Starting a 6-month journey: DietBet AND HealthyWage, with StepBet and WayBetter

helaurin

Our "lockdown" began in mid-March... and I gained 20 pounds in about 7 weeks. It's insane having a teen who can eat anything all the time, and a boyfriend who does eat anything all the time, and then my willpower goes. So I decided to use concurrent-running DietBet and HealthyWage games, as well as StepBet and WayBetter, to help motivate myself.

I'll focus on the weight-based programs first.

5/08/2020: Joined HealthyWage, starting at 189.6 pounds. My goal is 171.6 pounds by 11/08. HealthyWage doesn't set intermediate goals - there are just two official weigh-ins, one to start, and one to end.

5/11/2020: Joined DietBet, starting at 188 pounds. My final goal is 170.7 pounds by 11/05. DietBet sets monthly goals as well (they call them "rounds"), with both a low range and a high range. If you lose either too much or too little in that month, you are out for that round.

I figure that if my nude weight by November 5th is about 168 or so, I should be good for both DietBet and HealthyWage. And no, 168 pounds is still too much weight - but it's a reasonable and achievable goal for this time period.

I have a FitBit, so I'm also using StepBet to get me to be more active than I would otherwise. Yes, I'm working from home, meaning I have a laptop on my lap, for 8-10 hours a day. I consider myself very sedentary. There were days last year even where my total step count for the day was less than 500 steps... So challenging myself to get even 6,000 or 7,000 steps actually IS a challenge. Yeah, I know, many people might not consider that a lot of steps. For me, it is.

I should mention that I also have Psoriatic arthritis - which for me usually means pain and inflammation in my joints, ligaments, etc. Not to get gross, but sometimes the bottom of my feet break out in blisters - not from exercise - but from this disease. So when I have 15-20 blisters across the bottom of my feet, it just adds to the discomfort of walking.

So I've already completed a couple of StepBets and won! Not a lot of money, but it does bring out some of my competitive spirit.

I also joined a WayBetter game where I need to do four 30-minute workouts a week for four weeks.

Until early this year, I had a Weider home gym that took up about 20+ square feet in my basement, and got zero action - in fact, it got all covered up with boxes of "stored clutter" for want of a better phrase. And that home gym wasn't even something I'd bought - it was left for me by an unofficial foster son because when he got his own place, he didn't have space for it... and that was more than a decade ago! The last time I asked him if he wanted it - he said nope, do whatever I want with it!

So - I sold it for $80.

A week later, someone advertised their elliptical for... $80. I got it, because my two favorite pieces of equipment in the YMCA (when I went) was the elliptical and the rower. Now I have a little workout corner in my basement, and I actually am using it!

So when I use the elliptical for 30 minutes, I can generally count on me getting at least 2,700 steps... and that counts both towards the WayBetter exercise game as well as my StepBet for the day. I love killing two birds with one stone in this sense.

And starting this upcoming Monday, May 18th, I'll be joining a Food Tracking challenge and a water hydration challenge as well, both on WayBetter. Both are actions that should help support my weight loss journey, so why not?

Wish me luck! I'll try to post updates as I go along on this journey.