“I feel like I’m eating well, but I’m not seeing any changes.”
Is this true? And what to do about it.
“I feel like I’m eating well, but I’m not seeing any changes.”
I hear this one a lot, or variations of it. Sometimes it has to do with food, sometimes with fitness.
I’ve also personally said this and have felt this way.
This feeling can be tough because it can cause motivation to wane, or you can drive yourself crazy trying to figure out what's going on and why changes aren’t happening.
Two major things come to my mind when talking to people about this...
Thing one: Humans have been shown to underestimate their food intake and overestimate their exercise output. Sometimes by pretty substantial amounts.1 So, people in this study said they were eating ~1200 calories per day, which was found to be underreported by about 47%, and over-reported their exercise by approximately 51%.
That’s a tricky combination for any goals around body composition. And this type of situation could be why you may not be making the progress you’re looking for.
I’m not saying this to make anyone feel bad. I’m sharing this because it can be an unintended reality, and getting some level of accuracy IF you’re looking to see changes can be super helpful.
This accuracy could include:
Keeping track of, and aiming for, a certain number of servings of protein, fruits, and veggies per day, and monitoring treats and alcohol to a certain number of servings. And drinking your water, of course.
Keeping track of, and aiming for, 4-5 days of movement per week. Or, aim to accumulate a certain number of minutes of working out per week.
Writing down your food and movement for a few days so you can accurately get pictures of each day. Then, ask yourself how close or how far you are from what you thought you were doing.
You could weight and measure your food and track it in an app for increased accuracy, but this is certainly not required, and also is not necessarily right for all people.
Have an honest check-in to see if there are foods/bites/snacks that you’re currently eating that are not being mentally accounted for. Anyone else eating bites off of their kids plates that they don’t finish?!
Although it’s not food or fitness related, making sure you’re actually getting sleep is also huge. Track that for real for a few days/weeks and aim for at least 6, if not 7-9 quality hours of sleep, per night. Certainly sleep is beneficial for recovery and alertness, but getting enough sleep also impacts our food choices and allows us to have enough energy to work out.2
Thing two: Are you positive you're not seeing ANY positive changes?! Make sure you're not only using your own opinions, but also have some real data in areas that you want to see changes around.
Are you taking weekly photos to see changes?
Are you measuring your weight at least once a week at the same time?
How's your sleep quality?
How are your workouts feeling?
How are your clothes fitting?
How are your cravings?
What other metrics can you track that you care about?
Looking at real information—about various parts of life—is critical. If we're not tracking anything, or are just going with what we "feel like" or imagine is happening, it's very difficult to see changes.
And really, I get it, I’ve been there, I’ve wanted to throw up my hands and say there must be something wrong with my ________ (fill in with thyroid, metabolism, scale, etc.). The “this is out of my control” mindset.
What I’ve learned is that, most of the time, that’s just not true. Yes, certainly some of us do have real medical conditions or faulty scales or something else that is actually impacting out progress. But for many of us, it’s a level of honesty, accuracy, education, and consistency that we really need. Try some of the strategies above.
If you’ve felt like you’re eating well and aren’t seeing the results you want (and you know that there are not any medical conditions that might be impacting progress), it may be time to commit to a different path. If this sounds like you, send me an email at sara@nutritionforlifeproject.com or comment below. We’ll talk about your goals and experiences, I can make some suggestions to improve accuracy, and, if it makes sense, we can explore what it looks like to work together to reach your goals!
As always, thank you for reading!
Sara
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/1454084/
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC535701/#abstract1