December 12, 2003
Keeping a food diary

THERESA: Yeah, it's OK to overindulge from time to time of year. In fact, it's probably inevitable. But if you find yourself grazing on holiday sweets and snacks at work, at home, at parties, from morning 'til night, one useful tool for pacing yourself is to keep a detailed food diary. This is easy on a computer. Create a document listing the day of the week, followed by every item you eat. Type this up right after you eat anything. Every gumdrop. Every sugar cookie. Your tuna sandwich at lunchtime. Chips you grab from the snack machine. The sugar and cream in your coffee. The pizza and salad you have for dinner. And with every entry, type in the calorie value of that food. This is real easy using an online calorie counter. Total your calories as you go and you'll find you just naturally tend to keep your snacking under control. And on days when I overdo it, I just spend a little extra time on the treadmill to burn those calories off.

I don't do this every day, but once in awhile it's a good exercise, and especially during the holiday season.

Thoughts, girlfriends?

APRIL: I think that's a great idea, especially during the holidays, when you're exposed to tons of foods you don't get every day (like my mom's Italian cookies.) One of the things that happens when you keep a diary like this is you learn to target high calorie or high fat small, hidden things in your diet, like cream cheese on a bagel, or those tiny, seemingly harmless hors d'oeuvres at the weekend cocktail party.

ELLEN: I hate keeping a food diary. It makes me feel like a prisoner. That said, threatening myself with physically doing it can motivate me to do it in my head. I have toyed with more fun ways of keeping a food diary. One of them is a service called sparkpeople.com. There are several online fitness services that help you log your calories or workouts and help you stay motivated. Sparkpeople.com is one that appeals to me because it’s very personal. The Girlfriends profiled them last year.

THERESA: I took a look at sparkpeople.com and it does look like a very cool resource if you want a personalized gamplan to lose weight. It's $9.95 a year and includes a lot of bells and whistles, including advice from personal trainers and lots of nutrition information.


Comments

Like Ellen, I find food diaries depressing and too difficult to do over the longterm. I've tried it, and it keeps me conscious of what I'm eating for a day or two, but then I lose it. More useful to me is just staying mindful of amounts I eat, all the time. And trying to leave a little on the plate.

Posted by: Laurie on December 12, 2003 08:31 AM

I have been on Weight Watchers for the past year and a half. What I had hoped would be a loss of 20-25 has resulted in a loss of double that. WW insists that you keep a journal of everything you eat during the course of a day. Their motto is "Bite it and write it". Initially, I found the idea of keeping a journal somewhat demeaning. I mean, I am adult, right, I can keep mental track of what I have eaten. However, now I think keeping a journal helps you get a picture of exactly how much you have eaten. On days when I don't "bite it and write it", I go over in my head what I have eaten and nearly always I am saying to myself, "Oh, I had such and such, too," So, a mental record is not always the most accurate. I have been maintaining my present weight since last June and I still keep my journal during the week. I splurge on the weekends and eat just about anything I want (within reason) and don't worry about keeping my journal.

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