It’s true. The bodybugg is a pricey piece of equipment, and ultimately, only you can decide how much money you would be willing to pay to lose the weight you desire. I get asked this question A LOT. Is it worth it? When I started with the bodybugg, I only had 15 lbs to lose & was convinced that I had a slow metabolism. I knew that my workouts were good: I’m a personal trainer & nutritionist, so I knew WHAT I was eating was good too. What the bodybugg immediately exposed was that I was sedentary the 23 hours in the day I WASN’T exercising. We all know that moving burns more calories than not moving. The bodybugg illustrates that fact very clearly. Here’s my activity graph from one day. You can clearly see where I was moving & where I wasn’t. I apparently went for a run & Read More . . .
bodybugg vs fitbit: Round 4 – Activity & Accuracy
<< Previous Round bodybugg vs fitbit: Round 3 – Sleep Tracking So the reason I was initially drawn to the bodybugg was that it allowed me to see how many calories I was burning in a day. I knew how many calories I was eating. What I didn’t know, was how many I was burning; but why is that even important? Weight loss is a simple equation of consuming fewer calories than your body burns. There are TONS of food logging websites & tools, and as I mentioned, I knew what I was eating, because I was logging my food for years prior to knowing about the bodybugg. But eating is only half of the equation in weight loss and weight management. I can tell you that if you eat 500 fewer Calories per day than your body needs, you will lose 1 pound per week; I already knew that. Read More . . .
bodybugg vs fitbit: Round 3 – Sleep Tracking
<< Previous Round bodybugg vs fitbit: Round 2 – Food Logging According to the National Institutes of Health, 50 to 70 million Americans are affected by chronic sleep disorders, and I am very fortunate that I am not one of them. I didn’t realize this until just a few years back. I have no problems sleeping. Sure, occasionally I’ll have a night where I randomly wake up in the middle of the night, or have trouble falling asleep, but it typically doesn’t last more than one night & the visualization techniques I use will usually work to get me to sleep. The bodybugg armband has the ability to show sleep efficiency, but the web application doesn’t expose it. Sure, you can wear it to bed & you can see in the activity graph if you got up, but overall it doesn’t display anything different if you’re just lying there, awake Read More . . .
bodybugg vs fitbit: Round 2 – Food Logging
<< Previous Round bodybugg vs fitbit: Round 1 – Getting Going Logging your food is THE most powerful thing you can do to improve your diet & eating habits. Logging your food prevents you from mindless munching. It creates this awareness of everything that you put in your mouth – even if you're journaling your food with a pen & paper. I don't exactly know why it's so powerful – there are a lot of reasons: you become aware of everything that you're eating. Suddenly, you change your eating habits because you don't want to write it down (those 4 hershey's kisses that you scarfed off of your co-worker's desk. Additionally, you gain this awareness of how many calories are in the foods you eat. Whatever reason resonates with you, if you want to drop a few pounds, start journaling your food. Food journals have been around for ages! I Read More . . .
bodybugg vs fitbit: Round 1 – Getting Going
Hello, My name is Elizabeth & I'm a data geek. That's why I love my bodybugg. I've loved my bodybugg pretty much since the day I got it. The bodybugg is the first tool available that allows you to really see how many calories you're burning in a day. This is a fantastic insight for folks who are trying to lose weight, or maintain their weight loss because how do you know how many calories to eat if you don't know how many calories you burn? Since I'm a nutritionist, wellness coach and personal trainer, I instantly recognized how powerful of a tool this was & became a licensed reseller, which affords me the opportunity to distribute them to my clientele. Initially, the bodybugg didn't have any competition. The first competitor was the GoWear Fit, which is the same product distributed by the company that actually makes the bodybugg armband; Read More . . .
How Do I Edit my Meals in the Bodybugg?
The most common first question I get with the bodybugg application is, "I’ve entered my food, now I want to go back & change it & I cant." As far as editing the food log, yes you can do it & it’s easy; it just happens in a different place than where you initially log your food. I agree that it’s a little confusing. You click the “Calories Consumed” button when you’re entering in new meals, but not when you’re modifying previously entered meals. Editing Food Step 1: Using the Date selector, select the date for the food you want to modify. Step 2: Select the “Nutrition” sub-tab just below the “Calories Burned”, “Calories Consumed” buttons & just to the left of the Calories Burned graph. Once you’re on that sub-tab, you can edit any meal by clicking the “EDIT” button associated with the meal you’d like to change. Read More . . .
Heart Rate & the Bodybugg
There’s been a TON of discussion recently about Heart Rate Monitors (HRM) & the Bodybugg: The bodybugg should have one… Why doesn’t the bodybugg have one?… an HRM can do the same thing as a bodybugg at a fraction of the cost… and so on. So, I’d like to address some of the questions about Heart Rate & the Bodybugg. Heart Rate Monitors HRMs can range from $60 – 400. The most basic will tell time & HR. More sophisticated ones may also track GPS location, calories burned, speed, & allow you to upload the data to a website to look at it, and may keep history of several previous "files" (or workouts). I used a HRM for years because it was the only tool available to tell me how many calories I burned when I exercised. However, I tried wearing it the entire day once had no luck as Read More . . .
Is the Bodybugg Useful for Fitness Pros?
I mentioned in my last post that I’ve joined Twitter. I have two logins: @esherman that is more personal & I tweet about health stuff that interests me, and @bodybugg where I support the bodybugg twitter community. I’ve gotten to "meet" some great people, and have some interesting conversations. [click here to learn about the bodybugg & what it does] Here’s one that I’m currently having (keep in mind that twitter only allows 140 characters per post) @Targettraining The Bodybugg sucks, it is for those with no discipline and people that focus on the wrong part of fitness. @bodybugg that is absolutely false @Targettraining The BBugg is for trainers that are lazy or don’t know much about nutrition!!! That is how I feel.. @bodybugg As a trainer it’s a HUGELY valuable tool; it allows you to see into your client’s lives outside of the 3 hrs they’re with u @Targettraining Read More . . .
Are fitness apps a waste of time & effort?
I’ve been reading a lot of news stories lately about the accuracy of fitness trackers, which has been debate in the fitness community ever since I started in fitness over 10 years ago. The calorie readouts on the treadmills, ellipticals, and heart rate monitors were all that were available, back then. Soon after I started personal training, the bodybugg was introduced (and if you’re a long time reader, you know that I loved my bodybugg sooooo much that I became a reseller). It was expensive, but it was a great tool, and I finally felt like it offered the missing side of the equation to my food logging; you can log your food all you want, but unless you know how many calories you’re burning, you don’t have the full picture. Even if you are logging your food, how do you know if you’re consuming too many? Or not enough? I Read More . . .
3 Tips for Increasing Activity
Part 3 in the Runtex University Bucky & Bob Speaking Series In the ongoing debate of whether someone can be overweight and be healthy, one thing is clear: Being active and incorporating intentional exercise into your lifestyle is going to positively contribute to your quality of life as you age. It may or may not help you live longer, but then who wants to live until the age of 150 if you’re strapped to a wheelchair and feeding tube? The body and mind are so tightly inter-connected that regular, intentional exercise improves mood, quality of sleep, decreases stress and the risk of disease. What I have also found intriguing is that as individuals become more active, their bodies start to crave healthier options. Don’t be surprised if you start craving broccoli or salmon once you incorporate activity into your day. Your body was meant to move; treat your body well Read More . . .
Success!
After 12 weeks of using the bodybugg, I've achieved my goal weight. If someone had told me that I would have been able to lose almost a pound a week without starving myself or working out for 2 hours a day, I would have told them that they just didn't know my body. My body is different. It's very efficient & doesn't like to give up it's calories & fat. It's impossible for me. I know this because I've tried. I guess I really don't know this because after using the bodybugg, it proved that I'm wrong. I competed in a bodybuilding contest about 3 years ago. I competed in the figure division, which the judging favors the athletic female form rather than the overly muscled women that you think of when you think of women's bodybuilding. When competing in bodybuilding, the competitor must get his/her body fat down to Read More . . .
It’s Very Freeing
I really love my bodybugg! I love it because I am so close to achieving my goal. And that's exciting. It's exciting to know that as a personal trainer and nutritionist, I'm not a failure at losing weight — I just didn't have the proper tools before. And it's amazing to me how easy it is. As I've said before, I've always had a rather clean diet, and I've journaled my food for years — nothing new there. I don't think I'm exercising more either. I haven't given up carbohydrates, and I still pretty much eat chocolate every day. I have become more aware of my hunger, and I try to eat to that, however whenever I had tried to eat according to my hunger cues in the past, it had led to eventual overeating. I think there were days that I certainly didn't eat enough for my activity level, Read More . . .
The truth will set you free, but first it will piss you off.
It’s not that people lie on purpose; when it comes to weight loss, the most recent statistics show overweight people underreporting daily food intake by 30-40% while normal weight individuals underreport by 16%. Virtually no one over-reports their food intake. Additionally, they’ll overestimate how much they move. The combination of those two little white lies that folks tell themselves is partially to blame the expanding waistline of the American public. I’m not immune to these lies. I feel like I’ve struggled with my weight for years. Well, wait… let me back up there. For most of my life I ate whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted. It wasn’t until I was in my first marriage that I used food to emotionally cope with my problems. Although I wasn’t fit when I got married, I was thin, and when I got divorced,I was definitely fat. Here’s my transformation in case you’ve Read More . . .
Done with Dieting Episode #6: Do we need to Move More and Eat Less?
There’s no doubt that calories in vs calories out is the foundation of weight maintenance and weight loss. Yet, anyone who’s been on a diet and drastically cut calories, logged every morsel that’s passed her lips, knows the frustration and truth of being confronted with the math not working out when standing on the scale and not seeing the number that she had hoped for. So what’s that about? How is it that we can live in a calorie deficit and not lose weight? Truth is that although calories are in fact the way that we gain and lose weight, BUT there are many things happening within our bodies that are so complex – that we really don’t know why two people can eat and do the same things, and while one person will lose weight, and another won’t. In this episode of the Done with Dieting Podcast, we’re going Read More . . .
Buzz
Television House Hunters International We had the opportunity to be on House Hunters International after we moved to Mexico. It was a fun experience, and even though we filmed about 40 hours, and that got boiled down to 22 minutes, we were happy with the result. Click Here to enjoy the show! Podcasts Unf*ck Your Brain Podcast with Kara Lowentheil Ep# 258: Myths about Women in Midlife: A Conversation with Karen Anderson, Elizabeth Sherman, and Jill Angie Something that breaks my heart is how women who are in midlife, or even younger, start having this thought pattern that their life is over, it’s too late to change things, or that their lot in life is chosen and it’s all downhill from this point onwards. I’ve seen this pattern only get worse over time, but the great news is these thoughts aren’t facts. To declare that your life is over Read More . . .
Let Your Food Burn Calories For You
You’ve seen the titles of books & magazine headlines: “Fat Burning Foods”; “Eat More to Weigh Less” and it goes on & on. So what are these articles & books trying to teach us? THey’re trying to get us to use the Thermic Effect of Food (TEF) to burn more calories, and yes, it does work. Thermic Effect of Food Defined: “the increment in energy expenditure above resting metabolic rate due to the cost of processing food for storage and use” or, the number of calories our bodies use in eating. Yes, we burn calories by eating. NancySBrandt: I’m thinking this #bodybugg thing might be too good to be true. How can I have 747 calorie deficit after eating fast food for two meals? bodybugg: @NancySBrandt Ucould eat donuts all day &still hv a calorie deficit! it doesn’t mean tht it’s a good thing. Uburn fewr K digesting fast food Read More . . .
The Gift of Elizabeth
NOTE: pronouns (he/she) were intentionally interchanged in this post A few years ago I had a client approach me for a Valentine’s Day gift-certificate of Nutritional Counseling for her husband. "He really needs to start working out and eating better. He’s getting fat & I think he could really use your help." He never called me to schedule his appointments. I knew that he wouldn’t. One would probably think that I would be a huge advocate of giving the gift of Elizabeth; after all, it’s a win for everyone. Right? Well, not necessarily. Purchasing health related gifts for your loved ones is a delicate gift to give. This applies to purchasing personal training, nutritional counseling, gym memberships or even workout equipment and fitness gadgets like the bodybugg. If you’re reading this blog, you are probably somewhat interested in your health. You know how good you feel by eating foods that Read More . . .
Custom Calories?
Whether you use the Bodybugg Weight Managemtent System or fitday or the daily plate, or sparkpeople, to log your food, One of the complaints is that it takes a long time to find the food that you want to log. When I first started using fitday, I remember I typed in "milk" and got 350 items! As with any new activity, it takes a while to get familiar with the new way of doing things; and that's uncomfortable. The key in being successful in the new behavior is getting through the discomfort. One thing that's a HUGE pain in the rear whenever you use a logging tool is not only finding the foods that you eat (and remembering how they're listed) but then entering the foods that aren't in the system that you consume. Typically, we each eat about 100 foods over & over & over again. So, once you Read More . . .
I’ll try not to let it go to my head
I was interviewed by the local press last week about the Bodybugg. Jessica, my client did an excellent job in the interview & I think she even upstaged me a little bit. I'm excited about the buzz that it's causing. The news story was even picked up by not only the Texas Cable Network, but also three other markets: Austin, Las Vegas, and Topeka Kansas. How exciting! Apex is thrilled with the exposure, as they should be. It's a really cool device & I'm confident that it will do well. Lately, folks have been asking me if it will work for them. Yes, it will. However, I've been coming up with a list of criteria for those who it will work best with: You're motivated enough to wear it all the time – If you only want to wear it part-time, then just go out & buy a heart rate Read More . . .
But … how do you know? Part 1
On the bottom of every nutritional facts label there is a foot note. The footnote tells us that diets based on 2000 & 2500 Calories should have "x" amount of Total Fat, Saturated Fat, Cholesterol, Sodium, Total Carbohydrates and Fiber respectively. That's great, but how do you know which one you should abide by? How many Calories do you need in a day? Three things influence how many calories you need in order to maintain your weight. Your Metabolism (aka: Basal Metabolic Rate – BMR) The amount of activity that you get on a daily basis (aka: Thermic Effect of Activity – TEA) How many Calories your body uses to process the foods that you eat (aka: Thermic Effect of Food – TEF) Your metabolism is responsible for using the bulk of your calories in a day – roughly 75%. A few things contribute to your metabolism: Genetics Age Weight Read More . . .