Logging Food - A Primer

People who log their food in some way, shape or form are more likely to be successful with their eating than those who don’t. This has been proven over and over through the years and it completely makes sense if you really think about it. Just the thought of having to write down that I ate a cookie is enough to make me only eat one instead of three or four! Fairly often, I have clients log their food so we can get an idea of whether they are eating too much or too little for their goals. It really helps when they have done a resting metabolic assessment so I don't have to guess!

There are a few ways to do log your food, and it can be as simple or as detailed as you like. The important thing is that you have a method that works for you. Here are a few ideas:

• Use a fitness tracker app like My Fitness Pal or Lose It.
• Write down what you eat in a notebook every day.
• Use a habit tracker app on your phone. You might not be tracking what you eat specifically, but maybe you’re tracking whether or not you got a certain number of servings of vegetables each day. 
• Hang a calendar on the wall and track daily habits on it. Don’t use your calendar for anything other than habit tracking.
• You can make a spreadsheet to track your habits. You can print it out and use it analog, or you can keep it on the computer and be fully digital.
• Take photos of the food you eat. You can keep them for personal accountability, but it’s usually helpful to have someone holding you accountable. This can be as big as putting it out on social media or as private as sharing with a friend.  Enter yet, hire a nutrition coach to help keep you on track.

Now let’s talk about how to actually make those methods work, because it’s one thing for me to just site here and tell you to do those things, and another thing to actually put them into practice. You can choose from these options, or if you think of something that might work even better for you, go ahead and use it.

• pre-plan and pre-log what you’ll have. This works really well if you have to eat out. It will help you stick to your plan, because you don’t want to have to re-log everything. 
• You can log food immediately after a meal. If we’ve already implemented mindful eating and have a good practice, taking an extra minute or two to record food intake should be no problem.
• Take your food journal with you everywhere. You can get a small memo notebook just about anywhere. If your journal is bigger, you can keep it in a bag or backpack. This is also where apps for your phone come in handy.

Try not to think of logging your food as a chore, but instead as a powerful tool that will help you stay committed and consistent!

Bonus: you can also log your exercise. People who log their exercise also increase their chances of success. When you record exercise, you can be as general or specific as you’d like. It could be “30 min cardio, 30 min weights,” or “2 sets of 15 goblet squats w/ a 25# dumbbell, 2 sets of 15 push-ups and 2 sets of 15 inverted rows.” You decide how detailed you’d like to make it.

Hope this helps. Happy logging! ;-)

Self Prop Alert

Self prop alert:

I’ve lost about 15 pounds since the beginning of the year. 10 of those pounds has been in the last 3 months, with an almost 7% drop in body fat. If you feel like reading today, my story is below. Otherwise, do me a solid and go to my Instagram account (@whichwaytothegunshow), and double tap the pic.

This is embarrassing to admit, but I didn’t notice the weight packing itself on as I crept closer to middle age. It is especially embarrassing because I work for a fitness company and helping people with this very problem is something I do all day. 
I was busy with family and work and didn’t notice how stressed my body was. None of the injuries, panic attacks, headaches or lost sleep tipped me off like they should have. This is gonna sound dumb, but I was just too busy to notice, and I didn’t feel stressed. I have always been a happy, energetic guy and I would have thought it would feel different. Basically, I was acting just like almost every person who came to me for help.

But the inflammation was wrecking my body. A lady came up to me one day and poked me right in the belly. "You're getting fat," she said. "You better do something." 
I laughed it off. 
"She's a character," I told myself. 
Last summer I found tumors growing throughout my upper body, which my medical team accidentally made me think was cancer for about a month. I had the tumors removed in 2 separate surgeries, because I found the second batch of them the day after my post-surgery follow-up.
Although this isn't even half as bad as most people who find themselves in my office for a come-to-Jesus talk about their health, here's how wrecked I was feeling.

My blood pressure was high and the nurse said it was probably just white coat syndrome (it wasn’t, because being a science nerd, medical pros don’t scare me).  Also throw in the fact that my blood pressure was consistently north of 140/90. Also there were headaches from my blood pressure being so high.
My cholesterol was high and my doctor tried to put me on Lipitor. My hormones were out of whack and I felt depressed all the time. I had to drag myself through my day and somehow figure out how to inspire and motivate people when I felt like liquid shit. I started having self-destructive impulses. for a former IV drug user, I think you know what this means. 
The main question that was on my brain was, "How did I go from someone who took back his life to a sad sack in just a few years?" 
It's so easy to see all the signs of chronic stress in everyone else. 

I turned 40 in January and pretty much the next day my give-a-fuck-meter broke. I just wanted to feel good again. And I was ready to take back my life. That was the best birthday present I could have gotten from the universe. I decided to cut out inflammatory foods like grains, legumes, nightshades and squashes. I gave up meat, except for fish and the occasional hamburger (so probably like how all vegetarians secretly eat). I started placing priority on my sleep and trying to follow my body's natural circadian rhythm. I started doing heart rate zone-based cardio and walking 10,000 steps every day. I started therapy and started doing yoga daily to help deal with stress. thanks to a salivary cortisol and DHEA test, my supplementation is on point, and includes adaptogens and nootropics to help me regulate my cortisol and blood sugar better. 

Like I said, I'm down like 15 pounds and 7% body fat. Props to me.

Hope this inspires somebody. Even people who teach others to be healthy fall off the wagon and need to pick themselves back up. Of course, I couldn’t have done all of this without the support and encouragement of my wife Elizabeth and my coworkers at Life Time. My hope is to lose 10 more pounds and fit into a really dope tweed blazer I bought on my last trip to New York.