After having Mia I realised that my body wasn't just going to spring back to the way it was before and I was going to have to try a different approach. I don't have time to live at the gym so I thought the next best option was to plan and track my meals - enter Plate Planner!
Plate Planner were kind enough to collaborate with me and send me a diary to trial and test so I could give you moms a well rounded and realistic opinion on meal prep and tracking.
I started off taking images of every single day as I completed it however I quickly realised this post would be packed with images that pretty much all looked identical, so instead I created a short video and I will explain the sections throughout the post.
On the first page we have a section for you to write in your starter details such as your name, your start weight and start date. You then have a giant set of scales filled with stars and as you loose a pound you are meant to colour in a star. This is brilliant for motivation!
Going through you then have your weight loss progress and tracker, body measurements and somewhere to stick a 'before' picture so you can refer to this later and see the difference in yourself, the page after that is the progress body measurements and progress picture so you can have the 2 pictures close to each other to see the difference clearly.
You then have a section for your 4 week plan, I think this is meant to be how much weight you'd like to loose in 4 weeks or something, I am not entirely sure what this could be for so I am guessing it is whatever you make of it or whatever you need it be.
There is then a habit tracker and a step tracker, the habit tracker is a great idea for someone who genuinely is able to live their life by a schedule however I definitely am not one of those people, I am so busy keeping my daughter to a schedule that I am all over the place. The step tracker is brilliant if you, like me, walk constantly all day, every day, However I don't own a pedometer and I tried downloading one on my phone and it used all my data and battery so I decided to delete it, if you can get your hands on a proper one that will be accurate then I think its a brilliant idea.
There is then a section for you to write your goals for each week going all the way up to week 8.
For me my goal was just to feel more confident by the end of it so I went straight to week 8 and plonked that right there. I don't have any other goals except to stick to the plan (you'll already have seen that I haven't & I have failed miserably at the first hurdle!).
Week 1 -
Week 1 starts with a page where you can write anything you need to do that week, any appointments you've had, any new recipes you want to try, a tick list down the bottom of things you need to have completed before the week starts and your goals for the week.
This is perfect for someone like me because it acts as an actual diary as well as a meal tracker, I can keep all my appointments and things I need to do in the same place as the important stuff like my meals. There is also a section at the bottom for you to write down how much weight you would like to loose that week if you are tracking your weightless and inches lost.
Next we have an exercise plan for the week, this takes up 2 pages so you feel incredibly guilty not using all that space haha, I just wrote walking because I do around 2-3 hours of walking every single day. I don't have time to go to the gym and I know there are loads of exercises I can do from home but a little TMI, my shower is broken which means we have to have baths all the time and id rather not have to run 3 - 4 baths in 1 day because I got sweaty from doing exercises.
Next we have my favourite part which is the weekly food plan, mine looks stupid because I meal prep which means that every single day is the same, so I write what the food is in the first box and then draw an arrow down.
There is then a page with recipes and a shopping list section, the shopping list actually tares out of the book so you can write what you need as your planning and then rip it out and take it with you shopping! I love that and wish my lists could fit on it but I end up taking an A4 piece of paper haha!
Then the food diary starts, there is then 7 pages of 'Food Diary' with the date, a day letter for you to circle, breakfast, lunch, dinner, exercise, snack & notes sections, there is also a space for you to put how many steps you took, how much weight you lost, how your feeling (circle the face) and how much water you drank (colour in the cups) - I think you can have so much fun with these pages and make them beautiful and colourful and fun however mine suck! I do mine at lot at night or when I just want to sit and chill out so I scribble everything down with a brio and be done with it but I really need to spend more time making it pretty and decorating it, I think this will actually end up motivating me to not fall off track.
I then basically take you through the 2 weeks that I have completed and you may have seen the dates, I did fall off track after the first week, I then got back on for a week and have been off since, the reason I haven't filled it out is purely because I have been having take aways or rubbish food and felt a bit of a failure putting that down so instead I just didn't fill the week in at all.
I really hope I can use this to motivate me and stay on track because I think nutrition and meal prep can aid so much in weight loss and a healthy lifestyle.
The main reason I wanted a food diary is because I struggle sometimes with IBS and I have flare ups, not so much 'cant get off the toilet' but more extreme bloating and painful cramps, this can make day to day life so much harder and I really wanted to see if by tracking my meals and what I actually eat (rather than what I just want people to think I'm eating) is having an impact.
I also want to do this so I can see at the end of the day/week where I have let myself slip and where I might need extra help, for example on a Wednesday I might have a chocolate bar and a bottle of fizzy drink which will show me I obviously need a sugar boost on Wednesdays and I can prep and plan accordingly by finding a healthy recipe that will still give me the boost I need.
Overall I do think these planners are perfect for someone wanting to balance their lifestyle more, fix a few problem areas and concentrate on making themselves healthier.
Just a small disclaimer - the reason the majority of my diary is blank is because I personally don't track my weight or inches because for me I think it can create a very unhealthy mindset and my mind is a lot more important than my body in terms of health right now.
If you want to get yourself one of these fun and useful planners/diaries then head to www.instagram.com/plateplanner - they have now come out with an A5 organiser to put your food diary in and it also comes with a pen!
If you get a planner or organiser from Plate Planner please upload an image to Instagram and tag me in the image, also use the #PlatePlanner for the opportunity to be featured on their page.
I hope you have a great day or night where ever you are!
Emm xoxo
