I'm a night person by nature and this is what my schedule is MOST days. Go to bed at 7am, get up at 10am, go back to bed at 1:30pm, get up for work at 6pm and eat breakfast, Lunch at 11pm, and home again at 3:30am. My day spans two! So when keeping a journal what should I do? Go from midnight to midnight? From when I get up till when I go to sleep? What does everyone else do?
I personally do from when I get up until I go to bed. It really doesn't matter as far as the calendar goes - what matters is that you journal everything you do during your waking moments no matter what day of the week or time of day it is. HTH!
yah i agree! i'd do it from wake up to bed time (ps that schedule sounds bananas!!! good on ya for doing all this and coping with that! )
ps i bought the cutest journal at the dollar store! it's for kids for school heheh and it's shiny glittery pink, a big page per week, with squares that I can put Br./Lu/DInner and snacks, and columns to check off water & exercise heheh I love it! i'm a child
OK there's also STICKERS involved so sue me! heheheh
I think I read that FitDay goes from midnight to midnight, so if you're using that tool, just be aware that some of your "daily" food will be on one day and some on the next. But you could always decide to track from midnight to midnight anyway I guess.
I'd go midnight to midnight. That way any schedule changes doesn't effect anything; midnight is still midnight. You're really looking at an average of calories, anyway, so I wouldn't worry if some food leaks over onto a different day. It'll average out the same.
Fitday definitely goes from midnight to midnight based on one of the US time zones - I haven't figured out which one, but I gave up using it once I realised that. It just got too confusing for me - not that it takes much to confuse me!
Reddalice, like everyone else, I'd just choose a time to start your "day" - whether it be when you get up, go to work, have lunch, whichever works for you. Just try and keep it consistent if you can so that your days are all about the same length rather than having say a 36 hour day followed by a 12 hour day and so on...
My schedule can be kind of crazy, too, but I still use Fitday. I go from when I wake up to when I go to sleep, and sometimes I have to manually turn the Fitday "day" back or forward one in order for me to enter it that way, but it works for me. I've also found that getting enough sleep is a crucial ingredient in my weight loss, as I don't lose at all regardless of what I do with food and exercise if I don't sleep.
It can be really frustrating! Some times, with small amounts of sleep a day... or on my days of when I crash, my days are different lengths. Each time I wake up it's "my morning." I ran into problems with TOO many calories in a 24 hour period because I was having multiple and overlapping "days." o.o... Gah. But that's confusing
I live on graveyard so my bedtime is at about 6am. I count from 3pm (when I wake up) until I go to bed in the morning. It's harder with you having 2 different sleep times, but I'd just ignore one for purposes of journaling (I do this when my sleep is broken up like that). Personally, I'd go from 6pm-6pm. That's what your breakfast time is, so that'd be easiest for me. Really though, you have to just figure out what's going to work for you. As long as it all gets recorded I don't think it matters that much.
I know what you mean about eating too much sometimes. On the days I have appointments and such I'm often up for 20+ hours at a time so I naturally consume more food. Just do what you can, living on a messy schedule is a drag, but this can be done.
This annoying thing called time- Food Journals
