Hey.. look.. It’s a Question of the Week! I miss these. There will be more now.. I promise. :)
Anyway I had quick conversation with Dinneen aka eatwithoutguilt tonight on twitter that got me thinking.
She tweeted…
If you count calories, fat grams, or weight your food — you do NOT have a healthy relationship w/food. Sorry to tell you that..
my response…
Not sure I agree.. RT @EatWithoutGuilt: If u count calories, fat or weight your food — u do NOT have a healthy relationship w/food
@EatWithoutGuilt If u overeat & binge u don’t have a hlthy relationship either. There is a middle ground, being aware is a huge part of that
Her Response…
@RoniNoone Counting calories can help in beginning…but not sustainable. No way. Not over long run. And who wants to?
@RoniNoone And overeating & bingeing are def not healthy relationship w/food. I totally get that. It’s about balance :)
Mine…
@EatWithoutGuilt Agree.. but there has to be a balance. Everyone is in a different place. We need 2 educate not make people feel ashamed
Please excuse the "twitter talk" we do only have a 140 characters to get our points across but I think you get the gist.
As someone who’s been on both sides of the fence with food her tweet struck a cord with me. Probably because I am a food weigher and I feel I have a very healthy relationship with food. A much healthier one then when I was bingeing on entire stuffed crust pizzas and sneaking little Debbie snack cakes.
I don’t obsessively weigh. I don’t bring my scale to restaurants. I don’t even weight for every meal. But I use my kitchen scale as a tool to educate me on portion sizes. When I try a new cereal, I like to see what a serving looks like. When I want cheese (a trigger food for me) I weight out a serving as to not go overboard. I also use the scale a lot when measuring ingredients for GreenLiteBites.
Again, maybe I’m biased but I think you can have a healthy relationship with food if you count calories or use a food scale. I agree with Dinneen that you aren’t going to want to do it forever but you may very well be at a point in your journey where you are learning or even gathering information on you eating habits. And I think using a scale for measuring or counting points/calories/fat/etc for accountability is very helpful.
I’m sure others disagree.
So….
Do You Count Calories, Fat or Weigh Your Food?
How do you "weigh in" on this issue?
102 Responses to Do You Count Calories, Fat or Weigh Your Food?
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BlogToLose
What's Cooking in my kitchen?
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The other night it was just the kids and I home for dinner and I decided to make what I wanted to make no holds barred. Without The Husband home it's much easier for some reason. Hmmm wonder why? Ok, not here to husband bash.. really.. I'm not! I'm here [...] -
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Did you hear? The Laughing Cow recently launched Smooth Sensations a line of 5 cream cheese spreads. There's Classic Cream, Classic Cream Light, Strawberries & Cream, Garden Vegetable and my favorite… Cinnamon. It's a sweet wedge of creamy goodness! Today I decided to use my new favorite flavor [...] -
Confession time, I recorded a 30 minute video making this with both kids (partally) 2 nights ago. I miss videos. I really do but they seem so much more difficult with 2 children. I'm also having technical difficulties with my video recording and audio syncing making it VERY time consuming to edit. [...] -
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Yesterday I was dreaming about a salad. Not just any salad, but a chickpea filled, cucumber, and red onion salad with a fun, tangy dressing. Unfortunately, I had no cucumber or red onion. Well, that's a lie. I had a half of cucumber but it was a mushy mess and [...] -
Dinner meals are getting harder and harder for me to share lately. I've gone back to just whipping things up without really measuring anything (this meal was going to be one of those until I realized I still had enough light to take some photos.) I've also instituted a few brainless meal nights [...] -
Three years ago I posted a video called "Makin' Hard Boiled Eggs" where I shared my system for, well... making hard boiled eggs. Genius name, I know. I'm smart like that. Anyway, since then I've gotten tons of feedback and comments thanking me but all the information is locked in a long winded 10 minute [...]
About Roni
Roni started this blog in '05 to journal her weight loss. 70lbs later, she's committed to living a conscious, healthy life and hopes to inspire others along the way. Read more on the about page.
I no longer count calories, points, fat grams. I have decided to focus on eating real seasonal food in moderation and trust my body but this has been a long journey to reach this point. I think you need to do what works for you and that intention is very important. If counting/measuring is a way to deny/deprive your body of what it needs to be nourished it probably isn’t the healthiest approach. But if you are doing it from a position of love and desire to take care of your body, than it is a healthy approach. I agree that it probably isn’t sustainable for most people and that is why so many of us end up yo-yoing. At 47 I have decided to pursue a nourishing intuitive path and work with others who desire the same, but it is a personal choice. There is no one right way to lose weight and nourish yourself.
I counted my calories to lose over 100 pounds and it worked. I just counted calories–nothing else. And I’ve kept it off for 2.5 years now. I still count my calories.