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A food journal is a daily account of everything you eat or drink each day. Often, people choose to include how they felt after each meal or snack - both physically and mentally - in order to gain a thorough understanding of their dietary habits, and everything they consume across a day.
Often the intention behind keeping a food journal is to identify areas in your diet which you can improve on in order to lose weight. But if you think of it like this, it becomes almost like a calorie counting tracker or app - which we’re not all about! So it’s when you use a food journal to identify how your food and diet is making you feel where it becomes really powerful.
Sound like a chore to keep jotting down everything you put into your mouth for days on end? Well, let’s discuss the reasons and situations for which food journals can actually be incredibly useful.
If you’re focused on how you feel physically after each meal, you’re forced to tune into your body and check in to see how you react to certain foods. How are your energy levels? Is the quality of your sleep impacted? Do you feel more focused, or struggle concentrating? Do you feel sluggish, lethargic or bloated?
Keeping track of the physical symptoms and reactions you have to your diet is really helpful in understanding whether you’re feeding your body with foods it enjoys and thrives on. Plus, if you’re working with a dietitian or nutritionist, they can help you analyse your food journal to see if you’re meeting your nutrient requirements.
Unfortunately, according to the ABS, only 4% of the Australian population are currently eating enough vegetables. 90% of Australians aren’t consuming enough dairy, and the average Australia consumes just 2.7 serves of vegetables and legumes per day, compared to the recommended guidelines suggesting 5-6 serves daily. This can have lingering health consequences, and just prevent you from feeling and performing at your best. So by identifying trends, patterns and deficiencies in your diet (with the help of a health professional), you can ensure you’re fuelling your body optimally, and meeting all your nutrient needs. This way, you can expect to experience improved digestion, immune function, nutrient absorption, energy levels, sleep, focus, you name it! A healthy, well-balanced diet improves all these areas and functions, so it’s well worth investing the time to keep a food journal for a few weeks, to help you identify how your diet is tracking currently, and how you can improve it moving forwards.
In addition to the physical side of things, your diet has a significant impact on your mood and mental health, and vice versa. More and more evidence is emerging in support of the role of diet in influencing brain health, cognitive function and emotional wellbeing, so it’s important to ensure your diet is supporting health and function in these areas.
For example, omega-3 fatty acids, found in foods such as salmon, sardines, olive oil, avocado, nuts and seeds, has been shown to have a positive effect on general, emotional and mental wellbeing and function. And by keeping a food journal, you can identify whether you’re eating enough foods containing these healthy fats in order to reap the benefits.
Equally, if you’re noting down how you feel both physically and emotionally after each meal, it becomes possible to identify trends in your diet which may lead to changes in your mood. Ask yourself: do you feel tired and low after eating certain foods? Do you feel energised for a long period of time after others, and better able to tackle the day ahead? What foods make you feel calm, even happy? And do any make you feel low, sluggish or down?
Each of us is completely individual, in that some foods will make some of us feel fantastic, while others won’t react well to them at all. So identifying what’s going on for you after you eat common foods in your diet is super important in order to support your mood and mental wellbeing. If, for example, you identify that high-sugar or ultra-processed foods cause a slump in energy and mood for you, yet you’re eating them in every meal or snack you consume, you can recognise an opportunity to improve your diet, in order to feel the difference in your mood and emotional state. That’s an invaluable opportunity right there!
Find yourself bloated, or experiencing discomfort or stomach problems after eating? But not sure what the cause is? A food journal is a great way to identify the source of whatever could be causing these symptoms.
Unfortunately for some of us, we simply can’t tolerate certain foods - most often being dairy, gluten, or even things like raw vegetables and seafood. But why go through the hassle of cutting out food after food, or dealing with the unwanted consequences of eating something that doesn’t react well with your body, when you can use a food journal to figure out what could be going on.
Instead of worrying about elimination diets, low FODMAP foods and all that not-so-fun stuff, food journaling helps you get straight to the bottom of things - ideally with the guidance of a health professional. This way, you’re not restricting your diet unnecessarily, and you can still minimise whatever foods or food groups might be leading to your discomfort or other unwanted symptoms.
You may not classify yourself as struggling with disordered eating, but food journaling might help you identify patterns of restriction in your eating habits.
Unfortunately, thanks to the pressure put on us by ourselves, society, and social media (amongst many other factors), the prevalence of eating disorders and disordered eating is on the rise. But for many of us, we aren’t even aware of the food rules and fears we’ve created for ourselves over time. They often begin subtly, and increase progressively over time to become more rigid and controlling.
Disordered eating doesn’t look or feel a certain way. And kind of limitation, guilt around food, needing to compensate for things you’ve eaten, or fear of certain foods could indicate your relationship with food needs some work.
But if you’re not even aware of your tendency to engage in these behaviours, how can you ever recognise this fact?
Keeping a food journal can help you discover any foods or food groups you’re unknowingly avoiding or fearing. It can help you notice whether you’re eating enough to feel full and satisfied, or whether you’re regularly denying your own hunger cues and cravings.
Recognising if you’re struggling with fears around some foods, restricted timings where you “allow” yourself to eat, guilt after eating, or any other kinds of food rules that suggest a negative relationship with food is so important. The sooner you start working on your relationship with food, the faster you’ll free yourself from these harmful patterns. And keeping a food journal is an excellent way to hold yourself accountable, and see what’s going on for yourself - even if you’ve been unaware or in denial until now.
If you’re a gym junkie, it’s so important to make sure you’re adequately fuelling your training sessions, and replenishing your nutrient stores afterwards. And a food journal is an excellent way to suss this out.
Before a workout (whether it’s the night before, or 30-60 minutes prior to your session), you need to be fuelling your body with a balanced, nourishing meal containing carbohydrates, protein and healthy fats. This ensures you have enough energy to perform at your best during your session, allowing you to optimise your results.
After each session, you need to replenish your glycogen stores with a carbohydrate-rich snack, and also rehydrate your body! This helps your body recover after each workout, so you’re ready to go again the next day.
Keeping a food journal lets you monitor whether you’re meeting your nutrient requirements to support your training load, and also helps you identify what foods are supporting improved performance when you’re in the gym. You’ll be able to see how you feel after each meal, and how it impacts your workouts, as well as noticing any opportunities for increasing your energy intake to support your body and its increased demands as a result of your training.
If you’re not fueling your training properly both before and after a session, you won’t be able to sustain your workout routine long-term, and you won’t see optimal performance or results. So it’s definitely worthwhile using a food journal to keep an eye on things, and ensure you’re nourishing your body as it needs and deserves!
So there you have it, food journals can be incredibly beneficial and helpful when used for the right purposes. Mostly, they’re a way to keep yourself accountable, and identify areas of opportunity in which your diet could be improved or changed to support your happiest, healthiest self! If that doesn’t sound like a good idea, we don’t know what does. Happy journaling!
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