I completed 75 Hard as a breastfeeding, postpartum, vegan woman and I am proud of myself. Here are the rules:
Two workouts (one must be outside and their must be a 3hr difference between the first and the second)
One gallon of water a day
Ten pages of a nonfiction book a day
Progress picture every day
Must follow a diet
At the end of it all, I lost 20 pounds, gained my confidence back and looked at motherhood completely differently than when I began. Before I get into it all, I want to go back to where we began. Six months postpartum, feeling like I needed change and my husband telling me, “I think I want to do 75 Hard.”
It was a random day of the week and my day had looked the same; wake up at 7:00am right when my daughter does, feed her and go downstairs to grab a coffee. Play with her until her first wake window and put her down. Lounge on the couch and try to think of some creative concepts for BlkandVegan - look up and it’s time to grab her and start the cycle over again until bedtime. I would eat when I could and order what I wanted. Drink coffee throughout the day and justify it because I had just given birth. I felt like I had no time, no autonomy and no desire to workout. It was an interesting factory reset as someone who was known to love to workout, eat healthy and be super productive throughout the day. Although a day like that led me to 75 hard, I am appreciative of that season. That version of myself had gone through the biggest life change and needed to allow the ‘put together’ version of myself to rest. But after six months of days that looked like the above - I knew it was time for a change. So on that random day, I told my husband, “I think I want to join you.”
Joining the challenge was the easy part, now I had to think of logistics. Let’s be real - I had a 6 month old baby, no gym membership and no help. I stayed at home with my unpredictable 6 month old as my husband went off to work. How in the heck am I going to do this? The first time I did 75 Hard, it was just me. I had nothing but time, a gym nearby and I wasn’t breastfeeding. Quite frankly, this was not my reality anymore. So I decided to do what most mom’s do - I walked. It wasn’t ground breaking but it was stable and consistent.
I realized that waking up with my daughter was not going to work anymore, especially because I still wanted to pursue my passion of BlkandVegan. So I split my days - I would wake up at 5:00 am to do my first morning workout. I would go home, wake my daughter up, breastfeed her, eat my breakfast and weighed coffee (yes, I would weigh my coffee to make sure that I had the proper amount), put her down and go on my second walk. Once that was completed I knew I could transition the rest of my day to BlkandVegan - filming, editing, and posting. At night after I put my daughter down, I would read my 10 pages, take my progress picture and go to bed to do it all over again. Some days I was able to hit my community gym or partake in a fun class with a girlfriend but 90% of the time, I walked.
It was hard at first, but slowly I started to love waking up before my daughter and having the time to myself. On days that I would oversleep (which would happen) I would be sure to feed my daughter and walk together for her first wake window. No matter what, the first thing I did every day - whether alone or not was walk. And that has changed my life forever.
I am not here to sell you a dream - I am here to tell you the truth. I’m sure that a lot of you may be reading this because you’re breastfeeding and I will tell you this - I completed this challenge and I’m still breastfeeding. It has not stopped my journey but it has altered it. During this challenge, the diet portion required me to take fewer calories, which did alter my milk supply. Therefore, I increased the amount of formula as needed. To be frank - I don’t regret it. I was still able to be my daughters primary source of nutrition all while actually making my body a priority again. And to be clear, I have always combo fed my daughter - I always breastfed her during the day and supplemented with formula for her last feed of the day.
Now when it comes to the breastfeeding cravings - I have been there. Breastfeeding brought a sweet tooth with a vengeance! Honestly, I think that’s what even made me 20 pounds heavier than my usual weight. I was actually smaller the first week postpartum than I was at 6 months. I would order Cookie Society every day and always needed a sweet treat or salty snack. So cutting the excess calories the first three days made me feel starving. My body was so used to eating whatever, whenever that the drastic change did take a minute to adjust to. I will say, that my body did eventually adjust and was totally fine by day three.
Postpartum is probably the hardest thing I have gone through in my adult life. It’s almost undetectable, until its all encompassing. The early weeks of postpartum, I actually thought I was doing well physically and mentally. Until I looked up and realized the habits that I was exhibiting finally caught up to me. What I found is the process of changing doesn’t happen instantly, it happens slowly and thats for the good and bad. Waking up every single day, taking some time to myself and going on a simple walk can make all the difference. Choosing to not order the cookies and meal prep makes all the difference. Sometimes it’s not the big changes, it’s the little ones.
What Diet did you follow? The vegan diet of course! I simply portioned controlled based off of my macros which was 89g protein, 56g fat and 209g carbs. Heres some examples of the food I ate:
What books did you read? I made a list here.
What do you think made all the change? Walking and weighing my coffee (including the sweetener!) Trust me once you know, your order may change. I now have one oatmilk latte a day and if I feel like I need a second I get an iced almond milk latte.
When did you see results? I didn’t start to see change until day 50. Now that I am two weeks post challenge I see the MOST changes!
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