4 MAJOR Reasons to stop tracking your macros in MyFitnessPal.
Hanna eating snacks from a cooler on a Costa Rican beach.
(and EXACTLY what to do instead).
Trigger Warning + Disclaimer
We talk about food and body. We’re pretty unabashed in describing self-deprecating thoughts, binges, specific foods, and dieting.
Sugar Sober (it’s content and offerings) is absolutely not intended to substitute for psychological counseling, therapy, or professional health care advice.
If this is triggering for you and/or you need qualified, professional health care, we recommend you check out our Eating Disorders Resources page first.
Six years ago,
I hopped on the IIFYM diet (stands for If It Fits Your Macros). I became obsessed with maximizing my protein, building my glutes, and losing fat.
Then, I did what any good big sister does – I sought to convert my little sister to my exact lifestyle. #SisterLife
There’s two key things you should know about my sister, Hanna:
She’s been a hard-line vegetarian since she was 14.
She also has the appetite of a bird. That’s just her nature – sweet and light.
I calculated her macros, taught her how to track them in MyFitnessPal, generated sample meal plans, and created her weight training program (note: I was a Certified Personal Trainer at the time, please don’t try this at home!).
The result?
Hanna was miserable and threw in the towel within 2 months.
Why?
Meal prep went from daily pleasantry to college-level chemistry class.
She was force feeding herself egg whites and protein powder every damn day to meet her expertly calculated protein intake.
She’d shifted from embracing her body (after overcoming her own disordered eating) to disciplining and ranking it.
She was bonded in servitude to her phone – searching, calculating, and logging every bite.
Because more than anything, it was overwhelming.
Hanna’s experience is a case study in why diets fail. Diets don’t work long term because dieters don’t learning self-reliance. In fact, they spend each day practicing the opposite - dependence on outside tools.
In this blog post, I break down exactly why macro tracking may actually be sabotaging your diet goals.
Then, I’m going to introduce you to the single most effective dieting tool for long term success on YOUR terms.
I use this tool with all of my nutrition clients, and I created a FREE version for you so you can start taking charge of your diet TODAY!
4 MAJOR Reasons to STOP Tracking Your Macros
1. Numbers cannot control your behavior.
Using a number tracking system to control what you eat is like putting up a paper fence and expecting a tiger to stay inside.
MyFitnessPal (or Carb Manager, or Cronometer, or any other food tracking app) has no power to reach through your smartphone and slap the cookies out of your hand at night. It also has no way of tuning into why you’re seeking our cookies every night.
Expecting macro tracking to be your magic “Do Not Pass This Point” boundary is asking an external system to control you. You’re declaring, “I can’t stop myself from eating too many cookies, so I’m going ask this imaginary boundary (contained in a glass screen and built on an algorithm) to contain me.”
But it CAN’T control you, only YOU can control you.
Instead, what you need is a system that starts from the inside and moves outward. (Have you heard about the Sugar Sober Food Journal?)
2. Problem: Macros are invisible.
How many grams of protein are in 4 oz of chicken breast?
Is this 4 oz of chicken breast? Or 3? Or 2.68?
How much salad dressing is on this salad from the take out spot down the street?
Did babe serve me ½ cup of rice? Or 2/3rd cup?
Here-in lies the big rub with macro tracking – the grams of carbs, fat, and protein in a food is not visible on that food! Thus, you are dependent on your phone to calculate your macros for you.
No, thanks.
Plus, for the app to calculate it for you, you have to input the exact measurement of how much you ate. “About the size of my face” won’t cut it. So, you are also dependent on measuring tools all the time. You need a digital food scale, measuring cups, measuring spoons, pre-portioned tupperware, etc, at EVERY MEAL.
Oh, and that’s if you’re eating all single-ingredient foods, like: brown rice, steamed broccoli, 2 eggs (hello, fit-chick YoutTube).
But what about foods simmered in sauces or served in layers?
Soups, stews, and chilis?
Pho?
Indian food?
Italian food?
What about happy hour tapas?! (Brad Pitt “What’s in the box?!” voice)
I mean seriously, what are you going to do?
Only eat food you prepared and pre-portioned out yourself?
Plug in each individual ingredient for every recipe you make?
Then, tediously portion out how many servings are in the total?
So then you can calculate the serving of the total macros you’re consuming with each serving? (I’m exhausted just reading that explanation!)
Travel with a digital food scale in your carry on?
CONFESSION: I did ALL OF THESE THINGS during my days of macro tracking and #iifym dieting!
It was miserable, and I can’t say it did more for me long-term.
Any diet system in which you can only be successful with: specific tools and equipment, a live internet connection, and time to consult with your phone before every single snack, meal, or bite is not a real solution!
Not sustainable. Not adaptable. Not empowering.
3. Psychosis – tracking macros every meal is like living in two worlds at once.
While skimming the menu or cooking in your kitchen,
serving yourself or being served,
sitting around the table,
enjoying company and conversation,
being a part of what’s actually going on here and now,
Your mind is in its own reality:
Shit, I knew I would regret eating toast at breakfast! I’m gonna go over on my carbs now!
How much protein was in that food bar 2 hours ago?
Babe is going to make dinner tonight, she/he always cooks with too much oil. I’ve got to keep my fat as low as possible right now.
How late will I be up tonight? If I go to bed early, I can avoid getting hungry for a late snack. That’s the only way I can avoid completely obliterating my macros today.
TOTAL NEUROSIS.
The perfect setup for a breakdown (read: binge). It’s only a matter of time.
When you keep constant track of your macros, you superimpose a second reality on top of this reality.
You’re not even here at this meal any more. In fact, it’s not even a ‘meal’ anymore - its data points to calculate. You’re re-running through everything you already ate today, and spiraling off into the future worrying about how you’ll manage 30 g protein for dinner with only 2 grams of fat left.
You’re living a double life!
^ If that hit home, please, share this post on Facebook or Pinterest. Be the one who initiates a ripple of healing in your circle.
This is not only mentally exhausting, it’s emotionally isolating.
You’re waging a secret battle in your mind every day, all day. Keeping a secret about what is occupying your attention kills any type of relationship. Instead of connecting with others, you’re somewhere else, fighting a one-woman war.
We want you back here, with us.
4. It strips away the soul of food.
When I was in school, I fucking hated math. It was stale, tedious, even tyrannical. One wrong move, and you got slashed with The Red Pen. Every problem was like a little prison cell on a piece of paper.
Then, in 11th grade, I transferred to a boarding school in a new state (it’s a long story). I got a new math teacher, just in time for Algebra II and Geometry. His name was Mr. Fultz, and he was a white-haired angel in a sweater vest.
Fultz (I dropped the Mister, because we’re cool like that) tore down the prison walls separating math from real life.
How?
He brought the content into the real world and gave math exercises a story my 17-year-old self cared about. For every calculation, I had a reason to punch decimals into my TI-83 graphing calculator.
To complete the analogy - macro tracking and MyFitnessPal is Pre-Fultz math class. Your daily allowance of fat, carbs, and protein are little prison cells. Go past it, and sirens alarm and red lights flash and you’re put in solitary confinement (the shame) until you’re back in line. It dissects your eating as if it exists in a vacuum.
Food is rich in story, emotion, and context: the seasons, the soil, the hands that harvest, the culture that simmers and seasons, the company you share it with, the memories tied to a particular dish…
It has a soul far, far beyond numbers. There must be a meaning to your meals to ever truly find peace and confidence with food. You aren’t a robot programmed on algorithms, so stop trying to feed yourself like one. Nourish yourself in mind, body, and soul.
Enjoy the rich sauce of an Italian pasta dish.
...the smells, textures, and flavors..
Feel the joy in your heart (not panic) when your partner surprises you with dinner.
...let that oxytocin flow as you enjoy each bite …
Treat yourself to that pastry on a sunny spring afternoon at your favorite cafe....
...the flaky, buttery goodness that melts in your mouth…
Food is not just fuel, it’s a somatic experience for the senses. Stop stripping yourself of this beautiful human experience.
So…What the hell will help you gain confidence and control of your diet?
What’s a Portion Size Guide?
A portion size guide is exactly what it sounds like. It’s an infographic illustrating the appropriate serving size of various types of foods.
Portion size guides may not be fancy smartphone apps or have online chat forums with cult-like devotion, but they WORK.
Why a Portion Size Guide?
Simplicity.
Simplicity is the key to consistency.
Consistency is the key to long-term success.
3 Reasons A Portion Guide is a way more effective diet tool
1. You can actually SEE visual references (duh).
Here’s a scientific fact about the human brain:
Images are easier to remember than verbal or written information.
Every time you refer to the images on a portion size guide, they snuggle up in your long term memory. The images are concrete reference points and create mental hooks.
Comparatively, the number values (grams, ounces, milligrams, calories) you calculate when tracking macros are abstract, raw information. Plus, like I said in Reason #2 above, they’re invisible to your human eye. Macros are not useful or reliable reference points for your brain as you make food decisions.
2. You have the power.
Portion size guides are an illustrated guide – a learning tool. They are not a control mechanism.
When you let MyFitnessPal tell you when you’ve had enough (or when you’ve had too much), you’ve given away your power. You’re looking outside of yourself for control. Thus, you will remain as untrusting of yourself as when you started.
Portion size guides give you back that power.
Now YOU make the decisions on what you want to eat and when you’re satisfied. You look inward to learn internal cues, listen to your triggers, and manage your cravings. For food decisions, you consult with your hunger and satiety, your emotions, your heart, and your goals.
This is where actual self control and confidence is born!
3. Presence.
When you use portion size guides, each meal is independent of another.
It doesn’t matter what you already ate today, if you had a snack, or what restaurant you’re going to for dinner. All you have to deal with is this meal, here and now.
One meal at a time, refer to the images on the portion guide to learn how to build your perfectly portioned plate. Then, settled the fuck down and enjoy it, hon.
Nothing to calculate, nothing to get anxious about, and nothing to make up for. Your mind can finally be where the rest of your body is; Here, with us.
4. Totally custom to you and how you like to eat.
Tracking macros and using MyFitnessPal is like choosing to live in a dictatorship.
When you stop tracking numbers and instead learn proper portion sizes, there is no more dictator!
Vegan? Carnivore?
Savory tooth? Sweet tooth?
Eastern pallet? Western pallet?
You can eat whatever YOU like. It’s a journey to independence and trust in your own judgements, not a battle to hold yourself back.
Sugar Sober clients and students DON’T TRACK MACROS. Instead, every woman receives the portion size guide with easy to remember illustrations. The portion size guide is like a map to find your unique sweet spot.
It’s a guide, not a dictator.
An accomplice, not a captor.
That was a lot.
Let’s Review:
Macro Tracking
Reliant on something outside of your to control your behavior
Measurements are invisible
Reliant on a whole duffle bag of tools and equipment
Strips food to just numbers and formulas
Neurotic anxiety about the entire day’s food
Dictator
Portion Size Guide
Learn to make your own decisions so long-term change is possible
Measurements are visible
Totally independent and free to go with life’s flow
Embraces the full experience of every meal, snack, and bite
Free to consider only one meal at a time
Partner
If you can’t tell by the length of this blog post, here at Sugar Sober, we feel some type of way about nutrient tracking.
Maybe you don’t know how to control your cravings, stop the restrict-binge-guilt cycle, change your eating habits, etc.
That’s okay, we’d love to teach you everything we know about the How. (A good place to start is #1 way to master diet motivation). But for any of it to work, you have to believe you have the power to do it.
Not, “Oh, this expert system/program/diet can fix this for me!”
Instead, “Oh, I can totally figure this out. Where’s some reliable, fantastic information and tools?”
See the difference?
Closing Tip
Print out the FREE Portion Size Guide and post it somewhere you will see it with each meal. A lot of Sugar Sober ladies post it to their fridge or keep it folded in their purse.
In the beginning, refer to the Portion Size Guide as often as possible. The more often you refer to it, the more ingrained the images become. Eventually, you’ll get to where you don’t even need to refer to the Guide, because serving yourself proper portions will be an automatic habit.
That’s the goal, am I right?
Note: the Portion Size Guide is already included inside of the Sugar Sober Food Journal. But, we want to give you this large printed version so you can place it as many places as you want! Post it all over your house, put it up in the break room at work, share it with your friends, your mom, your sister in law, go wild!
Pin this blog to come back to later!
