{"id":4618,"date":"2008-04-29T08:21:29","date_gmt":"2008-04-29T14:21:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nutritionknowhow.org\/wordpress\/?p=210"},"modified":"2013-08-26T16:41:07","modified_gmt":"2013-08-26T16:41:07","slug":"how-does-your-diet-compare","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nutritionknowhow.org\/blog\/nutrition-2\/how-does-your-diet-compare\/","title":{"rendered":"How Does Your Diet Compare?"},"content":{"rendered":"

How would you describe your diet?\u00a0 Many of us would describe our diets as pretty healthy.\u00a0 But do we really know?\u00a0 Have you analyzed your diet to learn how many calories you’re consuming?\u00a0 How many grams of fat and saturated fat you’re eating?\u00a0 I bring this topic up because within the last year, I’ve had two family members seek my help after trips to their doctor revealed that their diets were not as healthy as they thought.<\/p>\n

One family member was frustrated to learn she had high cholesterol while only in her thirties.\u00a0 She’s active and described her diet as “healthy”.\u00a0 I asked her to record all the foods and beverages she consumed over a three-day period and I would analyze it for her.\u00a0 A quick scan of her diet looked pretty good.\u00a0 A more detailed assessment showed she was over the recommended amount of saturated fat every day.\u00a0 She wasn’t eating large amounts of meat or drinking whole milk, but the sensible amounts of cheese and animal products that she was consuming added up at the end of the day.\u00a0 We reviewed the analysis of her diet and came up with specific ways she could change her diet to decrease the amount of saturated fat while still being content with what she was eating.<\/p>\n

Another family member, an avid runner, could not believe he had high blood pressure.\u00a0 He ran several miles every day and described his diet as “healthy”.\u00a0 He also recorded what he ate and drank for three days for me to analyze.\u00a0 Again, a quick scan of his food record looked pretty good.\u00a0 But the analysis showed he was consuming more than twice the recommended amount of sodium every day and he fell short of the recommended amount of vegetables.\u00a0 I shared the results and he was shocked that his sodium consumption was so high and explained he ate vegetables every day.\u00a0 The challenge with sodium is that nearly all processed foods contain sodium and it simply adds up throughout the day.\u00a0 Oftentimes we only take notice when we’re diagnosed with high blood pressure.\u00a0 As for vegetables, he did eat vegetables everyday but only at dinner.\u00a0 Consuming the recommended 2 \u00bd cups of vegetables during one meal is challenging; consuming smaller amounts of vegetables several times a day is easier.\u00a0 He and I discussed eating a vegetable like baby carrots at lunch and using the nutrition facts on labels to select lower sodium items.<\/p>\n

The key to improving your diet is to first understand how your diet compares to recommendations.<\/h2>\n

The best way to do this is to record what you eat and drink for three days (preferably two weekdays and one weekend day) and then analyze it.\u00a0 I’ve provided a form (FoodRecord<\/a>)\u00a0for you to use that will help you record your food\/beverage intake.\u00a0 Be as specific as possible on the form\u00a0(it will make analyzing your diet\u00a0easier and more accurate).\u00a0 Next,\u00a0you’ll enter\u00a0your food record into MyPyramid Tracker, a web site provided by the United States Department of Agriculture that’s free to use.<\/p>\n

Before I explain how to use MyPyramid Tracker, I want to show you a sample of the information you’ll get by using the web site.\u00a0 I entered and analyzed what I ate yesterday, including the delicious ice cream.\u00a0\u00a0The pictures above and\u00a0below\u00a0show\u00a0two\u00a0of the reports\u00a0MyPyramid Tracker provides comparing my diet to the Dietary Guidelines.\u00a0\u00a0You can see I fell short of the Meat & Beans recommendation,\u00a0consumed\u00a0a little too much\u00a0saturated fat, and exceeded the\u00a0sodium recommendation.\u00a0 I also\u00a0consumed a few too many calories. \u00a0This\u00a0information helps me focus my attention on improving specific parts of my diet.<\/p>\n

\"BarGraph\"<\/p>\n

To analyze your diet go to: http:\/\/www.mypyramidtracker.gov\/<\/a><\/p>\n

Click on “New User Registration” towards the bottom of the page.<\/p>\n

Create a log in account.<\/p>\n

Next, enter in your age, gender, height and weight, allowing you to get personalized recommendations.\u00a0 If necessary, change the date to be the date for which you are entering the foods and drinks you consumed.<\/p>\n

Click “Save Today’s Changes”.<\/p>\n

Next, click “Proceed to Food Intake” and follow the instructions on the web site to enter in the foods you ate and analyze them.<\/p>\n

Enjoy\u00a0using this program\u00a0and let me know how it goes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

How would you describe your diet?\u00a0 Many of us would describe our diets as pretty healthy.\u00a0 But do we really know?\u00a0 Have you analyzed your diet to learn how many calories you’re consuming?\u00a0 How many grams of fat and saturated fat you’re eating?\u00a0 I bring this topic up because within the last year, I’ve had two family members seek my Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":9030,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[780],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4618","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nutrition-2","cat-780-id"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/nutritionknowhow.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/04\/dg-comparison1.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nutritionknowhow.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4618"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nutritionknowhow.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nutritionknowhow.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nutritionknowhow.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nutritionknowhow.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4618"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/nutritionknowhow.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4618\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8892,"href":"https:\/\/nutritionknowhow.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4618\/revisions\/8892"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nutritionknowhow.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9030"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nutritionknowhow.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4618"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nutritionknowhow.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4618"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nutritionknowhow.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4618"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}