Do you FAITHFULLY keep track
 

of your calories somewhere? I have done fitday and didn't like it. Most recently I have been doing the daily plate. But it's a pain to have to go in and log it all. Since Saturday I have just been tracking it in my head. I am hoping this doesn't throw me way off. But I feel like I have been doing this for a while now and know how much I can eat of what and when and It was getting too tedious to track it all at tdp. So I'm hoping my head will work it all out. Anyone else just track it mentally?

If I weigh in on Sunday and find out this was not a good idea, I will go back to tracking on tdp.

I track it mentally and so far, so good. I eat mostly the same things day in and day out. I've got all my meals down pat. So there's no reason for me to log in my food. If I am eating something new, then I will look up the calorie count. If at any point this no longer works, like you said, I will go back to tracking FAITHFULLY. Well, I shouldn't say faithfully, because what I'm doing now is pretty darn faithful, but it's just not WRITTEN anywhere.

What I do is not for everyone, but it works for me. And if and when it stops working - there WILL be changes. :)

I use DietPower. I started my weightloss journey exactly 327 days ago and I have logged absolutely everything (food and exercise) for 327 days.

I used DietPower previously. I have not gone back to that database but during that effort I went close to 1 1/2 years without missing a beat.

I see this as something that I will potentially do for a lifetime. It keeps me focused. Last time I quite I gained it all back. It is not that I did not know that I was falling apart but not logging it allowed me to stick my head in the sand and pretend like it was not happening.

Lori

Yes, even when I cheat I only let myself cheat with things I can track. Its not that difficult for me because I usually eat alot of the same foods (and don't need to look everything up). I eat the same breakfast most days so I really don't have that much to track. For some reason having to enter my food into a neat little digital log keeps me incredibly honest.

for now I do it all with fitday. Once I reach my goal I'm going to relax a bit and focus on portions

I don't do mine online. I find that it works better for me to actually write it all down in a notepad/journal. That way I can look at my b-fast, lunch, dinner and snacks each day... by only flipping my page.

I know that I am still sticking to my allotted calories. I have no desire to cheat. If I think I'm not being honest, I will start tracking again. I am determined to lose this weight this time. I am even chosing clementines over a 100 cal snack pack or a bowl of cereal in the evening. My two weaknesses. I am loving the new me and it's giving me so much motivation. But like I said, if I find this isn't working, I will go back to tracking.

I still track what I eat (most days.) I use fitday. The thing is that I can't eat the same things day in day out. I love food and can't handle boredum. So there really is no way for me to truely track in my head.

I do agree that fitday can be tedious though. I love being on the computer, so it doesn't bother me, but I can see how it would.

If tracking in your head works for you I see no problem with it. Whatever works, works.

I don't track mine, simply because..I don't want to have something else to obsess about. I don't want to have to count calories for the rest of my life...so eating better and exercising is all I'm doing...I know what I can and shouldn't have basically. I'm determined to make this my last time up and down the diet trail.

I have a spread sheet that I log everything into. I have a TOPS book that has the calorie count on most products that I use but when its a package I just log in the calorie count on the package.

On weekends I write it down because my grandson likes to mess with the computer and he is only 2 so I don't use the computer when he is around.

I look forward to the day that I might not have to do this but it may be a while because I don't trust myself. I have a naughty side that overlooks things like portion control and doesn't know right from wrong.

When I was losing weight and counting calories, I used Fitday to measure calories with as much accuracy as I possibly can. Now that I'm maintaining, I estimate my calories in my head.

I keep a blog as well as Excel spread sheets that lists everything that I have consumed since I started this. I find that it helps me stay accountable.

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I count everything, even the bad days (only two since Dec. 7th) in FitDay - the purchased/downloaded one. When I make new dinners (something I haven't mad before) I'll try it out in FitDay first, deleting it if I don't think it's worth the calories. I learned the hard way that I need to track, for at least the next few years, and probably longer than that.

Not everybody does, in the end whatever works for you is the right thing.

I keep a notebook and I write down everything I eat and the corresponding calorie count (or my best guess in some cases). I also track my water intake and write down what I did in terms of exercise. When I stopped doing this for about eight months, my weight loss stalled. As soon as I started doing it again, I started losing again.

I use FitDay, and yes, there are times now when I don't list my foods for a few days at a time. But that would NOT have worked for me when I started out. The reason is that I did not have a clue about the calories in many foods, and I also didn't have a clue about what 3 ounces of anything looked like, what a tablespoon of salad dressing looked like, what a 1/4 cup of yogurt was, etc. I really did have to weigh and measure things and look them up!

I found out many horrifying things along the way--those foods I thought "Oh, yeah, this is probably more than I should eat for lunch"--only to look it up and find out it was more than I should eat in the WHOLE DAY! :fr:

So, I would say, unless you are really, really sure of amounts and calories, you may need the discipline of tracking your foods for awhile, and by awhile I mean months, not days or weeks. Yes, it's a pain at first, but after awhile it's just what you do--and it doesn't take any more time than any other task that one has to do in a day.

Worked for me!

Jay

I won't put anything in my mouth that I don't know the calorie amount for. So that's how I know that I am staying within range. I did go in to tdp to calculate my recipe for lunch. Turns out it was even better than I thought it was. I have used it to look things up that I'm not sure of since Saturday. But I just haven't been logging like I was. It's been 7 weeks of logging, so nearly two months. I've kind of got it figured out how much I can and can not eat. But I will go back to it if this mental tracking thing doesn't work. And I have been semi-tracking, just not as faithfully as I was. This doesn't mean I am giving up. Just lightening up on the logging food.

During the work week I am much more faithful than on the weekends, when I am not on the computer as much. This is when I employ the method of keeping track in my head. Last weekend I logged on a really tried to make sure everything got logged, that way I understood where I was, even if it was over. I find that the more I log, the more I am accountable and the better I do. I think that once I am maintaining, I will still log, it helps me to understand what percentages of fat, protein and carbs my diet is and how much fiber, sodium, etc that I am getting. It helps me to better understand why I get the results I get.

Interesting question. I 've been pretty faithful. I started keeping track of my calories in January 2006. Since then, I've kept track of my foods all but about 45 days. Of those 45 days, about 15 of them were in one month, when my daughter was hospitalized for two different surgeries. So they kinda don't count to me.


This past weekend I took a break from fitday, but still trying to mentally keep my calories at their usual level. I didn't do very well. I binged badly Sunday, and I think part of it was that I didn't have to "account" for it. I'm not quite ready to keep up with it in my head yet.

I use Fitday PC, btw.

I've been calorie counting for about three months, and have logged everything I eat in TDP every single day. Even the really terrible days when I've binged at parties, I force myself to go back through and put in Every. Single. Bite. I. Had. It's really disgusting when I see how much I can eat when I'm snacking on hors d'oeuvres! Makes me not want to do it again though, which is great.

I write it all down in a journal at the end of the day. The journal sits on my coffee table. I write calories/food (or estimates) and exercise. I sometimes jot cal counts on sticky notes or something at work so I can remember what it was after I throw the packaging out. I am thinking of trying fitday or something similar again though. Last time it took TOO much effort. I tried one where I had to search and use ONLY the food items they had in their database. It's easier if it's more of a spreadsheet format. But yes, I count and track faithfully. Or have been since I stared doing it almost a week ago. Teehee

I stalled with weight loss for two separate weeks in early January, but the other weeks have gone amazingly well. When looking over my Fitday it was interesting to note that during the two stalls I hadn't logged my calories.

I *thought* I was doing well those two weeks and was discouraged at the time. It's apparent I need to log my calories every day in order to remain accountable to my diet.

Since then I've logged every bite every day and have not had a stall.

I do track, but I keep it in a notebook that is always with me...be it the kitchen or my purse. IT goes everywhere with me, no matter what people think. LOL

Fit Day for me. I log it all. I use the online version so I can log in lunches.

I didn't care about it in May. I went home to spend my mom's last days with her. I didn't have access to a computer, so I was not going to let myself obsess about it.

I had a bought last March with diverticulitis but I still logged my food. I was more upset that I wasn't losing weight. I wasn't eating much because of my illness.

I've missed days because we were out of town. I'll be missing about 11 days starting Friday. We will be going on a cruise for my DDs wedding. I just plan to watch what I eat and get some exercise. We'll see if I do any damage to myself.

I have to log it. Even though I've been stalled for a while (1 1/2 - 2 months), I'm logging it. I really can't go down much more on the cals so I think I'll have to start working out more.

Fitday PC version - every day, without fail since I bought it in July. I can keep track mentally, but I really, really, really like being able to look back and analyze trends and look at the charts and graphs. I am a data junkie and the data is affirming.

I hate to do math in my head, so I log it all. I use an online program that my gym offers, but I don't recommend it. I keep using it because I have about a thousand custom foods set up and I don't want to have to set them up again somewhere else.

I like to be able to run reports (in fact, that's my main complaint about the program I use--I wish it had better reports). For example, if I want to see how many grams of protein I've averaged per day over the week, I can calculate that with the click of a mouse. It would be a lot harder to do if I was writing it all down in a notebook (and impossible to do if I were just keeping it all in my head).

I also find that if I have an off-plan meal, it is critical that I log the rest of the food I am eating that day. Otherwise, the day just becomes an eating free-for-all. This is the one thing I struggle with the most. Day to day, I'm always POP, but if I have one off-plan meal, the whole day can be shot.

I will sometimes just wing it during the weekends, but I know to keep breakfast around 200 calories, lunch around 300 calories, and dinner around 350 calories. And even then, I usually log everything by the time I hit my afternoon snack (so that the program can tell me how many calories I have available for my snack).

I do, on spark people.

I use fit day. I log everything. Well not everything, I don't log things like ketchup or mustard.

I use Fitday PC version. I log in exercise, water and every bit of anything that touches my lips and even the things I inhall to fast for it to touch :lol: I like to be able to look back and see how my food choices are getting better, and when theres a weight stall I can figure out why.. I love the reports, because even though I can't see the changes in myself, I can see it all on paper. It helps me stay focused and on track.

I have used fitday in the past but found that I was not consistent with it. Maybe I can transfer my written data to fitday in order to get those nifty charts again ;)

I use a notebook that I have with me all the time. I used to use the online trackers (and still do for my weight - I like the graphs!), but I get too OCD with tracking macros and when I can't get it perfect, I say screw it. Tracking calories only has kept my perfectionism from tripping me up this time :D

I about had a heart attack last night.... one of my 5 month old Dane pups had found my notebook on top of the patio table and was about to eat it when I caught her! Noooooooooo!!!! *whew*

i do keep track... i keep a little notebook with me at all times... i've become very Anal Retentive about it...

I've been logging for years now...I can tell the days where I went way off track because they are when it was too much to even log.

I tried stopping for a while...that's when the scale started to go back up. :eek:

i was taking weekends off from tracking a while ago (been tracking for about 5 months now) and i started to gain weight.. so now i make sure i track on the weekends too and have only had a couple of weeks where i have gone way over and gained a couple of pounds

Absolutely, especially now while I'm trying to lose weight. It really helps me to stay on track. I use DP and I love the graphs and I just love seeing my weight go down on the graph.

Well, I tracked faithfully last week, not so faithfully this week. Last week I lost 1.5 pounds-- this week 2 pounds. So I must not be too far off.

I weigh, measure and log everything into dietpower. I find it interesting to plan menus on it and see not just the calories, but really see what food is made of. It tells me instantly how much protein, fat and carbs I've had, reminds me if I'm low on a vitamin or mineral etc and suggests foods. Also gives you a graph that tracks your weightloss so you see this descending line everytime you use the program. It's particularly useful when you have to plan a days food in advance ie tomorrow I am going on a day long bus trip and need to pack a brown bag lunch and dinner and snacks- I can punch in my planned food in advance and make sure it's going to be balanced. It allows me to tweak my menu to stay on track.

I do keep track of everything and write it down on a tablet , this works for me, others prefer to do it online. I llike the pen and paper method because I can use it any time and can take it with me and don't have to be online. I find that if I don't keep track that I eat more calories than I think.Planning ahead is the key, after all is said is done it was not planning that brought me to me highest weight of 206.

This is my 4th day and so far I am faithfully tracking and plan to continue. I am using Fitday and I love it! It is a sanity saver for me!

i have memorized every calorie for every meal, eaten every 4 hours.

There's no other way for me.