Accuracy of MFP numbers put to the test...

So I started using My Fitness Pal on May 26th of this year as a tool to help with the lifestyle change (not a diet) that I began on March 9th. At that point, I had already lost 67 pounds but I was becoming very uncomfortable with my eating. Not that I was eating too much, but that I was scared to be put in a situation where I didn't know exactly what I was consuming, and not eat anything at all. I had started an excel spreadsheet in March at work and had kept it up for a few weeks, but found it too difficult to keep up (especially after a weekend). So I just gave myself calorie goals to stay under for each meal, and kept as good as a running tab as I could for each day. However, I still felt that if I had a bad meal or a bad day, that I would begin to sabotage my efforts. And then I got the MFP mobile app. It took a couple of days to get used to it, but now I don't know how I managed without it. Being able to record everything I was eating with great ease boosted my confidence in my fat shedding abilities into the stratosphere. Coupled with the new heart rate monitor I received as a gift from my wife, I was not as sure as one could be of the work I was doing. So over the past 47 days, I have recorded every morsel of food entering my body, and entering the calorie counts from my HRM for every drop of sweat I efforted. So how do the numbers stack up? Did I lose what MFP said I would. Let's find out:

I began my journey at 471 pounds. When I started MFP, I weighed in at 404 pounds. Over the past 47 days MFP says that I should have lost 28.73 pounds (about 4.28 pounds per week - even though they say 2 is the maximun that you should lose per week, on some days that would have me eating 4500 calories, which I will not do). And what did I weigh this morning:

375. For a 29 pound loss since beginning on MFP, and a 96 pound loss overall (I'm coming for you, 100 pounds). So in my case, it has been a pretty accurate register of my weight loss. I have been stressing to everyone I know that the best way to lose weight is to write down EVERYTHING that you eat and be HONEST about it (a steak as big as the plate is not 5 ounces).

So there you have it, and this is one man who will be using MFP for another 125 pounds.


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