What did your day one look like? I'm just starting!

I found that planning and weighing food IS EVERYTHING. You 100% have to have a food scale! Its amazing how off we can be on serving sizes. Planning your meals will make it convenient for you and convenience is success! You can do it, good luck!

Hi, my diary is open. Go ahead and look at it. I eat everything now that I did before. Not a lot of cooking this weekend because, well, I was busy and I'm lazy about cooking. I do weigh 95% of what I eat solid food wise and measure all of my liquids and that is the key.

Read these:
http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/1080242-a-guide-to-get-you-started-on-your-path-to-sexypants
http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/1235566-so-you-re-new-here

I started by getting a general idea of what my caloric intake was by tracking for a few days.

There are some formulas you can use.

First of all, you should figure out your BMR (Google BMR Calculator- http://www.bmi-calculator.net/bmr-calculator/) Your BMR is the energy (calories) that you spend on every day body functions if you were to never leave your bed.

Then there is another calculation you can do, the Harris Benedict Calculation. This uses your BMR and your activity level to determine just how many calories you would need to consume in order to maintain your current weight.

Losing weight is science. If you use more energy (calories) than you consume, then you will lose weight. Every 3500 calories is equal to one pound. So start building a deficit.

Also, don't go below 1200 calories a day or you will put your body into hibernation mode which is not good for you.

I used a formula to figure out what my daily calorie goal should be if I wanted to lose 2 pounds per week. I stay under that. (I also adjust it as my weight adjusts).



Hope this helps!

When I started logging my food on MFP I had already been eating somewhat healthy but honest logging of 100% of my intake showed me a lot really quickly - like sodium in restaurant meals, and how high sugar a lot of things in my diet were (stuff I never even thought about having sugar in them). While I am not a slave to any macro (such as fat, fiber, sodium, carbs, sugar, etc) and regularly go into the red on some of them, it showed me some areas I thought I was doing well in, I wasn't, and some areas I thought were fine, needed attention.

But as for the first day or week...I stayed pretty much on my normal path, to get a baseline idea of what I needed to do differently. I remember the very first day I went out for Starbucks and had a huge latte and I also ate 2 pieces of fried cheese from a deli and I wasted a lot of calories that way. Within a week or so, I found that I was choosing more wisely and feeling much more satisfied with my food intake.

Planning ahead is good. It's nice to have go-to meals on hand that don't leave you scavenging for snacks or grabbing fast food. I don't think fast food is evil or anything...but for me it's nice to take the guesswork out of breakfast and lunch by having healthy, balanced, home prepared meals so that I can have more flexibility when it comes to dinner.

One thing to remember is that a loss of 0.5, 1, or even 1.5 lb per week will seem pretty slow. But it does add up. I've been logging every day for 14 months now and have lost 78 lb but I did not have that initial crazy loss that some people talk about. You may experience that--great!! But don't fret if you're down just a couple of pounds in a month. It pays off long term! Good luck!!!