What happened when I exercised 30 minutes every day for 30 days?

This post isn’t about my personal finance journey but to chronicle my personal challenge to exercise at least 30 minutes every day for 30 days.

This past year has been very up and down for me in terms of diet and exercise. In 2017 I gained some weight, so I decided to do weight watchers with a friend in early 2018. We started at the end of February and I did it until August, with a net loss of 20lbs. It was the first time I ever paid for a weight loss program and I was overall pleased with the results.

Pretty happy with my weight post WW, but I would like to lose another 10lbs. I’m not really overweight, even when I stated WW I wasn’t, but I weigh a little more than I would like and I am a person who really likes food. My husband does this strange thing where he doesn’t eat if he’s not hungry…such a weirdo. J

My kitty doesn't trust the FitBit!

I have always exercised somewhat but not consistently. I was hooked on Zumba for about 5 years and then had a multi-year love affair with barre classes, so I normally would workout 1-2/week. Sometimes 3 times on a good week and sometimes 0 times for two weeks in a row if I was busy. Unfortunately, around the time I quit WW, my barre instructor moved and my gym cancelled my barre class. Since I wasn’t going much after that (read: at all), I cancelled my gym membership.

I will be tracking my 30 minutes of exercise with my FitBitAlta HR, if it doesn’t think it’s exercise I won’t count it. If you are not familiar, the FitBit tracks your pulse and when it’s high enough it deems you to be “active” and if you are active for at least 10 minutes in a row it will track that. It can also recognize certain types of exercise like walking, elliptical or aerobics.

So I started my 30 days on Sunday, November 25, 2018 and yesterday I was thinking I should track somewhere to keep me honest, so here I am. I’ll update with my workouts and their impact. On my first day, I was +4lbs from my normal weight – I had gained 2lbs on a work trip the week before thanksgiving and another 2lbs over thanksgiving.

Weighted gloves make you feel bad ass!

Day 1 Nov 25: 37 mins, 222 cals – I did the Dance Yourself Thin workout video from Prevention, while wearing 1/2 pound weighted gloves. The gloves are really for kickboxing type workouts but I put them on thinking they would give me a better arm workout and they definitely did. The workout was a little slow paced for my liking, I prefer dance workouts where they just do it and you try to follow rather than slowly teaching you each move.

Day 2 Nov 26: 39 mins, 263 cals – I went for two short walks, one before lunch and one after dinner. I was feeling yesterday’s workout a little bit which surprised me since I didn’t sweat much during the workout.

Day 3 Nov 27: 56 mins, 372 cals - I did great on active minutes but I felt like some of my minutes were a little too generous. I went for my typical lunchtime walk but I was walking around in my office beforehand so I think my fitbit counted that too. After the walk I was already at 28 mins for the day but I didn't feel like I had done much and only walked the day prior, so I did Tae Bo Celebrity Fit with Billy Blanks for another ~30mins.

It was my first time doing this workout and I hadn’t done any Tae Bo since…the late 90s? The workout was pretty good and started off quite challenging but toward the end it was really annoying me because the counts were not even. It seemed like he was telling the group to do whatever came to his mind. Since I have the DVD I’m sure I’ll do it again but I don’t see it becoming a favorite. Though I might look for some of his old 90s DVDs to add to my collection.

Day 4 Nov 28: 30 mins, 225 cals - I did the Turbo Jam fat blaster workout with my weighted gloves. I love Turbo Jam workouts, it's like dancier cardio kick boxing. I like the cues from Chalene and I feel like it's a good, solid workout.

Day 5 Nov 29: 41 mins, ???cals - I went for a 27 min lunchtime walk for 187 calories and then topped up with a YouTube 4 min arm workout and a standing ab workout. The FitBit tracked the YouTube workouts but didn't tell me the calories burned because it wasn't 10 minutes it doesn't recognize them as "exercise" only activity. I also weighed this morning and not only have I not lost my thanksgiving weight, I was up another 1/2 pound. I think was using the exercise challenge as an excuse to eat whatever I wanted at work, so I need to get my eating a little more under control.

One of my Turbo Jam DVDs

Day 6 Nov 30: 32 mins, 234 cals - I am very proud of myself for getting up early to get in a walk before work! I hate getting up in the morning to exercise. I have lunch out with my Work Wife today and friends are coming over tonight for dinner so I knew this was the only way to get my 30 minutes in today. I walked my neighborhood.

Day 7 Dec 1: 50 mins, 262 cals - I did 30 mins (109 cals) of Barre with the video Standing Slim with Sadie Lincoln. I bought a 5 disc set of Barre3 DVDs and this was the first one I tried. I really liked it and could definitely tell I haven't done barre in a few months! It was a 30 minute workout but I noticed the DVD also has 10 minute segments, which is a nice option. I also did a 20 minute (153 Turbo Jam workout for a little extra cardio to combat all the bread I've been eating.

cals)

Day 8 Dec 2: 33 mins, 200 cals - I was awake early this morning so I went for a walk at 8am. I have plans with some friends later and it's nice my workout commitment will be out of the way. I went to a holiday market all afternoon with friends and ended up with 61 active minutes for the day!

Looking at the comparison of my first week of the challenge and the week prior, my total calorie burn has gone up nicely. See all those stars? That means I met or exceeded my calorie goal for that day. My goal is set at 2300 calories/day.

Day 9 Dec 3: 32 mins, ??cals - I had one 22 min walk for 154 cals and I added another 10 min walk at home but it didn't track my calories for that, maybe because it wasn't long enough. I had 44 active minutes total for the day but I kind of felt like a slacker for just walking again.

Day 10 Dec 4: 38 mins, ?? cals - my lunchtime walk (12 mins, 86 cals) was short today because it was too cold and I was wearing uncomfortable shoes. I had to make it up when I got home for the rest of my 30 minutes! I decided to do Jillian Michaels: 30 Day Shred. It was my first time doing this workout and I had thought it was 3 different 20 minute workouts but it's actually different variations on the same workout, it has 3 levels. I decided I'd do level 2. It was a good, hard workout. It's supposed to be 20 minutes but the run-time is actually longer than that. My arms felt like jelly afterwards but I'm not sore today - which is exactly what I'm looking for in a workout.

I had a total of 38 active minutes but I'm kind of getting annoyed that my fitbit won't tell me the calorie burn for strength type of workouts, it didn't have a count for the Jillian Michaels workout.

Day 11 Dec 5: 31 mins, 218 cals - I was hungry and tired so I skipped my lunchtime walk and just walked a full 30 minutes when I got home. It's so hard to motivate to walk when it's cold.

Day 12 Dec 6: 32 mins, 223 cals - I walked, it was cold but my husband came with me.

Day 13 Dec 7: 33 mins, 267 cals - I tried another Prevention dance workout, this time I did Dance It Off. I did the first 30 minutes of the DVD only because I was running late. The pace on this one was much better and I felt like it was a good workout. I got a total of 74 active minutes! I was off of work and did a lot of cleaning, so my house looks great and I burned some calories.

Day 14 Dec 8: 25 mins, 204 cals - I didn't quite make my 30 minutes, I have no excuse, I was being lazy. I had walked 25 minutes already but it was cold and I didn't want to go out again. I did have 70 total active minutes but only 25 of actual exercise.

Day 15 Dec 9: 30 mins, 285 cals - We had a snow storm today, so no walking outside. So, I did my Turbo Jam workout but I did the middle "work section" twice to make it 30 minutes. There is also a 30 minute workout on this DVD but unfortunately, mine skips. I need a new copy.

Day 16 Dec 10: 32 mins, 274 cals - I did a YouTube Latin Dance workout (basically Zumba) from Popsugar. They have a couple with this instructor, Nicole Steen, and I generally quite like her moves and level of intensity.

Day 17 Dec 11: 30 mins, 259 cals - I had a total of 38 active minutes for the day. For my exercise, I was still feeling the Zumba so I did another YouTube workout video from OneHowTo. They only do silent queuing, if you're not used to that it make take you a minute or two to catch on but I really like their routines and I wish they had more full-length videos. I needed a few more minutes, so I also did my 4 minute PopSugar arm video.

Day 18 Dec 12: 32 mins, ?? cals - I think I have been favoring cardio because I like seeing the calorie counts, so tonight I mixed it up a little and did Jillian Michaels: 30 Day Shred again and added on a 5 minute squat workout from Popsugar. I had a total of 44 active minutes for the day, the other 12 I suspect came from walking to/from the car at lunch!

Day 19 Dec 13: 45 mins, 317 cals - I finally walked again! There was still snow on the ground but the sidewalks were mostly clear. In the south nothing is ever plowed and we just wait for it to melt. It's crazy. I had a short walk at lunch and a short walk with my husband while waiting for our dinner to be delivered.

Also Jillian definitely knows whats up, since I was feeling the workout from the night before.

Day 20 Dec 14: 31 mins, 209 cals - I had a 6 am conference call this morning, which only lasted 30 minutes, since I was already up, I went for a walk before heading to the office. I'm trying to look at the bright side of having gotten up super early on a Friday. It was really cold still, so I wore my snow pants! Whatever works.

My work holiday party was also this afternoon, we went axe throwing(!) at Urban Axes and I had a whopping 85 active minutes for the day and my calorie burn was 2,825 for the day!

Day 21 Dec 15: 49 mins, 339 cals - My husband and I walked to our favorite brunch place. It's a little over a 20 minute walk from our house, even though it was December, the weather was nice. Also, at the end of breakfast (only half the walking!), my Fitbit said I had burned more calories for the day than were in my breakfast, even though I ordered a medium-caloric meal. I love calorie counts on menus!

Day 22 Dec 16: 30 mins, 212 cals - I did two short walks and then my husband and I went to a holiday cookie party 😆

Day 23 Dec 17: 12 min, 109 cal walk and 20 mins 159 cals of aerobics. I tried a new Popsugar bellydance workout that was quite fun and surprising challenging. I had a total of 52 active minutes. I have also still gained weight...but I also ate like 8 cookies at the party...um....

Day 24 Dec 18: 41 mins, 309 cals - I did a couple of Zumba videos on YouTube from OneHowTo, they honestly weren't my favorite ones but it could be that they were new for me and I might need to do them a couple of times to learn the moves. I did this one and some of this one.

Oddly, I only had 35 active minutes today, even though I had 41 minutes of exercise?!? I officially do not understand FitBit's tracking.

Day 25 Dec 19: 32 mins, 261 cals - I wasn't feeling great but I still walked.

Day 26 Dec 20: 33 mins, 139 cals - I walked a little in the morning before work (13 mins, 79 cals) and after work I was still feeling a little under the weather so I decided to do some yoga (20 mins, 60 cals). I'm not much of a yoga fan but it really felt great stretching last night.

Day 27 Dec 21: 36 mins, 192 cals - I walked, really slowly because I happened upon a friend who lives in our neighborhood who has an adorable new puppy! I bumped into them and happily joined their walk.

Day 28 Dec 22: 32 mins, 223 cals - Family has begun to arrive for Christmas and the days are getting hectic, walking is the easiest to squeeze in, so I walked again.

Day 29 Dec 23: 38 mins, 296 cals - Today I did a good workout, to counteract the cookies! I did several of the sections of Dance It Off from Prevention with my weighted gloves on.

Day 30 Dec 24: 33 mins, 277 cals - Today I walked much faster, and squeezed it in before Christmas dinner.

So, while I didn't lose any weight during my challenge, it was also the holiday season and I ate...a lot of cookies and delicious things and managed not to gain any weight doing so. Also, I think exercise became more of an ingrained habit because I got a little behind on my blogging and did an extra day without realizing the challenge had ended.

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