My first #75Hard journey 18th April to 4th July 2020

Hello my name is Clodagh & I love challenges 💪🏻

Over the past 17 years when I first started focusing on my health I have participated and completed many different types of challenges. Here are a few . . . 

• 30 Day Bootcamps - training three times per week, at 6am in the morning, outside, in Sydney - (ended up doing them every month for a year)
• 40 Day Baron Baptiste Yoga Transformation (completed this twice) 
• Surf Paddle in Sydney Harbour on Australia Day (barely completed this once 🤦🏼‍♀️ )
• Quit alcohol for over a year in 2018 and quit regularly for long periods from time to time 
• Trained and competed in multiple CrossFit competitions from 2013 to 2016
• Whole 30 Food Challenge
• Trained and competed in multiple National & International Powerlifting competitions from 2014 to 2019 

These are just a few I can remember . . . I will add more as they come to me. 

When the lockdown was announced in Ireland 15th March 2020 my diet had already slipped and after a few weeks of bad choices and feeling very bloated I decided to take positive action, I knew if I kept on that path where I would end up and I did not like the outcome.

At the beginning of April, I started to eat clean and take the medicinal wine drinking out of my daily routine. On the 17th of April, a friend of mine posted a video on Linkedin about how he had started Andy Frisella's 75 Hard Program. He looked amazing, focused and clear even though he was going through some personal and professional challenges. 

I listened to Andy's Podcast about the program, read the instructions, cleared out my fridge, wrote the instructions up on a blackboard in my kitchen, sent my friend a message to say I was starting and cupboard of non-clean diet foods. I started my first 75 Hard Challenge the next day :) 

The rules are very simple and it is very clear that while you will see changes in your body it is a mindset challenge/program more than a fitness one.

✅  Follow a diet. This can be the diet of your choice, but it must be a structured plan designed with a physical improvement in mind.

✅   You must complete two 45-minute workouts. One of those workouts MUST be outdoors.

✅  Absolutely NO alcohol or cheat meals.

✅  Take a progress picture every day.

✅  Drink 1 gallon of water, 4 litres. 

✅  Read 10 pages of a book. **Audiobooks DO NOT COUNT.

I had been eating clean, off the wine, drinking lots of water, working out every day and going for regular walks outside during the week so honestly the first 50 days were relatively easy, it was about day 55 that I started to feel like every day I was walking in a swamp. With the lockdown, living by myself, throwing myself into work, the routine was starting to become soooooo boring.

I was expecting it to get easier but there I was struggling through every day and on day 70 as the lockdown in Ireland was about to lift, I broke down. I was not ready to socialise or be indoors with people and I did not want my 75 Hard experience to end. My family did not feel the same, they were ready to be with other people outside of our agreed bubble and so our family pop-ins, dinners, sleep-overs and most importantly hugs, ended. 

The tears flowed and would not stop, but I had a workout to do so I there I was on a Sunday afternoon lifting and crying uncontrollably wondering what was wrong with me. 

It was at that moment that I did something I have rarely do, I shared with the 75 Hard Accountability Facebook Group that I was struggling. This is not my natural style I keep my troubles to myself and figure them out on my own, not wishing to be a burden on others or showing my vulnerabilities as I am usually the strong person that people come to for help and advice. 

Within a few minutes, two members of the group reached out and reminded me that this was a mindset program and what I was experiencing was perfectly natural to and to keep going one day at a time, there were only 5 left.

That evening I cried in the rain on my walk (so dramatic 🤦🏼‍♀️ ) and for the first time in a very long time, I realised that while I was on my own, I was not alone. 

P.S. (that lump on my back is a lipoma - been there for years - have had it checked - all good :))  

I was happy enough with my physical changes - the scales moved down a few kilos however my muscle mass high at 60%+.  My strength is more or less the same (still rep 60kg bench) and I have been vegan-ish for over 7 months. I am 47 and 177cm tall.