My Fitness Pal

By Megan Risinger

I've always been the type of person who doesn't truly and/or accurately keep track of what they are eating or how many calories per day I'm consuming. I usually would just use the technique, "Ok, I've had ice cream yesterday, so I probably shouldn't eat it for awhile," or "I feel like I haven't eaten 'healthy' in awhile, so I'll pass on going to McDonald's today." I never really knew how much I was taking in on a daily basis or how much exercising helped in that area. Recently I was introduced to a website called My Fitness Pal (www.myfitnesspal.com). On there you can track what you are eating for every meal, including snacks! Most of time, I'll eat something and will not remember to look at the amount of calories or I go out to eat and don't know how many are included. With this website, I can simply type in a restaurant, brand, or food item and then I can look through the list to find what I ate, plus the amount! I love not having to mentally add up all calories I've eaten in a day - I let the website do it for me. Once you start adding in your foods, the tracker will tell you how many calories you have left remaining for the day (your daily calorie intake is based on a desired goal YOU set for yourself - if you want to lose 3 pounds in X amount of weeks, it calculates the amount of daily calorie intake you need to reach your goal). It's kind of like a budget for you calories. If I know I went all out for a big lunch, I know my dinner will probably be a smaller portion and/or healthier option. Sometimes I use to splurge on both lunch and dinner, so now I'm on track to watch out for that. Also on this site you can log your exercise for each day (cardiovascular and strength training). If you do cardiovascular exercises in a given day, it will let you know that you were given an extra X calories because of your cardiovascular exercise (that definitely motivates me to get that in as much as I can - you can eat more :) It's interesting how my choices will vary, knowing that I can see what I'm eating and what my "budget" is for calories. I find myself not buying that coke, because I know that will take up my calorie space. It's free to do and really puts it all into perspective! Try it out and see how it works for you!