How to log *amount* of liquid in a thick drink

dcopeland137

When I drink a milkshake of course I log the nutrients. What I want to know is about logging the amount of liquid in the "water" category. If I drink a 16 ounce shake do I log 16 ounces of water? Whaddaya think?

cwolfman13

I honestly wouldn't log anything for that. You get water from the vast majority of foods you consume as well and trying to figure that out seems a bit OCD to me. I frankly never logged water at all. I think it may be a beneficial feature for people who don't drink frequently and are chronically dehydrated but that was never me. I've had a refillable water bottle by my side for as long as I can remember. Staying hydrated is what is important and you can tell that by the color of your urine.

ETA: I would personally consider a milkshake much closer to eating ice cream than it is to an actual beverage.

bojaantje3822

Yes, log the full amount of liquid.

I log the full amount of every liquid I drink. So I would log a soft drink, tea, coffee, water, milkshake, cocktail, etc. I would not log soup, the milk in my cereal, etc. But I mostly log out of curiosity, I have pretty good thirst signals and I read them well so I rarely get dehydrated and my "water" intake varies from 1250ml to 3250ml 95% of the time. Only during heatwaves do I go over.

I think whatever you do, do it consistently. You won't get a clear image if today you log the full milkshake, next week you kog 50%, and yesterday you didn't log it under water at all. Choose one and do that from now on.

kshama2001

cwolfman13 wrote: »

I honestly wouldn't log anything for that. You get water from the vast majority of foods you consume as well and trying to figure that out seems a bit OCD to me. I frankly never logged water at all. I think it may be a beneficial feature for people who don't drink frequently and are chronically dehydrated but that was never me. I've had a refillable water bottle by my side for as long as I can remember. Staying hydrated is what is important and you can tell that by the color of your urine.

ETA: I would personally consider a milkshake much closer to eating ice cream than it is to an actual beverage.

Yes, I logged fluid briefly and soon realized this was not a problem for me and stopped.

While I agree with a milkshake being more like a dessert than a fluid, to help the OP, I make smoothies that are about the same consistency of a milkshake. This has 10 oz fluid in a 24 oz smoothie.

dcopeland137

I'm coming up on my tenth anniversary of using MFP every day -- I joined on August 29, 2012. I have kidney disease and I log all input and output, which my nephrologist finds very helpful. I also belong to the NSF sponsored research program AllOfUs, and they have access to my MFP dataset.

I guess who I ought to ask about logging fluid from milkshakes is my nephrologist or the nephrology department's dietitian. I'll do that and report back.

KNoceros

Yes, log the full amount of liquid.

I did vote on your poll, but wanted to add that I don’t actually log my fluid intake at all. This is because as others have said, so much of our fluids are “hidden” and the body is actually remarkably good at regulating its own fluid needs. Contrary to popular opinion, we’re not all blindly stumbling around grossly dehydrated. Thirst exists for a purpose. That unpleasant dry mouth feeling is a manifestation of thirst.
Granted there are a small subset of people with various medical conditions who have to be more careful to ensure that they either meet (or more commonly don’t exceed) a certain fluid intake.

However, if I was going to log fluids,I’d put the whole shake / smoothie / whatever down.

IAmTheGlue

OP, I just want to commend you on taking your kidney disease so seriously and monitoring everything you can, the best you can. My mom has Stage 3 CKD and does not care one bit to manage it… honestly it’s heartbreaking.

Best wishes! 💐

AnnPT77

Since you have special reasons to monitor closely, I wonder if you could approximate the fluid content by taking the total weight of the drink, then subtracting the grams of carbs (including fiber), protein, and fats? That wouldn't be exact (for a variety of reasons I won't belabor), but it might be fairly close.

missdoom84

I wouldn’t log that under the water category at all. I only log the actual plain water I drink in a day.

lemurcat2

Like cwolfman13, I never logged water, because drinking lots of water has always been a habit, and I go by urine color as a better test.

If the issue is to log everything you eat or drink, I'd look at the ingredients in the milkshake. Did you add any water? Is it made with ice cream? Milk? Do you mean a protein shake? Basically, you are logging the ingredients other than water in your diary, I assume, so for your purposes I would likely log only water I added.

Similarly, I sometimes make smoothies and add water to the smoothie. You also get liquid from the fruits and veg in it, but I log the fruits and veg, so I'd only log the water if I added water. I had coffee this morning (and most mornings), but I log the coffee (it has potassium, after all), so logging the water in it would seem redundant if the point was to track everything I consume. 12 oz of coffee or some such tells you I had water with the coffee, presumably.

sollyn23l2

If you made it, and you added water to it, you could put whatever amount of water you added into the water category. I would say the same thing for milk or juice. Any solids you added (fruit, ice cream, etc.), of course, I wouldn't include in the water section. But definitely, asking your nephrologist is the way to go.

westrich20940

I would not log a drink that was not predominantly water. I personally don't even log my water anyway...but if you are someone who wants to log your water intake....log things that are mostly water.

Water, carbonated water, coffee, tea.....that's it. Everything else I'd log as food (including juice or smoothies).