Benefits to a food diary

Food dairies have always been a huge success when it comes to dieting and weight loss among all my clients. Tracking your intake allows for accountability of what you're eating, increase motivation, increase your efficacy and help attain your goals.

To successfully use and achieve your goal through using a food diary, you must record everything you eat and drink. Beyond counting calories, keeping a food diary will allow your personal trainer to look to see if your meals are balanced and composed of the right proportions of carbohydrates, protein and fat.

Through the recording of your consumption, it will also allow yourself to see what is consumed on your average day, where improvements may need to be made and how they can be achieved!

Writing everything down may not be everyone's taste, however there are plenty of phone apps available in which you can track all the foods you consume, through scanning of bar codes and searching products for accuracy!

What should you include in your food diary?

- What you have eaten & how much! Being honest at this point is the main thing. Weighing out your food and tracking portion size, might be stopping you from reaching your goal.

- What time you have eaten. Building a routine around your eating habits will help you to stick to your goals.

- How you felt after eating. Did you feel bloated? Happy? Annoyed? If you have ever felt uncomfortable, sluggish or annoyed at yourself for not actually wanting to eat that bar of chocolate, this may help you change your mind set!

- Water consumed. We should be consuming at least 2 litres of water a day, so make sure you're writing it all down!