Broccolibabe's Journal, 24 August 2017

My philosophy is if you have time you do it, if you don't have time you don't, That is the last thing you need is to be tied down to implementing data on something you know in you mind what and how you are eating, Don't make it a struggle,its a journey.Sometimes if I know I'm eating a item later I put it in when I can, My life does not evolve around my calorie input..Deep breathes and move on !! 

Planning can be good but you can never be so sure that what would u eat as ur snack or if sth happens that u would need to change ur meals... Sometimes u go out of some stuff and couldn't prepare what you'd planned for! But I've done it before and on somedays it went just so well. Give it a try=)) 

I plan my entire day (meals, snacks) in advance if possible. In fact, I usually pan a couple of days in advance so I know what to take out of the freezer or if I have to go shopping. But that works best if you can prepare your meals .. and not so great if you go out a lot and/or are served meals that someone else prepared. I like using the website directly for planning.. the interface is much better IMHO. The mobile app is better for journaling if you are out and don't know ahead of time what you are going to be eating .. or for checking "what was it that I was supposed to eat again??". But probably the most important thing is to log everything your eat one way or the other. (And I find it easier to do that in "planning" mode.) GOOD LUCK  

I tend to have an idea of everything I'm going to eat in a day, and update early in the morning. If I change anything during the day, I go back and document those changes in the evening, or the next morning. But I agree with DO N OK - do it if you have time, but don't worry about it if you don't. 

I meal prep a week at a time and normally put everything together either Sat or Sun. I log in the meals into myfitnesspal. It makes it really easy for any change outs or substitutions. It happens and sometimes you just aren't in the mood for what you had previously planned...just go in and swap out the meal. Sometimes too I tend to skip a snack because I get busy at work so it's easy to delete the meal or swap it to another date. It just takes a bit to get used to doing things this way but soon enough you will realize how quickly you can put together meals...I normally do a weeks worth in about an hour and that is for a family of 4 with extras to go into the freezer for a later date.  

It probably annoys anyone who's following me and receives notifications, but I often use the food calendar as a draft, then adjust as I go. If I can't adjust within the app or site, I write down the foods and amounts, then enter them later. -- I joined FS in order to track what I was eating, both for myself and to have the option of showing to my partner, who had expressed concern about what they perceived as increasingly restricted eating. Within the first few weeks, without changing much of how I'd been eating, I gained SO much insight, learned new things about foods I'd had misconceptions about. So I log EVERYTHING I eat, and look at macros and nutrients. I don't care about calories, other than that I dropped visible body fat in the first few weeks, before even adjusting macros to keto-oriented levels, because I was trying to roughly follow the RDI. That again is the kind of insight that tracking everything gives me. -- In restaurants, I estimate, and track that. I can see arguments for carrying a scale and ordering only items that can be logged exactly, but that's not what this is about for me. -- Tracking everything feels very freeing. It's a huge relief compared to how I was approaching food while doing lowish carb on my own, in close contact with someone who does one meal/day of high protein, free fats, and occasional vegetables. -- I don't necessarily recommend my approach to logging intake, just wanted to present one method. Which I now see is pretty much what @Rhills wrote, much more succinctly. :-) Yes, the web site definitely easier. -- Entering what I've written on paper WHILE I'm eating kind of ruins my enjoyment of the meal. Trying not to do that any more.  

I like to start in the morning and put in everything till lunch then log dinner at dinner because I like to change things plus I really don't know about what I'm eating until then. I also meal prep so I can just grab a meal throw it in lunch box and rush out the door. This seems to help. 

I find that if I enter the "plan" for food I'm more likely to stick to it...that is until I get home a realize I'm missing ingredients 

I enter it as I go during the day. 

I make sure I have the right foods in the house at all times. I intermittent fast 16/8. That means I only eat between 12:00pm-8:00pm, usually two meals, lunch and dinner. I eat whatever I feel like eating at the time and log it in. Usually 400-500 calories a meal. With drinks I average 1100 cals a day. Weekends are usually around 1400. Some people plan ahead and eat what they planned to. I don't like doing that. I don't know what I'm going to feel like eating in 8 hours. Although planning the days menu really helps some people. The key, for me is to have an assortment of allowed foods available to me at all times. Hope this helps. 

I like to plan ahead and then make changes as I go along.  

I plan my day the day before, and modify if necessary. I used to do it as I went, but that leads to being off on my ratios. But whatever works for you is the best. Not logging is the real issue. 

I plan the day before, too, ApacheTiger37. I get my ratios right, then I follow my plan. Will be starting classes again in less than a week, so I got a NutriBullet Lean so I can take smoothies to school with me. i pre-prep any meals I will have to take out with me, depending on where i have to go.  

Thanks everyone for all your comments and ideas! I tried logging everything this morning and actually stuck to the plan pretty well! I'll make the few changes tomorrow...too tired tonight. Can't tell you how nice it was to have so many people take the time to share their approach to journaling. 😊 

I enter as I go If I can't, I take photos to remind myself latet 

I think about what I want, journal it in advance, go and eat it - ideally in that order. 

i mark it down as i eat it.