A personal training & food journal. Read about our weight loss progress at Train With Ron in Chicago, our nutritional habits and the life changes we're making to get in shape and stay healthy!

I am on week 3 of closely monitoring my food intake and it’s getting less time consuming. Mentally, it’s a whole other matter.

So, grab some edemame, sit back and let me tell you …

My first week, I ate as carefully as I have been since I started this journey, but like I did before I tracked my food with a magnifying glass. At the end of the week my trainer DB looked over my numbers (see the chart below) and gave me some tips for improvement. Lower my fat & carbs and increase my protein.

The first thing I did was research the foods that are high in protein and low in fat. I wanted to make changes to my shopping list and menus. Preparation makes it easier. It’s like shopping when you’re hungry … not a good idea. There are tons of sites out there dedicated to giving nutritional advice and information so you have to spend some time and make sure your source is current and accurate. I found a great little nutrition tool on the Self website that lets you find foods with highest or lowest concentrations of specific nutrients. Find things you like to eat and ones that meet your needs. Stock up on them so when snacking, you’re snacking on the good stuff.

I also try and stick to single ingredient foods that naturally meet my requirements rather than processed and chemically altered foods. That’s a tip my trainer Ron talked about when we first sat down and talked to him about our goals.

A great example of single ingredient foods is Oatmeal. HAVE the Old Fashioned Rolled Oats (the only ingredient on the back being rolled oats) put in bananas, raisins or peaches. Go nuts and add flaxseed. DO NOT HAVE the pre-packaged instant Strawberries and Cream Oatmeal (or other flavor). Tons of sugar and not to mention extra ingredients. Its a common mistake that you may not think of unless you flipped those boxes around and compared the nutritional info.

Week 2 rolls around and I needed a mid-week check up with DB because my numbers were at 19% protein, 34% fat and 47% carbohydrates. An improvement from last week but the fat % still being too high. Continuing to show DB my numbers makes me feel more accountable. To myself, more than anyone else. And by week’s end I was able to improve my numbers just a little bit more. Week 2 was when I added the 2 extra workouts to my week and as you’ll see below it helped a ton with my calorie budget.

Here we are on week 3. I MUST share my numbers with DB because I totally skipped over it Monday. I’ve improved but I have a little voice in my head arguing with me. Telling me that I should stop tracking my food and that I’m working out so many times a week now that I deserve to treat myself. Reward myself for working so hard. Sound familiar? Well, there’s another voice telling me that nutrition is just as important and I need to keep it up and that this is how I will reach my goal. To be honest with you, most times, when I ‘cheat’ it only makes me feel sick. It’s like my mind wants it but my body doesn’t. Habit? Addiction? For me it’s mental exercise.

I look forward to finishing the week strong and see that fat % fall below 30% and protein over 30%. That’s my goal for the end of this week. Just thinking about it is sending my brain to work to figure out what I should have out of the foods that will help me reach that goal. So instead of letting my mind wander aimlessly through candy land I am sending it to work and it’s too busy to think about chocolate …… Oh chocolate … Huh?? … Ok, I’m back. It’s all good.

I am finding myself with more to say but I’ll leave it for later this week. I’ll share with you a couple of days out of my food diary and also tell you about this amazing workout I had with Matt today. I love, love, LOVE strength training. Unconventional, unique and very physical strength training. I had some of that today and I’ll just leave you with this: I pushed a tank. There, let that swoosh around in your head a little bit and I’ll give you details later this week.

In closing, please note that by no means am I an expert in nutrition nor do I claim to be. This, being a blog, is just a journal of information I’m finding out about the foods I eat, the changes I am trying in my life and how all of it is affecting my workouts and everyday life. You have to do what works for you and what is appropriate for you. You also have to check with a doctor before making any drastic changes with exercise and diet. Got it? Good!