Reading Labels

If you know me in person, you know that I'm a HUGE fan of myfitnesspal.  Recently, I had a person ask me why I use this program being 7 years out.  Aren't I a natural at figuring this all out?  Not at all.  I was never good at balance and moderation before my weight loss surgery.  Nothing comes naturally to me in this regard.  I suppose if I had been a normal person who perhaps gained pregnancy weight that I might have a "normal" relationship with food....but I don't and never have.  I can remember as a teenager having a friend who could eat a single serving bag of chips and keep half for later.  I never could.  So this is a constant thing I have to work on.  I MUST be accountable for what I put in my mouth on most days.  That doesn't mean that I will record every day but you better believe when I'm trying to get back on track, I make it part of my regimine again.

Which brings me to a topic that I see a lot of newbies struggling with and that's not reading labels.  I recently talked to a newbie who was only a few weeks out and she'd had a Starbucks Iced Chai Tea Latte and wondered why she wasn't feeling good after having one.  She wondered if maybe she had an ulcer.  I asked her if she'd read the stats on it before drinking it.  She had not.  I explained to her that it's no wonder she didn't do well with it.  Her guideline said no more than 10 grams of sugar and this drink had over 40. 

One of the best things that you can do for yourself as a weight loss surgery patient is to read labels and to read them incessantly.  Stay far away from sugars, watch the calories and carbs.  Be sure to get your protein goals met.  The best thing you can do in your first year by far...and well quite frankly, a necessary evil if you want to KEEP it off long term.  If you get too hooked on sugar early out, you are doomed to regain. Seriously.  It's way tougher later on.

I have a non wls friend that I recently met for coffee and she is one person that I know that is always complaining about her weight.  When we went out, she'd had a Maple French Toast bagel with butter.  Now, while I love a carb now and again, she ruminiated again and again over what to eat and pronounced that the bagel was a far "healthier" option than something like a cookie.   Little did she know that the cookie or even a donut would probably have been a bit of a better choice.

Her totals for her bagel were:  420 calories, 12 grams of fat, 67 grams of carbs (!!!) and 10 grams protein.
A peanut butter cookie was:  280 calories, 16 grams of fat, 27 grams of carbs, and 6 grams of protein.

At least the peanut butter cookie would be more of a "snack" (100-200 calories) than a meal.

Label reading is HUGE.

You'll find now that the advertising is now devious when it comes to healthy and unhealthy foods.  Just because something is "lite" or made with (my personal favourite) "Whole grains" does not make it healthy.  I love, love, love sites that debunk "healthy" products such as:

Nutrition Unplugged

Nutrition Action

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