Why all the fuss about recalling 24- hour dietary intake, filling food frequency questionnaire and penning down your activity chart for the day? When most of us visit a professional nutrition expert we are asked to do one or all of these activities before we get on with the actual task.
We might feel these activities do not hold any importance or might find it monotonous thinking we tend to remember what we eat and do the entire day. But the truth is majority of us are likely to forget the small treats in terms of namkeens, chocolates, mithai, biscuits etc. we keep giving ourselves throughout the day.
Imagine we have N number of household items to buy from a grocery shop; the fact is we forget to buy most of the things once we are at the shop provided we are not carrying a list. Similar is the case with our bodies, we keep feeding it with N number of junk items throughout the day without even remembering what we have eaten. This is where 24- hour dietary recall plays the role.
Your activity chart would help introspect your daily lifestyle pattern suggesting the time when your body is most active and needs maximum fuel to drive it. Sitting in the office leading a sedentary lifestyle will not help as our body, muscle, bones need constant hustle- bustle to be on the right track. For majority of the individuals, life is different during weekdays and weekends. Thus for ideal calculation it is better to write down a 3- day diet recall and activity pattern- two for weekdays and one for the weekend.
Check for yourself to see of what you think you eat and what you actually eat are same or they are just two different sides of the same coin.
Do check out my Medium blog to know more about eating right & living healthy! :) https://medium.com/diet-nutrition