Truth on Nutrition

If you tell the truth, you don't have to remember anything. -Mark Twain.

You will never find yourself until you face the truth. - Pearl Bailey

When you are sorrowful, look again in your heart and you shall see that in truth, you are weeping for that which has been your delight. - Kahlil Gibran

We all know Nutrition is important.

How do you expect to loose fat if you are consuming large quantities of it?

It isn't all about fat consumption either. Too many Carbohydrates creates fat stores, high sodium intakes increases water weight... It's a lot to remember and take in sometimes!

What do I do?

There are a few different apps out there that allow you to track what you eat. Different apps and websites offer different services and have benefits. With any of them, you can share your logs with your trainer so make sure you are on track with nutrition and exercise. Keep in mind, that even logging "cheat days" and bad nutritional days is important. I also recommend that you journal things like how you are feeling on these days, stress levels, sick, exercise, and if you work as well. This allows you to see how your mental state also affects your nutrition.

Here is a list of a few Nutritional Tracking Web-based Apps that I have tried:

1. 411 Fit - FREE/PAID - This is my personal favorite. For people who are just learning about nutrition this is the greatest! Instead of giving milligrams and percentages, you get a letter grade for how your nutrition is going. It tracks nutrition, exercise, journals, makes graphs, and tracks progress! You can use it free, but if you are interested in being coached, you can contact me and upgrade your account to a coach-client account with me where I can give you daily accountability, nutrition guidance, and more. While you can use this as a free account, having a coach in it makes things a lot easier, especially if you have questions. The biggest down fall, it is primarily used on web-browser, but can be easily used on a mobile browser.
2. My Fitness Pal - FREE - This is the most popular application for calorie tracking. It allows for easy tracking with bar codes. One of the best parts of this application is the social networking aspect. You can loose weight with your friends and keep in touch with everyone super easy by linking your MFP account with Facebook. However, really being able to see where you are going right/wrong with nutrition is a little more difficult for those who don't know what they are looking at.
3. Livestrong - FREE - This is iPad and iPhone only. It is almost identical to My Fitness Pal but is operated by my favorite resource for all things health and fitness.

Bottom Line...

Keeping track of your nutrition is the best way to keep yourself "honest" with your trainer. Keeping a journal not only helps you but it helps your trainer know how to best help you. What do you most struggle with? How do you feel? How can we help you?