Body Monitor

[thyme4change]

Malarky - you said you have been wearing a body monitor. I would love to hear more about that, because I have seen about 10 different ways to calculate calories needed, and I am blown-friggin-away by the difference between the highest and lowest estimate.

What brand is it?
How much does it cost?
Where did you buy it?
If I bought one, could I wear it for a while to find out how I'm doing and then pass it off to my husband, or is it registered and programmed for one person?
What are some of the problems you have encountered using it?

[Malarky]

I use a bodymedia
www.bodymedia.com/
It was a bit cheaper when I bought it last summer. I signed up for a year or so of service and got 6 months for free and pay $6.95/month.
I wear it on the back of my left arm and most of the time I'm not really that aware that it's there.
I've been more than a bit lax about it lately but it's really effective if you're willing to use it properly. I think it shows an example on the website of all the categories it gives you values for. I tried to post a screen shot but it showed all my personal info. Once you set it up you basically need to tell it honestly what you eat and it tracks you progress. The days when it tells you that "you are on a weight loss trend" are so much better than the days it tells you that "you are on a weight gain trend."
I was downloading the info (just plug the thingy into the computer) every night after dinner. I would record me meals if I hadn't done that at all during the day and judge whether I needed to work in another walk, or a bit more time on the elliptical. I haven't been doing that consistently lately.

[Malarky]

One thing I like about mine, and one of the main reasons I bought it is because it measures how much I sleep. I've always thought that I wake up repeatedly at night and that's why I wake exhausted. Turns out I'm right.
It can actually tell if I'm lying down and watching a movie. LOL, some nights I'm so restless it gives me credit for steps even though I haven't gotten up. It's cool to look at the graph and know that I slept for 1 hour 27 minutes, then tossed and turned for 18 minutes, then went back to sleep.
I can even look at a graph from three weeks ago and figure out when I was probably sitting here posting on the boards.
Even though I haven't been using it to it's full potential, I'll be getting back to that.

[thyme4change]

Now that you know for sure how many calories you are burning, have you found an online calculator that comes close to your average? As I said before, the calculators give vastly different results. I'm not sure I'm ready to spent $200 to find out the truth. Luckily, I'm still in my ideal weight range, although I've moved from the bottom to the top of that range over the past couple of decades. I want to make sure I halt the creep. I guess I should just follow my instincts - like the fact that I just ate 9 heaping spoonful of cookie dough with 2 glasses of wine. No nutritional value there!

[Abby Normal]

How easy is it to enter food items? I've been thinking about getting something like this. I've been using some other online sites to track food, but alot of them are a pain. Do they have brands and such to choose from or do you have to load all the specific nutrion info for what you eat.

[motherto2]

thyme, that's my kind of snack!! I was wondering the same thing. I'd like to find something that will make me a little more accountable. I realized over Christmas break that when I retire I'm going to have to find something to get into that gets me out of the house otherwise I just sit around and graze all day/night. I'm also interested in the sleep part also. I normally do a lot of tossing and turning, and never feel like I get a good night's sleep.

[Malarky]

It took me all of three minutes to record my food intake for the day. There are a lot of foods built into the program, plus Ive added most of my favorite recipes over the past 6 months, so it's all there at my fingertips.
Tonight the hardest thing I had to do was input roasted chicken, peas and baked potato with butter and sour cream. Everything else I ate was just a matter of a click.
Today was a good day. I burned way more calories than I consumed.