In case you missed my any of my updates on my DietBet, you can check them out here:
Guess what guys!?! I’m a winner!!
Do you see how big that pot is – $12,480!! I don’t know how much of it I get to keep because not everyone has done their final weigh-in but I’m pretty freaking excited!
So, I’ve been saying in my DietBet update posts that my starting weight was 143.6, which is kind of a lie. When I did my official weigh-in for the game the scale said 146.2 pounds, which just about made me cry. I knew I was really bloated that day and when I weighed myself the next day it said 143.6.
I had already submitted my official weigh-in photo for the game so I had to stick with 146.2 but I knew my real starting weight was closer to the 143. I met my goal either way with a final weight of 136 pounds even!
If you ignore the bloat weight then you can see that I still lost 4% of my weight and am a legitimate winner!
Starting Weight: 143.6 pounds
Goal Weight of 4% lost: 137.8 pounds
Current Weight: 136 pounds
Total Weight Lost: 7.6 pounds
You may not care, but if you click on the picture above to make it bigger then you can see that my thighs got smaller! I knew that I had lost inches because my clothes fit me differently (my favorite shorts are now too big) but it’s hard to really tell when looking in the mirror. Before and after pictures are really great.
Not only did I make it through the DietBet as I winner but I also made it 28 days eating nothing but raw fruits and vegetables! I am so happy to report that I felt GREAT the whole time! It wasn’t always easy but I really wanted to see if I could do it and how I would feel so I stuck with it.
Here are what my last few days of the DietBet looked like, and what my first days back to cooked food looked like.
Friday
What I ate:
Breakfast: Pineapple, peach, and green smoothie
Lunch: 3 bananas and some grapes
Snack: 2 or 3 mangos
Dinner: Giant salad topped with corn and cherry tomatoes and my taco salad dressing
Dessert: Peanut butter banana ice cream
TOTAL calories: 1,956
Exercise: 40 minutes of spinning – 10 min easy warm up, 3 x 5 minutes hard with 5 minutes easy between, 5 minute cool down
Sleep: Ross and I had date night at home so we could watch a scary movie (it was Friday the 13th!) and still get to bed at a decent time. We had our race this weekend so we didn’t want to go into it more sleep deprived than we already were.
Saturday
What I ate:
Breakfast: Orange juice and some kind of melon I got at the Asian market last weekend
Lunch: about 2 pounds of grapes in the car, plus a couple of bananas
Snack: 2 mangos
Dinner: Lots of fresh fruit, 2 bites of salad, 5 bites of spaghetti, and 3/4 of a bread stick.
We left at 10:00 on Saturday morning to drive to Possum Kingdom Lake for our Triathlon. I made sure to eat lots of fresh fruit throughout the day and bring plenty with me because I wasn’t really sure what my food options would be when we got there.
We signed up and paid to eat a prerace dinner with the other athletes which ended up being pasta. I opted for a small portion of angel hair (the only noodles that weren’t slathered in butter) and some marinara, plus a bread stick. Over at the salad bar they had greens with itialian dressing and some fresh fruit.
The salad was smothered in dressing and way too oily for me, so I only had about 2 bites before I passed it on to Ross (who only had about 3 bites). While I was eating my fruit (grapes, apples, cantaloupe, honeydew, and watermelon) I commented that the fruit had pepper on it. Ross looked over and asked, “Does it also have oil on it?”
I took a couple more bites and realized YES, my chopped fresh fruit had oil and pepper on it. It tasted good but I wasn’t really happy about it being covered in oil. So weird. I still went back for 3 huge helpings of the fruit and I did also have 5 small bites of my pasta and 3/4 of the bread stick. I was okay with that decision.
Exercise: none. Off day to let my legs rest before our race.
Sleep: Great! I took out my contacts around 8:00 and laid there while Matt (Lynn’s husband) and Ross watched a movie, and probably fell asleep around 9:30 or so. I didn’t actually sleep very well that night but I was proud of myself for going to bed so early since our alarms went off at 5:45 the next morning.
Sunday
What I ate:
Breakfast: fresh OJ, 2 mangos, and 3 or so bananas
Post-race: Veggie burger, chips, and a banana
Lunch: Veggie delight from Subway with 1/2 a bag of chips and some grapes
Dinner: Baked sweet potato topped with black beans and salsa
Dessert: 3 pieces of toast
Exercise: 6.2 mile run as part of our relay triathlon
I cannot even tell you how excited I was that they had veggie burgers after the race! The sign at the grill said they were offering hamburgers or cheese burgers and I fully expected them to tell me no when I asked if they had veggie burgers. One of the ladies volunteering even checked the box for me to see if they were vegan. They were!!
If I hadn’t eaten the burger then my post-race options would have been semi-green bananas and some oranges. I happily scarfed the burger and even ate a bag of Lays potato chips. I’m not really proud of the chips but it is what it is.
On our drive back home we stopped at Subway and I got a veggie delight sandwich and we shared a bag of BBQ chips. And since I had already eaten so much cooked food that day I decided to treat myself to a cooked dinner as well.
I baked a sweet potato when we got home, added a little vegan butter, some black beans, and some salsa and was so excited to sit down and eat. Then I dropped it on the floor, face down. Womp womp.
I heated up some more beans and got some more salsa and ate it anyway. It was delicious. Since I’ve been craving bread (and tofu) the most while eating raw I decided to go all out and have some toast for dessert. I went back twice for more and ended up eating 3 slices total.
I was a little worried when I went to bed because the next morning was supposed to be my final weigh-in for the DietBet. I knew I had eaten too much for the day and while I wasn’t ashamed of any of it, I was questioning whether or not it was a smart end to the DietBet.
Luckily they didn’t email me the code word for my final weigh-in until I was already at work the next morning so that meant I had one more day to sort of make amends for my Sunday eating.
Final Thoughts
I am so excited that the DietBet went so well, that I lost the weight I needed to, and that I’m a WINNER!
Overall the process was really easy for me. Since I was training for our triathlon and am working towards a marathon in November it wasn’t really hard for my to stick to exercising. It was just part of my training that I had already committed to so I just stuck with it.
Eating a low-fat raw vegan diet for 28 days really wasn’t that hard either. I have to say I think it was easier because I did practice for two weeks Monday through Friday before committing to the full 28 days. I did have a few moments of temptation, but overall the process was fun and easy for me. Sharing my progress with you guys and experimenting with new raw recipes in the kitchen helped to keep it fun and exciting.
I never felt hungry or deprived. If I did start to feel hungry I would just eat more fruit. There was no guilt or feeling like I shouldn’t be eating because I was on a diet. Instead of focusing on the fact that I couldn’t eat cooked food I just made a commitment to eat tons of fruit throughout the day and lots of yummy veggies for dinner. I was actually surprised at how happy I felt throughout the whole process.
What Now?
Now that I’ve successfully come out the other side of the DietBet and 80/10/10 experiment I’m trying to decide what’s next for me.
As far as eating goes, I think I’m going to keep with the low-fat raw vegan for the most part. Yesterday I ate 100% raw again and I loved it. I think what is realistic for me at this point is to keep eating raw during the week and at home, but eat cooked vegan food if I go out to eat or someone invites me over to eat. If I see a cooked food recipe that I really want to try then I might do it too. I’m not going to hold myself to anything, I’m just going to eat the way that makes me happy and makes me feel the best. Right now that’s mostly raw foods.
As far as weight goes, I am thinking of joining another DietBet. Ross and I talked about it and the weight that we both think would look the best on me and allow me to perform my best athletically is 130 pounds. Remember, Ross is a certified personal trainer with a master’s degree in exercise science, so his opinion isn’t something he just pulled out of his ass. I don’t think I’m fat in anyway and neither does he, but I think I would like to try and get down to 130 and see how I feel — see if it’s maintainable for me.
If I were to join another DietBet and commit to losing 4% of my body weight again that’s 5.4 pounds, which would put me at 130.6 pounds. I think the DietBet is an awesome way to keep yourself accountable. I knew I had $30 on the line if I didn’t lose the weight so that simply wasn’t an option to me.
My only concern is that the DietBet I want to join starts on Thursday of this week and last for the next four weeks. We’re going to be in Hawaii for one of those weeks. Do I want to be participating in a DietBet while I’m in Hawaii?
On one hand, it would encourage me to stay active while we’re in Hawaii rather than laying on the beach all day every day drinking copious amounts of alcohol. On the other hand, I want to be able to eat what I want when I want and not be concerned if I’ve had too many calories for the day.
Realistically, I think I’ll burn more calories in Hawaii than I do at home because at home I sit at a desk for 9 hours a day, 5 days a week and barely move. In Hawaii I’ll be swimming, walking on the beach, checking out the local farmer’s markets, running on the beach, hiking, exploring, etc. I also think I’ll eat pretty healthy while we’re there because that’s what keeps me feeling my best, and because I’m going to eat tons of raw fruit while we’re there. So I’m really leaning towards doing it again.
I CANNOT WAIT FOR HAWAII!!
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