Weight Loss Tip #15: Keep a Food and Fitness Journal

I've read it on many occasions from dieting experts: don't count calories. I couldn't disagree more. Losing weight is essentially a math problem. If you consume more calories than you burn, you'll gain weight; consume fewer you lose; consume the same, you stay the same. Now, while metabolism may alter these numbers, the basic principle stays the same. So, it's helpful to know, especially when you're trying to lose weight, the specifics of your diet. This is particularly true because we can consume so many hidden calories or can be misled about what foods are helping us put on weight.

A good friend of mine lost a bunch of weight, but before this, when he tried and failed to lose, he ate a lot of pretzels because pretzels were better than other snacks. True. However, he would sometimes eat nearly a whole bag. Counting calories would tell you that a 10 oz. bag would give you around 1100 calories, or over half of your daily calories. Seeing it on paper or on your computer has a way of cutting through the denial!

Calorie counting (and keeping track of calories burned) in my life has been beneficial for several reasons:

It has revealed hidden calories- Those "little" snacks that I ate throughout the day added up to not so little numbers at the end. For example, eating peanuts for a couple of minutes could easily pack 250 calories. In addition, meals that didn't seem so bad on the surface really were. For example, who would've guessed that broccoli, bacon, cheese, and mayo salad that I loved could have over 400 calories a cup!

It allowed me to accurately gauge loss, gain, and maintaining weight- This was important especially as I moved towards maintenance in my diet. I needed to know if my calories were realistically coming close to my exercise output.

It gave me a mental sense of accomplishment- I could look at the trends in my calorie counting and see how I'd done over a long period of time. This gave me a sense of accomplishment and also allowed me to make adjustments where necessary (e.g. cutting out foods that brought lots of calories but few nutrients).

It created structure- This is probably the hardest to explain, but putting in my calories and fitness output was (and is) an important part of my day. It helps keep me focused and structured in my plans and also as a check on tendencies towards getting back to previous poor routines. It's kind of like a little reminder, a trophy of sorts, of how well I've done.

How should you count calories? If the thought of pen and paper scares you, it should! You don't have to be an accountant or statistician to count calories these days; computers do it for you. I recommend the program Fitday. They have a free online version at Fitday.com, but I recommend the software. It allows you to keep track of all your calories and fortunately has a huge database of foods. It not only keeps track of calories, but also a host of other nutrients, vitamins, and minerals. If your food is not there, you can create custom foods by combining ingredients. You can record your activities and the calories burned. There are tons of prelisted activities and you can create custom activities. The software also includes options for measurements, mood, weight, etc. The best part is that you can run reports to see various trends, such as how your weight has fluctuated over 6 months.

So, it may go against what you've heard in the past, but if you want to lose weight and get fit, start counting!