7 Day Challenge Summary

So for the past 7 days I have been doing a challenge.  It went like this:

Day 1: All vegetables, mostly raw, a serving or 2 of extra virgin olive oil or coconut oil allowed, vinegars allowed for dressings.  Green tea allowed, 1 cup of black coffee allowed (I didn't drink any coffee myself).
Days 2-4:  Same as day 1 but 20-25 grams of protein added twice.
Days 5-7:  Same as day 1 but 20-25 grams of protein added four times.
Day 7: I cheated and took a bite of fruit.  (I felt obligated to add this.)

Weight lost: 6.6 pounds from Monday morning 4/9 to Monday morning 4/16.  Which really gave me a 4.4 pound loss, as I had gained 2.2 over Easter weekend.  That's a HUGE loss for me.

I had a breakfast this morning much like I have been with a few tweaks.  I had 2 hard boiled eggs, butternut squash, carrots, and some banana and strawberry yonanas (basically frozen banana and strawberries).

This week the only changes I am making is adding in sweet potatoes, some fruit, some dairy (mainly in the form of plain Greek yogurt), some nuts, and probably some legumes.  I'm going to wait on adding any grains back for a little while.  The goal is to just have whole foods, nothing processed.  I really really really don't want to count calories anymore and I am hoping that this way of eating will allow for me to not have to do that.

Whole foods and portion control are my new eating plan.  Unlimited veggies, up to 2-3 servings of fruit per day, 1-2 serving dairy, protein 3-4 times per day (at around 20-25 grams of protein per serving), legumes a couple times a week, nuts once a day preferably (2 max) including natural peanut butter if wanted.  Doing a rough caloric estimate that should put me between 1200-1700/day, which is perfect.  If at any point I show a gain over the period of a week or 2 (water weight happens due to change in diet or exercise, so you can't freak if the scale shows a gain over the course of a couple days), I will reevaluate.  For now, I am thrilled to not have to count calories, and really hope the whole foods will not only help with my weight loss, but will just make me healthy over all.  Also I need to start exercising again, I missed an entire week!

I would recommend this challenge to anyone trying to change their lifestyle as a segue into healthy eating, or to someone already leading a healthy lifestyle who wants to do a cleanse or renewal of their current way of eating.  Obviously if you do this for 7 days then go back to crappy eating it doesn't really hold much benefit in the long run.  It's not meant to be a crash diet (at least from my perspective), it's meant to restore you, cleanse you, and detox you.  It's not easy (at least it wasn't for me), but it was definitely worth it.