My Top Ten Keys to Weight Loss Success: 2 - Logging
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dksmith20110
Posts: 35 Member
Ok, so again let me emphasize that these keys are just the things that have helped me succeed so far. Everyone is different. It helps me stay motivated to write about this; call it personal therapy of sorts. But maybe it will help someone else, maybe not. I'd love to hear what worked or is working for you.
So I started this 8 week diabetic weight loss program in April at work. In the first session, they said that we needed to count calories and log everything we ate. My heart sank. I would never be able to do that. All I could think about was reading product labels and manually logging everything. I knew that was never going to happen and I felt pretty hopeless at that point. But then one of the nurses mentioned there was this app called My Fitness Pal (MFP) where you could log your eating and it would tally the numbers for you. Further, this app had a database of lots of foods already in it, and it would let you scan bar codes on food products to automatically enter the data into my food diary. Hmmm...a glimmer of hope I thought.
Well MFP was the breakthrough I needed! I tried it, and it worked for me. MFP did all the tedious work for me so I could focus on my goals. Not only that, by setting my goals in my MFP, it helped me stay on track. Yes, I had to make some tweaks, and gradually reduced my daily calorie goal. Currently I target 1900 per day, and I can still lose at that level with the amount of activity I now do each day. So logging works if you do it every day consistently and if you log honestly what you are eating. Losing the weight is still hard, but MFP gave me the tools I needed to be successful.
So log every single day. Be honest to yourself about what you are eating and log as accurately as possible. Not sure? Then estimate conservatively and go with the higher estimate. It typically takes less than 2 minutes per meal to log. It's not that hard. As you start doing activity and getting mobile again, log your exercise. My exercise is primarily walking. Initially, I could not walk more than maybe a tenth of a mile, and it hurt. I am now up to 60 minutes at one time. Learn from your logging and make adjustments to your diet gradually.
I don't know if you will find logging to be as big a breakthrough as I did. But for me, it has been one of the biggest keys to my success. I am hoping to log my eating for the rest of my life. I don't want to go back to where I have been.
So I started this 8 week diabetic weight loss program in April at work. In the first session, they said that we needed to count calories and log everything we ate. My heart sank. I would never be able to do that. All I could think about was reading product labels and manually logging everything. I knew that was never going to happen and I felt pretty hopeless at that point. But then one of the nurses mentioned there was this app called My Fitness Pal (MFP) where you could log your eating and it would tally the numbers for you. Further, this app had a database of lots of foods already in it, and it would let you scan bar codes on food products to automatically enter the data into my food diary. Hmmm...a glimmer of hope I thought.
Well MFP was the breakthrough I needed! I tried it, and it worked for me. MFP did all the tedious work for me so I could focus on my goals. Not only that, by setting my goals in my MFP, it helped me stay on track. Yes, I had to make some tweaks, and gradually reduced my daily calorie goal. Currently I target 1900 per day, and I can still lose at that level with the amount of activity I now do each day. So logging works if you do it every day consistently and if you log honestly what you are eating. Losing the weight is still hard, but MFP gave me the tools I needed to be successful.
So log every single day. Be honest to yourself about what you are eating and log as accurately as possible. Not sure? Then estimate conservatively and go with the higher estimate. It typically takes less than 2 minutes per meal to log. It's not that hard. As you start doing activity and getting mobile again, log your exercise. My exercise is primarily walking. Initially, I could not walk more than maybe a tenth of a mile, and it hurt. I am now up to 60 minutes at one time. Learn from your logging and make adjustments to your diet gradually.
I don't know if you will find logging to be as big a breakthrough as I did. But for me, it has been one of the biggest keys to my success. I am hoping to log my eating for the rest of my life. I don't want to go back to where I have been.
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