Logging Before or After

I mostly do a combination of "pre-logging" (not really planning what I'll eat for specific meals -- it's mostly for keeping my focus on food that needs to be eaten because it's perishable and to find a good database entry for foods that aren't in my regular rotation that I've bought, so I don't have to worry about that in the rush of putting a meal together) and logging throughout the day, as I actually decide and weigh what I'm having for a given meal or snack.

On rare occasions, when eating out at a restaurant without nutrition information or at family or friends' houses, I'll log after the event, reconstructing what I ate, and that definitely could be at the end of the day.

It varies some. Mostly I log at the end of the day, though I may log a meal at a time (usually after eating it) sometimes if it's more convenient. I pretty much only pre-log if my intuition suggests I'm running low on the day's calorie budget, to see what will top up my nutrition goals within the calories remaining.

During the day, I note items eaten on a junk mail envelope or some other paper already headed for recycling, then log it all in my phone later. I don't like messing with my phone while cooking.

I did slightly more pre-logging when I was first losing, but it still tended to be a meal at a time, not the whole day. I'm too impulsive about food choices to pre-log: It would make the process meaningfully more annoying or unpleasant to me, and I like things to be easy, as long as easy will accomplish my goals.

I'm in year 8 of calorie counting (year of loss, maintenance since). At this point, I have pretty good intuition about whether I have plenty or few calories left for the day.

I'm also much more relaxed about overages at this point . . . after getting past the newbie-maintainer magical thinking that if I eat wrong one day I'll somehow gain back a bunch of weight. At this point, I know viscerally that it doesn't work like that. At worst, I'll slowly creep up a pound or few if I eat over maintenance semi-repeatedly. I've proven to myself that I can creep those pounds back off again, so I don't stress much about it at this point. 🤷‍♀️

MacLowCarbing wrote: »

Thanks for the input, it's useful.

I've been trying different ways to be more consistent and effective.

Mostly I am trying to get into the habit of sitting down at the end of the night when I have my coffee and play around on the internet. I log for the next day so I can make sure I eat enough, not too much or too little, and also so I don't get halfway thru the day and realize I've blasted thru my carb allowance at breakfast and have to figure out something 100% carb-free to eat.

But then some nights I have to go back and change it because something came up-- out of an ingredient, or got busy, or like today I got an upset stomach and wasn't hungry and didn't feel like cooking.

I'd rather have the plan there, and change it if/when necessary, rather than to try to go along figuring it out in the day and logging it later. When I do that I find I always go under, over, mess up my macro balance, or I forget to list something. I'm just not at that point yet in my journey.

Sounds like great planning

My breakfasts, lunches, and snacks don't vary a lot. But it is very helpful for me to prelog dinner.

I typically have a good idea of what I will eat each day, but I also intermittently fast a few days a week. I prefer to just log what I eat, when I eat it to build my habits and it also helps me make better choices for the day as I'm forced into looking at calorie count more often than I normally would. I also work out 5 times a week, so there are days I'm just more hungry than others and will eat more so logging real time works better for me.

I prefer to log as I go. It helps me to make better choices.

I prelog my day to make sure I can fit in everything I need, then adjust if necessary when plans change etc.

I do the same as nossmf (I thought I was weird). I have always had the "menu board" on the fridge, I log the week dinners in advance then fill in the day either as I go or at the end. I'm retired now but when we were working it just made life so much easier, both from the shopping and preparing point of view.

My breakfasts and dinners are largely the same with some last minute variations. Snacking and dinner gets logged when I cook orgrab it as I often don’t know what I’ll eat.

Im mostly a pre logger. I’d say 90% of the time. I create the menu for the day and then eat what I log.

Sometimes I will have to edit if I get something different at a restaurant or cafe by my office.

I have always found that checking your foods before eating is a smarter option for me. It gives me a chance to switch things around both for nutrition and bulk. I am a bulk eater.

I don't think I have pre-logged a single meal... I always log as I go. Breakfast depends on my better half and daughter so that's always up in the air. The better half works evening shift, so dinner is usually what ever is in the fridge that I feel like making for myself and the kid. We grocery shop on the weekends, usually buying stuff like meat and frozen veggies in bulk so there is always something available... just depends on effort and desire.