day. He also mentioned that The Biggest Loser had a resort in Utah. They might call it a ‘resort,’ but it’s really a boot camp. They have a masseuse on staff, but that’s pretty much it.”

Suzanne said that in the meantime, she had been urging her nephew to plan a trip to the Grand Canyon where they could do some scenic hiking.

“But when I heard about the Biggest Loser Resort, I realized that this was something I could do by myself.”



Boot camp



Suzanne called The Biggest Loser Resort in Utah for reservations and was booked for the week of Jan. 10-17.

“I really didn’t know what to expect, but I had heard the hiking scenery was incredible,” she said. “The day I checked in and got my schedule, I thought that there is no way I can do all of this. But then I looked around at the 67 other people who were checking in at the same time and saw that they were all different ages and sizes.

“Some of them were retired people. I said to myself, ‘I can do this.’”

Suzanne said each day began with breakfast at 7 a.m., followed by a 2 1/2-hour hike.

“Breakfast was different every day,” she said. “The chef had a degree in culinary arts and studied under Wolfgang Puck for three years. The food was incredible. I just don’t know how he could prepare 1,200 calories a day and make it taste that good.

“We were served all whole foods — whole grains, no sugar — no coffee, no caffeine of any kind and no carbonated drinks. We got our proteins from chicken, fish, eggs and nuts. It was a no-dairy diet, but we got a lot of soy cheese and almond milk. I was never hungry, not once after I got there and got started.”

Once the hiking group returned from the morning hike, which was to a different destination in the rocky hillsides and mountains every day, it was time for 11 a.m. exercise class.

“Lunch was at 12 p.m., followed by an educational class on nutrition at 1 p.m.,” she said. “Then at 2 p.m. there was another exercise class, and at 3 and at 4 other exercise classes. Then it was dinnertime, followed by another nutrition education class. When I got out of that, I fell out.”

She said class members had their choice between exercise activities, such as swimming, kick-boxing, cardio machines, cardio disco, yoga or circuit training. “By the end of the day I was exhausted,” she said.

But she said she was also invigorated by the schedule. “I think it was a good way to jump-start a program and a really good way to de-tox.”

“We had sessions with a trainer and were given ‘budget sheets’ on which we calculated our resting time metabolic rate,” she said. “The calories burned were our ‘income’ and what we ate was our ‘expenses.’ Going over in our expenses was ‘paying our debt.’”

Suzanne said she was there for just a week, but others were there for four weeks and even six months.



Back home



“I was anxious to see how all of this would work with my regular routine,” she said. “I can be honest — I can’t live without my coffee, but I did go to caffeine-free. I’m trying to be realistic, but whatever I have I will count the calories.”

Suzanne said she lost four during her week at Biggest Loser Resort and she wants to keep up the momentum by sticking with her 1,200 calorie-a-day plan and adding an hour a week to her exercise routine. But she has learned that no one succeeds on a weight loss and fitness program without “slipping” occasionally.

“The way it was explained to us is that if you were in debt and had to pay off your credit card, would you go on a vacation?” she said. “But they also have the 90-percent/10-percent rule. Ten percent of the time you will do bad.”