What do I watch?

jules1476

Okay - so I'm pretty new to trying to lose weight and I love this website but I'm getting a little confused. I really like entering food and it's made me was more aware of my eating habits - but what exactly should I be watching most? Should I just concentrate on calories? Try to balance calories, fat, and carbs? You hear about diets focusing on each individual one, but since this website shows all of them I don't know which one I should be most concerned with. I can do well with my calorie goal, but then I go over on fats or carbs. Any advice????

jules1476

Okay - so I'm pretty new to trying to lose weight and I love this website but I'm getting a little confused. I really like entering food and it's made me was more aware of my eating habits - but what exactly should I be watching most? Should I just concentrate on calories? Try to balance calories, fat, and carbs? You hear about diets focusing on each individual one, but since this website shows all of them I don't know which one I should be most concerned with. I can do well with my calorie goal, but then I go over on fats or carbs. Any advice????

bluestime

simply make sure you stay under your allotted calories for the day and you'll be good, that is, you'll lose weight. I don't look at anything other than calories.

zenmama

I personally have to watch my carbs....and my calories usually fall into place when I do that. It is up to you and your body.

dd

songbyrdsweet

Balance them and watch total caloric intake. You want about 30--50% of your calories to come from carbs, 20-40 % from protein, and 20-30% from fat.

There are 4 calories in a gram of protein and 4 in carbs too.
There are 9 calories in a gram of fat.

So let's say you need to eat 1500 calories, and you want to eat 40% from carbohydrates.

1500 x .4= 600.

But that's *calories*, not grams. To get the correct grams of carbs to eat, you have to divide 600/4, which is 150. So you'd eat 150g of carbs. You can do the same for protein and fat, except you divide your fat calories by 9.

What you eat is just as important as how much. A diet that's 70% carbohydrates with just 15% protein and 15% fat is not as nutritious as one that's 50% carbs, 30% protein, and 20% fat because it's too low in fat and too high in carbs, which can cause higher blood sugar and decreased satiety. Hope that helps!

MontanaGirl

I would start off simple (read: have started off simple ) and am focusing mainly on my calories. You do need some balance, but at least get started. Then as you go along you can keep track of things that are important to you - maybe you are concerned about sodium. You can track that - songbyrdsweet knows a lot about nutrition and I think she's right on but if you get overwhelmed back up a little and take it slower as far as finding out how to make everything balance out for you. You'll get there!!

NurseBarb

I have followed Songbyrdsweet's advice, she is majoring in nutrition and fitness and she's been a wealth of information and help to me.

I adjusted my personal goals for protein and carbs because on the norm I just wasn't eating as many carbs as it was giving me. I fall a little more to the protein side, which is fine. I'm not anti-carb at all and you shouldn't be. The biggest thing I've learned is to stay balanced and stay under my calorie goal. Adding exercise to your day earns you extra calories! I just found this out yesterday and it's so cool! If you add in an exercise, it says "congratulations you've just earned ______ extra calories!"
I love being able to eat things I love and still lose weight!!! YAY!!!

So good luck to you! This is a FANTASTIC place to be!

Nich0le

If you are just starting keep it simple. Watch your calories and choose fresh food over pre packaged if possible. Once you have adjusted to eating less calories then you can start to focus on what matters for any health concerns you have, songbyrds math is pretty right on for the big 3. Depending on the day you will see highs and lows for every catagory but the longer you work on eating healthy the better your eating habits become. :happy: