Sunday, January 30, 2011

Welcome!

Hey Everyone!

So the reason I'm writing this blog is two-fold.  1). I am trying to lose weight and thought this would help me stay accountable.  2).  Nutrition and food are two of my interests (I'm currently working on my Masters Degree in Nutrition) and I wanted an outlet to share facts, current events and tidbits of information with everyone as well as to generate discussions on the topic.

Ok so yesterday was not a good day for me as far as eating because I went out to dinner....major calories!  I did work out though so that helped.  Here are my stats for yesterday:

Calories consumed: 2425    
Calories burned: 2129
Calorie balance: + 296

Obviously a positive balance is not what you want if you are trying to lose weight, and going out to eat will almost always jack up your calories consumed.  In fact, of those 2425 I consumed yesterday, 1800 were from my dinner out!  Today I need to make up for that surplus by either working out longer or lowering my intake...we'll see how it goes!

The one piece of advice I could give to those of you who are trying to lose weight is to keep a food journal!  You can work your butt off in the gym but if you do not control what you are eating you will not see the results you want!  Most people greatly underestimate the amount of calories they intake everyday so I strongly recommend measuring and weighing your food, and writing it down everyday.  An online food journal that I used to use is www.sparkpeople.com.  It is an awesome resource and best of all it is free!  It may seem like a hassle to do this but it really does not take that much time or effort and it will be worth it when you see the scale start to change!

Feel free to comment or share ideas....I want this to be a collaborative effort!

Best,

Meghan