Author Archives: Vivikare

A review of six months at MyFitnessPal

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August 6th, exactly six months ago today, was my first day tracking at MyFitnessPal (if you’re on it as well and want to add me, go ahead!).

Since then, it seems that my whole life has changed. I’ve already written a lot about everything that has changed since last summer in my review of 2011, so I will not repeat everything again, but I want to focus on my experience with MyFitnessPal instead.

I remember hearing about MyFitnessPal from other weight loss bloggers and as I was really unhappy with Weight Watchers at this point, I decided to give it a go. I installed the MyFitnessPal app on my iPhone and signed up.

I kept my Weight Watchers online membership for the remainder of August but then canceled it, and never looked back. I spent so much money on Weight Watchers for over a year and a half, and in the end, I weighed more than I did when I signed up. Don’t get me wrong, I am not blaming Weight Watchers for this, I know I would have lost weight if I’d actually stuck to the program, but it just wasn’t working for me anymore.

At first, MyFitnessPal was a bit daunting for me. I was annoyed with the huge amount of (duplicate) database entries and the fact that searching for ‘banana’ would not bring up a plain banana as the first result but a banana smoothie. I also had to enter a lot of foods that I eat seeing as the app (and website) is not available in German or very popular here, so German foods are hard to find in the database. But, once I got past that, I loved it.

MyFitnessPal is a simple but fantastic tool for tracking calories and macro nutrients, allowing you to lose weight healthily without doing a diet. (By the way, I do think that this is also possible with Weight Watchers.) In my opinion, that is the best way to lose weight and keep it off in the long run. I am so glad not to be on a diet, no foods are off limits for me, I just make sure that the majority of my calorie intake is made up of healthy food.

I think MyFitnessPal so easy to use, I love having a website and an app to enter food (something that I was missing with WW seeing as they took until December 2011 to come out with an iPhone app in Germany), and I love the support network that it comes with. I have met a bunch of great people on MyFitnessPal who support me every day, and even a couple of good friends.

I think that without them, I would not have done as well, as they keep me accountable day in and day out. I know that I have made huge progress in exercising will power but I do think that there have been a few moments that I probably would have eaten a few things if I hadn’t known that I’d have to log them and answer for them later. Of course, always provided that I log honestly and don’t leave off anything, but honesty to myself and others is a prerequisite for losing weight, in my opinion.

Six months ago, I doubted that I would ever make it this far. I didn’t really see myself weighing quite a bit under 80 kg, well, because I had never managed to get there on any of the other attempts since I first lost weight in 2005/06. I didn’t think I’d be running 10 km any time soon. And I would have never dreamed of becoming a person who would go out for a run in -9C. In a way, I have changed so much in the past six months. But I am still me. I did this.

After six months of logging at MyFitnessPal, I have lost 20.7 kg (45.6 lbs). My BMI has gone from 33.7 (obese) to 26.54 (overweight), and I only have another 4.5 kg to lose before I am no longer overweight. I have dropped a couple of sizes and I have become so much fitter and stronger, working out 4–5 times a week on average. I am a much happier person now than I was in August, I feel a lot more comfortable in my body and more self-confident. I am more active and a lot healthier. I am not giving MyFitnessPal credit for that, as I did this, so I think I deserve the credit for my weight loss ;) – but I do think that MyFitnessPal is a great tool that made it all possible. I don’t think I would have done as well without it.

On lunch at work

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I work for a fairly small company in a very small town. Choices for lunch are limited. There is a grocery store about 5 minutes walking distance from the office, a pizza place we can order pizza from, and once a week, there is a truck selling doner and rotisserie chicken. I am sure you can see the common thread: none are healthy choices. The grocery store is the healthiest but when you do not want to cook your lunch, your choice is narrowed down to sandwiches, microwave dinners, and salad.

At a company meeting a couple of months ago, the CEO of my company brought up an idea. The wife of our janitor is a cook, and she offered to cook for us for lunch. Like a very small cafeteria, there would be two meals to choose from every day against a fee to cover her costs. The CEO also suggested that the company would cover part of the cost. It sounded like a great idea … for most people.
For me, giving someone else control over my meals is not an option. When you know what a difference a tablespoon of butter or olive oil make, you want to know exactly what is in the meal you are having every day for lunch.

And while this woman may be a professional cook, she is also an older woman from small town Bavaria. If you know traditional Bavarian food, you know that it wouldn’t be your first choice when trying to lose weight. I have my doubts that her meals would really be that healthy. I do think that for some of my co-workers (especially the guys) who live on a pizza, doner, and chicken diet, it would be a huge improvement. But for someone like me who is already very aware of what they are eating, it wouldn’t be that much of a beneit. I’d rather keep control over what I eat, knowing the exact ingredients and nutritional value of my meals.

Even though in the past few weeks, I have been slacking off a little with cooking lunch meals for work, and have bought microwave dinners at the grocery store a little too frequently, I still make good choices, always aware of the nutrition facts and choosing the healthier microwave dinner over another.

During the company meeting, I felt a little odd. I felt like the CEO was talking about me. Despite how open I am about my weight loss, when someone asks me about it, I noticed that it is still a sensitive topic for me. When someone talks about poor nutrition or unhealthy food, I feel like they are talking about me. It makes no sense because for the past six months, my diet has probably been better than that of most of my co-workers but in the end, I am the one who is overweight. My co-workers may eat crap all day, but they are skinny. I know that often people mistake skinny for healthy.

This company meeting happened in November, and I think my attitude has changed a litte since then. I realized that it is far more likely that the CEO was not referring to me when he mentioned unhealthy eating habits. But I sometimes worry that people cannot see past my appearance or will always remember me for how I ate during my first six months working there. Because, let’s face it, my diet was not good at all for a while.

Another thought I had with regard to this idea is to wonder if it is within the CEO’s right to suggest that a lot of his employees have a poor diet and that we eat more healthily. Of course he has an interest in our health, and many of us would benefit from this, but at the same time it is each person’s private business what they put into their mouth. Do you think he was overstepping boundaries?

How do you handle lunches at work? Do you have a cafeteria you eat at or do you bring your own lunch to work?

Recognizing a pattern

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A couple of months ago, I had a sort of eureka moment. I had bought a lot of candy and unhealthy snacks which seemed a good idea at the moment that I bought them. I didn’t understand why I had bought them in the first place, what made me think it was a good idea.

I realized that this had happened before. I also realized that the other time this had happened, I was out grocery shopping with the same friend as this time. I do think that part of it was that we went to a store I usually do not shop at as it is not possible to get to with a car, a much larger store with a much bigger selection of candy & co. Another reason was that I spent a lot more time browsing the shelves, usually I will not spend that much time on grocery shopping as I often get it done during my lunch break or right after work.

But I also think that there was something else to it. My friend bought a lot of snack type food for herself and her family, and I think part of me thought that if it’s okay for her to buy this type of food, it it okay for me do to the same. Like her buying chips, candy, etc. gave me permission to buy candy as well.

It’s much easier to say no when you are by yourself or everyone around you is also saying no. It’s so much harder to say no to the candy isle, when the person you are shopping with is saying “yes, yes, yes!”

I also think that in some weird, twisted way, I bought the snacks to show her that I was still allowing myself to eat everything, that I was eating normally and not depriving myself. Proof that I was still having “fun,” that I was no different from her or others. I think that I don’t like standing out as the one eating or buying “diet food” in the company of others.
I know this friend since May, so she has been one of the people who has noticed (and commented on) my weight loss the most. She recently made an off-handed comment that she’d prefer to lose weight slowly but in a sustainable way. As if that is not what I am doing.

For me, recognizing this pattern was huge. I think that it’s essential to recognize the reasons for a habit if you want to change it. And the fact that I made this realization shows me that I am making progress.