My Big Fat Low Carb Life

Numbers, numbers, numbers, my life is ruled by numbers.  I count the grams of carbohydrates and protein I consume. I count the number of calories I intake. I watch the number on the scale. I keep track of the measurements of my waist, hips, breasts, arms and thighs. I count the minutes that I exercise each day. I take my blood sugar every morning because I’m diabetic and I worry if my blood glucose level is above a certain number. Likewise for my blood pressure, which I take weekly. For someone with a degree in English Literature, I sure seem to do a lot with numbers these days.

So why do I worry about the numbers so much? Because if I didn’t keep up with them, getting off track would be easy AND inevitable. Is it tedious to keep up with all these numbers? Sometimes it is, especially on weekends, when my schedule is not dictated as much by the clock. Does it behoove me to keep up with the numbers despite the tedium? You bet it does.

Americans spend $35 billion dollars a year on weight loss products. Pills, shakes, exercise equipment and more. That is equal to the gross domestic product of countries like Costa Rica and Nigeria. All those dollars – numbers – to lose weight, focusing on being thin, not necessarily healthy; and what would those people who spend that money (including me) benefit from most? Writing down the numbers. People who track what and how much they eat, how much water they drink and how often they exercise are twice as successful than those that don’t. Whatchoo talkin’ ‘bout Willis? Well, Arnold, since you asked so nicely… Those folks who keep a food diary and exercise log,  statistically lose twice as much weight in the same amount of time as those who don’t. And, those same people not only take it off but KEEP it off.

Keeping up with the numbers can be very simple. One easy and free way to do this is to keep a spreadsheet of calories, exercise time, and body measurements. If you don’t have access to a spreadsheet program or prefer connecting pen to paper amazon.com sells several really great food diaries. Of course using this method, you will also need a book, like The Ultimate Calorie Counter or The Doctor’s Pocket Calorie, Fat & Carbohydrate Counter.

My favorite method is using an online food diary program. There are several out there that are really great and even free. You can sign up for free accounts at websites like fitday.com or thedailyplate.com. Both of these are excellent resources if you don’t want to spend the money or don’t have the funds.

I actually pay a monthly fee for myfooddiary.com’s services. The features on this site make it totally worth the price for me because when it comes down to it, I’m too lazy to look stuff up in a book and I really hate doing the math. So, what did I look for when choosing a program? I wanted a really extensive food database as well as a way to enter foods manually AND most importantly, since I love to cook, I wanted some way to get the nutritional data per serving for my recipes. Myfooddiary.com has all of these features and many more, such as keeping up with the amount and type of exercise that I do daily, and tracking my measurements in their handy dandy body log. There are also reports and colorful charts and graphs if you’re into that sort of thing. The only thing it doesn’t do, that I wish it did was create a shopping list for me, because I would totally use it to plan my meals every week.

Getting into the habit of using some sort of food diary is like any new habit. You have to make the decision to use it and dedicate yourself to following through. I want to be healthy – not just thin. I want to stop lining the pockets of the pharmaceutical companies and be medication-free and I want to accomplish some other more physical goals. These are pretty strong motivators for me to change my life. So taking the time to use a tool to help meet those goals makes sense to me. In the meantime, I’ll just keep plugging in the numbers and looking at my pretty trend line chart of my weight going down, down, down.