MFP Frustrations
SwtHedgehog
Posts: 175 Member
Has anyone lost weight using MFP as a food diary (and not relying on the calorie count)?
I keep reading posts about being accurate with your diary (including using a scale) is the only way to lose weight. I don't understand this concept, as I am not seeing how one can be so accurate down to each calorie, given there is so much variation in foods and exercise (the only way to truly know how many calories you're burning is to be in a fitness lab hooked up to a bunch of tests).
As an example, yesterday I had a slice of New York Style Pizza (spinach feta) from a local pizza place. When searching for that, a range of calories from 145 to 520 (or something like that). Additionally, the service size is 1 slice, which doesn't tell me anything because a slice from a 14" pizza is going to be quite a bit different than a slice from a 20" pizza. Most foods in the database have not been verified (I'm still not even sure what it means if the food has been verified). Do people just search the entire database and look for the most calories?
I think I've tried tracking in MFP a few times, but I get frustrated because it seems like I end up sitting around more trying to add/track items, that I was losing out on moving around. I also get frustrated because it seems like a lot of work for something that I can't depend on. For the most part, I eat pretty healthy, but tend to lose track of how much I'm eating (I'll have a handful of grapes, but then I'll go back multiple times because they taste good and I can't seem to stop). I've thought of looking into an app that you can photograph your food (I don't want to keep those photos in my regular photo database) so you can physically see the amount of food you're really eating (so it provides more of a cue to your brain).
Any insights would be appreciated.
I keep reading posts about being accurate with your diary (including using a scale) is the only way to lose weight. I don't understand this concept, as I am not seeing how one can be so accurate down to each calorie, given there is so much variation in foods and exercise (the only way to truly know how many calories you're burning is to be in a fitness lab hooked up to a bunch of tests).
As an example, yesterday I had a slice of New York Style Pizza (spinach feta) from a local pizza place. When searching for that, a range of calories from 145 to 520 (or something like that). Additionally, the service size is 1 slice, which doesn't tell me anything because a slice from a 14" pizza is going to be quite a bit different than a slice from a 20" pizza. Most foods in the database have not been verified (I'm still not even sure what it means if the food has been verified). Do people just search the entire database and look for the most calories?
I think I've tried tracking in MFP a few times, but I get frustrated because it seems like I end up sitting around more trying to add/track items, that I was losing out on moving around. I also get frustrated because it seems like a lot of work for something that I can't depend on. For the most part, I eat pretty healthy, but tend to lose track of how much I'm eating (I'll have a handful of grapes, but then I'll go back multiple times because they taste good and I can't seem to stop). I've thought of looking into an app that you can photograph your food (I don't want to keep those photos in my regular photo database) so you can physically see the amount of food you're really eating (so it provides more of a cue to your brain).
Any insights would be appreciated.
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Replies
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When I'm home, I use a scale and weigh out my food, and that accounts for 70-80% of my meals. When I go out to eat, yes, estimating portions and calories is a bit of a crapshoot, but I also tend to go to the same places frequently so I have a good idea of what is on the menu, and I just take the highest estimate from among the choices given.
I also make heavy use of the "recent foods" and "frequent foods" functions. For example, I eat a variation on the same breakfast almost every day, so by clicking off the items from the "frequent" list, I can log my breakfast in the time it takes to swallow between my first two bites.
To your point about photos: You might try the blog function to keep a visual diary. I did that several years ago for 30 days, and it was a good exercise for me. Knowing I was going to have to take a picture of everything I ate also stopped me on several occasions from picking up a bag of chips or just walking by the pantry and popping something in my mouth on a whim. (You can take a look at the blog at https://www.myfitnesspal.com/blog/rosebarnalice "Waits and Measures")-- for some reason, not all of the pictures display any more, but I have them saved on my laptop.
Ultimately, the MFP tool is only as good as you are at using it. So, like any tool, sometimes you have to either practice using the tool until you get good at it, or adapt the way you use it to serve your needs.
Best of luck to you!9 -
Mine are mostly estimates.
I track, but I don't lose sleep over inaccuracies, to a point. And I don't own a food scale. Its all just educated guessing on my part.
For your pizza example, what I would do personally is just take a look at what the calorie range is, collectively, and then pick one that fell on the higher end of average. Higher end to be safe.
Its worked thus far for me. I understand that it might not work for others, but I've had success with it. If I feel I'm not seeing the results I want, I adjust my calories to make up for the small indiscrepancies that come from my inaccuracy.5 -
You only have to be as accurate as what allows you to meet your goals. I will tell you, I don’t always follow all the advice I give on here about weighing things and accuracy - but here’s the thing - I’m meeting my goals. Whatever estimations and guesses I’m making are not enough to cause me to struggle. For others, it may be, so I tell them to weigh everything, log as strictly as possible, so they can figure out where the problem is. They can do it forever if it helps, but they don’t have to. They just need to adjust the problem area, either by adding more calories for that entry, or not eating it anymore. I know that if I start struggling, all I have to do is get strict until I figure out where the heck i was messing up. That’s the same advice I offer here, do what works for you, but if you start struggling, there is likely an accuracy problem somewhere that you need to identify. As an example, I eat a lot of frozen food. Rather than weigh each one to make sure it’s accurate, I just add an automatic 10% “overfill” tax on the calories, as some are overfilled by 20%, and some aren’t overfilled, so it balances out. This is how I be “lazy” while still meeting my goals.
I have lost weight before by logging in a personal diary and not tracking calories, but I was actually under eating, so I like the calorie nature of MFP. It helps me not undereat when I’m trying to lose weight.9 -
It is very hard to be accurate when eating out, even if you go to a chain that publishes calorie information (since your portion size may be larger than it says). If you eat out a lot, it will be difficult for you, also because restaurant food tends to be very high in calories. Basically, I would recommend eating out less if it is causing problems for achieving your goals. Based on your comments of eating pretty healthily, I'm guessing this isn't the primary problem, though.
I almost never eat out, in part because of numerous dietary restrictions, but I do still eat prepared foods. It is tempting to say "oh, it's 250 calories, it says on the label" when eating something like a protein bar. But if you actually have a food scale and weigh it, it can often be 50-100 calories more than that, since it is safer for companies to give you more food than the label says, rather than less (in terms of preventing lawsuits). So it is important to weigh these things if you eat them often. If it is an occasional thing, it is not such a big deal.
Regarding the grapes issue: try pre-logging a fixed amount that fits in your calorie goals, e.g. 200g of grapes. Measure out that 200g of grapes and put the rest away before you begin eating. In general, I find logging something before I eat it is extremely important to achieving my goals. I make a point of planning my day in the morning or even the night before - this might be vague, e.g. if I'm cooking something new for dinner, I may just pre-log "600 calories". But when it comes to actually eating dinner, I will calculate the calories in my new meal *before* portioning out what I will eat. This ensures I stay within my planned calories. Logging your own recipes is also extremely important to accurate logging - e.g. don't just log "1 cup lasagna". Instead, use the recipe builder and put in what you actually cooked (and I would of course recommend serving sizes in 100g, not cups).
Also, you are correct that calculating exercise calories is a bit of a joke on MFP. Even a fitness tracker often hugely overestimates calories burned. What works for me is to have a set calorie goal every day - I do not adjust it based on exercise (as a result, my calorie goal is higher than recommended by MFP, since I'm not eating back exercise calories). I set my goal based on observed rate of weight loss - it takes some trial and error.3 -
I never expected MFP to be totally accurate due to the many variations in food preparation. I'm satisfied with a "best guess" for tracking. I figure sometimes the estimate will be high and other times low, so over time it averages out. I find that looking up and tracking everything I eat makes me more aware of what I'm actually putting in my body every day. It has helped me cut down on portion size and snacking. Right now I'm happy with not gaining more weight, but my ultimate goals to to lose weight gradually trough better eating habits.10
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I never expected MFP to be totally accurate due to the many variations in food preparation. I'm satisfied with a "best guess" for tracking. I figure sometimes the estimate will be high and other times low, so over time it averages out. I find that looking up and tracking everything I eat makes me more aware of what I'm actually putting in my body every day. It has helped me cut down on portion size and snacking. Right now I'm happy with not gaining more weight, but my ultimate goals to to lose weight gradually trough better eating habits.
^^ I'm with jdlatshaw! I "guess" which is the most accurate/similar food to what I'm looking for. There is no way be EXACT with all your food, unless you make it all yourself, measure out every ingredient and every portion size. I get it, it's annoying, time consuming & not always accurate. But you can't expect MFP to know everything for you lol Also, with exercise. There's no way to MFP to know how many calories you are ACTUALLY burning.... it's all esitmates. If you want more personalized numbers, you'll need to pay for them somewhere else I'm sure.
Basically, estimate, estimate, esitmate..... if you're losing weight, it's working! You don't need to know the exact numbers...... right?? If you arn't seeing the results your hoping for, you probably need to track a bit closer. (count all the grapes, ect...) It's a committment and will take time. But it's time well invested!!
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I am not aware of anyone who says that is the "only way" to lose weight. Weight loss works by taking in less calories than your body burns. That is true no matter the mechanism you do it by. For some people, it is as simple as "cutting out soda and walking more" or "just eating healthy", because the changes they make naturally puts their body into a calorie deficit. However, for a lot of us, it is not that simple, and we need to do more work to get a calorie deficit correct.
Your body keeps an exact log of how much it takes in and how much it burns. Unfortunately it isn't nice enough to share that information with us. So we have to do our best to measure it ourselves, by estimating our calorie intake and our calorie output. You are correct that there is always a certain amount of estimating that goes into it. Again, everyone is different. For some people, just logging a rough estimate of what they eat everyday is sufficient enough to keep them in a deficit and on track. For others, we find that we have to be more accurate with our logging.
So the suggestion of "use accurate entries and a food scale" isn't something that needs to apply to everyone. But it is the most accurate way you can measure your food intake. So it is the first suggestion given to people who are struggling with losing weight. Because when someone is struggling, a lot of time they are eating more calories than they think they are eating. So weighing and double checking their entry is the best way to trouble shoot that.
The honest truth is that sometimes losing weight does require sacrifice, and that is not only in eating less of the foods that we like, but for some people, that involves eating less places that are hard to track. So if you go to a local pizza restaurant that doesn't have nutritional information, that one of the more difficult meals to track accurately. You are going to have a higher margin of error with that vs preparing food yourself, or even a chain restaurant. So if you find yourself struggling with losing, you may need to tighten your logging, and reduce places that have a harder to estimate calorie count.
But if you are losing weight, then none of the above really matters and you can do it however you see fit. However a lot of people find they can be looser in the beginning than the end. So you may find that you need to tighten your logging as your weight loss journey progresses.5 -
I try and track as accurately as I can - including weighing everything I eat at home. This has helped me develop an eye for portion size when I go out so that I can still eat at a sensible level. Where I do guesstimate when out I try and be absolutely honest with myself - I think I know in my heart the difference between a 300 cal slice of pizza and the sort of toppings that would take it way over that. If I look something up when out and am given a choice between 500 cals for a serving of cake or something and 750 I make a judgement looking at size and richness of the product and err on the side of caution. It's not perfect but only has to be right most of the time. Same with exercise - mfp exercise cals are not perfect but I don't eat all of them back - it works for me as a way of being aware of how active I've been each day and whether I can adjust my intake accordingly (my mfp is set to inactive as that is my preferred state!) I've lost weight comfortably doing this and am gently maintaining during a pause before my last 10lbs or so.
I think people encourage accuracy of weighing and logging because it is SO easy to kid ourselves that a piece of bread is really only 50g, or that piece of chicken was a 'normal' portion. Including everything I ate for a while was a real eye-opener regarding things like dressings and even fruit - I would happily eat all the fruit every day but looking at the actual weight of fruit taught me to put the brakes on a little.
But I do me and I think you should do it whatever way it works for you - the important thing is to learn how not to kid ourselves
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Sure, there are plenty of variation inherent to foods themselves but why wouldn't I work to introduce less variance by ensuring that I'm logging with as much precision and accuracy as possible?
For something like the pizza you described, I would at the very least consider the size of the pizza, the number of slices, and log it as a fraction of the whole pie from some place I would consider comparable knowing up front that choosing the eat food I'm not preparing is introducing some variance into my data to begin with.
To you point about taking time to track being akin to losing out on moving around, I'm a huge proponent of pre-planning as much as my day as I can and pre-logging. It's really easy during the work week as I eat basically the same thing every day and build in some cushion for flexibility in portions. I'll pre-log what I expect a portion to be and can quickly correct to the weighed portion once it's prepared (i.e. 105 g bagel instead of the stated 113g, etc.). I
In the context of how much NEAT contributes to your overall expenditure I'll break down my average TDEE:
Average observed TDEE: 2545
Estimated BMR: 1836 (72.14%)
Adjustment for "Sedentary": 367 (14.42%)
Remainder accounted for in exercise: 342 (13.44%)
Granted, this is for my overall average, and doesn't take into account the fact that I don't workout daily, usually getting 4 lifting sessions in per week. So, lifting days are accounted for below (60 minute sessions).
BMR: 1836 (65.5%)
"Sedentary" adjustment: 367 (13.1%)
Calculated Workout adjustment: 599
Total lifting day TDEE: 2802 (21.4%)
So, even on days on which I lift, almost 80% of my expenditure is due to me just existing and going about my daily life. In reality, how long are you really taking to log your food and how much does that time matter in the grand scheme of things?
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Calorie counting isn’t for everyone. There’s a significant learning curve and ramp up that doesn’t get a lot of discussion. No one was born counting calories. We have to learn it.
But once you get it up in running, it works.
Try planning a menu. You’ve got it backwards. The problem isn’t that wandering around eating handfuls of grapes reveals the shortcomings of calorie counting. It’s that calorie counting reveals the shortcomings of wandering around eating grapes or anything else by the handfuls.
You will know its working when you start considering your food diary and calorie count before making food choices.
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That’s the thing about the energy balance equation - there is some uncertainty on both sides of the calories in, calories out inputs. That doesn’t invalidate the whole equation though. Weight loss comes down to creating a consistent calorie deficit over time. You can do this without counting a single calorie, if you’re able to get to that calorie deficit without logging, estimating calorie burns - just by changing the way you eat and maintaining portion control.
That said - you don’t have to be 100% accurate with every calorie logged in order to be successful. Consistency in logging, using common sense and reasonable estimates, practice, and monitoring plus adjusting based on your actual results can lead to great success. I always advise new users who are struggling to use a food scale but truth be told - I didn’t when I was losing or in my few years of maintenance. But I logged everything using good judgement and estimates and adjusted when I hit plateaus.
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I've tried several food tracking sites/programs ... this one is the easiest I've come across. And it really is easy ... isn't it.
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WinoGelato wrote: »That’s the thing about the energy balance equation - there is some uncertainty on both sides of the calories in, calories out inputs. That doesn’t invalidate the whole equation though. Weight loss comes down to creating a consistent calorie deficit over time. You can do this without counting a single calorie, if you’re able to get to that calorie deficit without logging, estimating calorie burns - just by changing the way you eat and maintaining portion control.
That said - you don’t have to be 100% accurate with every calorie logged in order to be successful. Consistency in logging, using common sense and reasonable estimates, practice, and monitoring plus adjusting based on your actual results can lead to great success. I always advise new users who are struggling to use a food scale but truth be told - I didn’t when I was losing or in my few years of maintenance. But I logged everything using good judgement and estimates and adjusted when I hit plateaus.
I agree! Not weighing/logging works until/unless it doesn't. For some people, it always works, right through their weight-loss phase and into maintenance. For others? Not so much.
In the end, your progress (or lack thereof) will determine which method is best for you to achieve your particular goals.2 -
I do a lot of cross referencing with the nutritional info provided on restaurant websites in cases like your pizza. If its something I eat often i try to get the right amount the firdt time so that I have the right amount everytime. For something I eat occasionally its a bit less of a worry but I try to pick at higher (not highest) estimate from the database if I can't get specific info. However, I used to weigh everything. I've been here since 2013/2014 so I have a pretty good feel for most of my foods. I do ot weigh any more. Now, I log what I think is close and just adjust my daily goal till i see the rate of loss I want on the scale. If I think I'm eating 1800 a day but actually eating 2000, but still seeing the results I want, what does it matter? The point is the results. If 1800 isnt 1800 but Im losing my 0.4 lbs a week, then I'm still losing at my desired rate.
I weigh some things. Such as bread (large variation in calories depending on where in the loaf the slice comes from), cereal (hard to eyeball), and high calorie foods like bananas, avocados, oils.. that kind of thing. Other things I go by the package and divide it.
Oh and verified entries? Means nothing. Half of them are still wrong. Even barcode scans are wrong for me once a day.0 -
I use a food tracking journal. I write down what I eat and an estimate of how many calories each item is. I find it better for me than using the MFP logging system. Don't misunderstand...it is still work if you are serious about losing the weight.
Much of what I eat is repeat things. Take for instance my bacon/egg/cheese sandwich is 320 calories. I have about 20 recipes that I use and I have a list of those and the calorie counts per serving. When I make a new recipe I use MFP's recipe builder to find the calories and determine how many servings that I can get from it and still stay within my goals.
I have spent a lot of time on learning portion sizes and do a fairly decent job at it. On occasion I will weigh something but not very often. Grapes are one thing that I weigh...it always surprises me how much those little guys weigh. I had a small bowl full for a snack that came to 400g...160 calories!
I still use MFP's guide lines to set my calories except I now eat within a range. I use my MFP figure as the bottom number and my maintenance number at goal weight as my top number. I also found that having regular times to eat has helped me from that "all day long snacking" that I was doing.
As far as those things that you don't have a precise calorie count on I just use whatever the restaurant says or google to find something close. Those estimates are close enough for me and so far they have not interfered with my weight lose nor even slowed it down.
I would be remiss if I didn't mention that there are pitfalls with this method. I know that at some point that it might quit working and I will either have to go back to weighing my food or be happy with the weight amount that I did lose. Also if you are in to tracking macro/micro this method doesn't work.
The worse pitfall so far for me is getting to the end of the day and finding that I didn't eat enough. I have had several days that I was way below my goal...thus I have lost weight faster than what I intended and had to up my minimum calorie goals. No matter how you go about keeping track of what you are eating it is work. You just have to find a method that works for you and gives you the results that you want to see.
I disagree that the problems that you are having with logging your food is an MFP problem. IMO it is yours expecting perfection. I have used MFP as it was intended and I lost weight. I just came to the realization that I needed to do things differently for now.
I wish you luck on figuring out what will work for you.
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Just a suggestion for weighing grapes. Not much in the scheme of things, but something if you want to tackle one thing at a time. I weigh an empty bowl. Put a bunch of grapes in it. Weigh it again. Write it down on a scrap of paper. Put the paper in the bowl. At the end of the day, weigh the bowl of grapes again. Subtract. Know the weight of grapes I ate. Takes longer to tell than to do.
I eat a lot of peanuts. Weigh out a small handful. Put them on the cabinet. Log them. Eat from the cabinet, not the jar.
Logging was SO HARD at first. But it got easier—and then easier, and easier. I still have occasional meals that I just say
“What the heck” use fast add and take a wild guess, but they are fewer and farther between than they used to be.2 -
brittanystebbins95 wrote: »Mine are mostly estimates.
I track, but I don't lose sleep over inaccuracies, to a point. And I don't own a food scale. Its all just educated guessing on my part.
For your pizza example, what I would do personally is just take a look at what the calorie range is, collectively, and then pick one that fell on the higher end of average. Higher end to be safe.
Its worked thus far for me. I understand that it might not work for others, but I've had success with it. If I feel I'm not seeing the results I want, I adjust my calories to make up for the small indiscrepancies that come from my inaccuracy.
I do the same thing. I always go higher if I have any doubts about how many calories I'm actually consuming. I don't have a good scale either so it's hard when cooking protein at home and trying to figure out if you are eating 3 oz or 4 oz. So I will usually go with 5 oz just to be safe.1 -
I don't find counting calories hard at all, the scale is pretty accurate, and if I have multiple calories in the database for the same meal, I'll go for the highest number.1
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