From September 18th to September 22nd, I recorded the foods I ate throughout the day and the nutrients in those foods. At the end, I also calculated how much more or how much less of each nutrient/ingredient I was eating than I should have been. My calculations strangely showed that, overall, I consume too much, as I consumed over the recommended amount for every component of food that we analyzed.
One major element of my diet that I now know I need to improve on is my sodium intake as I was 383% over my recommended amount. Recently, I noticed that I have been eating out a lot - for example, the foods in my diet that had the highest amount of sodium were a pizza from Pizza My Heart, a Razzmatazz smoothie from Jamba Juice (twice), and chicken noodle soup from Safeway. I partially blame this on how stressed I was last week as I had a test in every class and hence, I didn't have time to make lunch for myself in the morning and so generally went off campus for lunch. I think if I started limiting the amount of food I eat out and start eating homemade food more often, I could reduce the amount of sodium I eat.
One other area of my diet that needs improvement is my protein intake. According to my calculations, I consume about 355% more protein than recommended. Throughout the week, I had some sort of meat 3/5 days and consumed meat during two meals on those 3 days. I think this significantly contributed to the high amount of protein in my diet. If I consume less meat, I can reduce my protein intake and bring it closer to the recommended amount.
Though I initially thought I didn't eat as much as I should, my calculations show that I need to start cutting back on the number of calories I eat because I consumed approximately 170% calories above my recommended amount. One way to improve the amount of calories I've been eating is to reduce my carbohydrate intake. Most days, I either ate cinnamon buns, a sandwich, or a bagel at some point during the day. All of these foods contain lots of carbohydrates and contributed heavily to my heavy calorie intake. If I cut down on the amount of carbohydrate-heavy foods I eat, I could reduce the number of calories I've been consuming by half. Another major reason for why my calorie intake is so great is once again, how much I have been eating out. I think I need to start eating lighter meals and instead snack throughout the day. I have a general tendency to not eat anything for hours and then eat too much during meals. Another way to potentially cut down on my calories would be to work out more - although I do attend tennis practice, it's not too grueling and I could probably fit in time to go to the weight room after practice or go for a run, which would help me burn more calories. In addition to reducing my food consumption, this would lead to a healthier lifestyle.
In order to improve my diet, I need to start eating more fruits, vegetables, and dairy products, and I need to start cutting down on the amount of calories, protein, and sodium I consume. I think I need to also be more aware of what I buy from the supermarket - for example, trying to avoid products with hydrogenated oil or high fructose corn syrup, as we learned in class. One possible reason that my data showed I was above the recommended amount is because I may not have given myself enough credit for how much physical exercise I do when I was calculating my recommended amounts When I'm stressed out, I tend to "stress-eat" and eat a lot of carbohydrates In addition, I tend to eat while watching TV or watching Netflix, so I don't realize how much I'm eating. In order to improve my diet and live a more healthy lifestyle, I think I need to start being more aware of what I'm eating and what the nutrition facts are. I will also start bringing food from home instead of eating out at lunch all the time. I think these changes will greatly help me bring my food intake closer to the recommended levels and help me eat healthier.
Bibliography:
Chex mix label
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