Tuesday, April 28, 2009

I Need A Custom Calorie Counter


Lately I've been a bit concerned about loosing my baby weight. No, not the weight I gained while pregnant with Cheeks. I lost a good bit of that shortly after he was born. I'm talking about the weight I've gained since then as a result of having a baby in the house. You know, the cookies I eat because I can eat one while changing a diaper instead of toasting a whole grain English muffin with a spritz of zero calorie "butter." And the ice cream I eat because it is faster than washing and coring an apple and spreading it with a tablespoon of protein rich peanut butter. And let's not forget the salad I didn't eat when opting for 3 helpings of last night's lasagna in my bathrobe today simply because I was feeling frumpy and hopeless.


Oops, I think I've said too much. Sorry, lasagna does that to me.


So, I decided to copy my sister who is loosing lots of weight on the SparkPeople program. I signed on, set up my profile, input my personal health stats, and went to plan my day's menu in the calorie counter. This is where I had problems. I couldn't find "left over lasagna with extra cheese and sauce" anywhere on their food lists. And, HELLLOOOOO, where is the ice cream list? And I scoured the snack section and couldn't find any calorie info for the little burnt remnants of cheese that I scraped off the pan and snacked on after making grilled cheeses for the kids today. And do I count Sweet Terror's frosting-less Oreo remains I ate today because I was worried about the starving children in China?
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I want this SparkPeople thing to work for me, really I do, but they need to make a realistic menu calorie counter for the everyday women like me. You know, the half crazed, mom of too many, unwilling to face reality, eating ice cream in my closet, kind of woman.
.
Or maybe I could just learn to eat like a normal person.........
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(Dear SparkPeople, if you need help setting up an ice cream calorie counter, give me a call.)

11 comments:

Poppy said...

I don't think you would like to know! We need a counter that would lie! BTW-here's an ice cream you should really try if you like english toffee. It is at Kroger stores (smiths, ralphs, etc.) It is my latest "can't live without" treat at the moment. The brand is Private Selection and is called English Toffee Temptation. I am always tempted!

Stephanie said...

I feel your pain.
That's all.

An Ordinary Mom said...

Ditto to Steph. What is with having a baby in the house?!

Sea Star said...

I am still waiting for baby weight from #1 to come off and here I am gaining again for baby #4. Being at home with kids certainly wears a mom out and she just needs that handful of chocolate chips or dish of ice cream to keep the energy going.

And don't even get me started on eating the leftovers off of the kids plates. I don't even make myself lunch anymore. I know I will have the crusts of 3 sandwiches to eat. Don't they know how expensive food is getting?

Good luck with the calorie counter! I am just trying not to gain too much, at the moment.

Steph said...

I love reading your blog! You're so funny! I think you'll have better luck with Pablo's chart-thingy than with trying to change survival-based habits, such as eating leftovers and nursing your frazzled nerves with ice cream. (I eat in my closet too) :)

Amber M. said...

You're KILLIN' me!! That darn baby weight is like glue. Wish it would stick to the baby and not to my thighs. It looks much cuter on the baby.

Packer Family said...

Try Nutrtion Data . com

Richelle said...

You are too funny.
You could try calorieking.com, too. I don't know about spark people, but calorie king has restaurants, too. It was really handy for counting carbs when I had gest. diabetes.

Lara said...

If we were smart enough to count calories we would be smart enough not to have gotten fat in the first place. Spinach doesn't have any calories so just eat that. I wonder if anyone makes spinach ice cream? Hey, that's a good idea! I'm going to patent it so don't steal it.

Lisa said...

A few years back I did really well counting calories with Calorie-count.com. Look at that, I'm sure they have ice cream on the list. My problem with them is cooking from scratch. I don't have time to enter in every ingredient to calculate calories, so I would just calculate everything else for the day and my exercise totals and just estimate what I could eat in the evening. Good luck! It does work!!

Michal said...

i'm with you. i put on a little weight when i'm pregnant, but it is much worse when i'm nursing. combine extreme fatigue, crazy busy-ness, and voracious appetite of lactating woman and you get fat and frumpy. at least when that lactating woman is me. i try not to hate the women who swear all they do is nurse for a year and they end up skinnier than they were when they got pregnant. i am lucky at my six week check-up to be down ten pounds--pretty sad when my babies weigh seven pounds at birth. ugh.
and what kind of lame calorie counter doesn't have ice cream, let alone kids' leftovers? if we didn't eat that stuff, we wouldn't need the dumb counters!:)