Image via Flickr user Loren Sztajer

Mid December my husband and I were in a pretty bad accident with a semi truck. Ongoing story summed up, being in the wreck helped me to make a serious lifestyle change. At one of our doctor visits, he mentioned blood pressure medication. Now, I am all for modern medicines but I don’t want to take them unless I have to so it was finally time to get off the couch and hit the gym. Just a week before said doctor visit, I had finally gotten rid of my old flip phone from 2004 and joined the modern age with a new iPhone. What I didn’t realize was how much I would use my smart phone to help me make this huge lifestyle change a reality. I started looking for apps that could help me stick with the changes I had made. Here are my three go to apps for health and fitness.

1. Fooducate: This app is fantastic and I have used it every time I go to the store. It incorporates a scanner which you use to scan foods at your grocery store or things at home. It then pulls up information about that food, lists healthier alternatives, and gives it a health grade. The scanner works very well and if a food is not in their database it gives you an opportunity to add it. I started scanning things in my pantry that I thought were fairly healthy. For instance, in the past I have bought those oatmeal bars for a quick breakfast. Fooducate gave them a D+ . It went on to tell me that the product contains trans-fats even though the label says zero (there is a loop hole that if the amount is small enough the company can round down), that there are a whopping FIVE teaspoons of sugar in just one bar, and that there are controversial additives such as BHT and EDTA in it. Based on this review, I won’t be buying these again. Needless to say, my grocery trips have gotten a wee bit longer in duration as I am madly scanning things as I go through the store. However, it has helped me to change my shopping habits and buy healthier versions of foods we already buy, like peanut butter and bread.
2. RunKeeper: I love this app! When I am ready to go workout it helps me keep track of my time, calories burned, how fast I was moving, and my route  on a map via my phone’s GPS. When I use gym equipment I can easily enter the information from the machine I used to keep track. It keeps all the data so I can look back and see my progress over time as well. From their website you can also see where you have set personal records, such as farthest distance or fastest speed, and it allows you to share your workouts with others to help keep you motivated. RunKeeper also has many apps that have integrated with them so your data is automatically downloaded. For instance, my workouts are shared with Earndit, a site which gives you monetary rewards for working out. At some point, I will have earned enough points to get a free gift certificate. Woot!
3. MyFitnessPal: This app has been great to help me count calories. I love to eat and snacking was killing me, literally. This app also has a scanner that works quite well so you can scan the foods you are eating and save them into your daily food diary. When you set up you account, you input your weight and activity levels. You can set goals and based on these it gives you the calories you should be eating per day to lose weight. It has a list of thousands of foods you can add, including things from restaurants like Chipotle and Chick fil A.  You can also input a recipe from home and have it give you the calories. Whatever activity you have done that day is added to your diary which helps you see how many calories you have earned back.  At the end of the day it gives you nutritional totals as well as calories burned and logs your entry onto their website indicating whether you met your daily goal or not. The online community can help cheer you on when you have an off day as well. It also gives you a week view where you can see where your calorie totals were on any given day. It is no coincidence on days we eat out, I have a hard time not going over my allotted calories.

Using these three free apps, I have lost more than 10 pounds since January 4th. Together they are helping me stay on track and stay motivated.  If you are struggling to make a healthy lifestyle change, take a look at these apps. What have you got to lose?

Jennifer D. is a married mother of two, one still in diapers.  She is a Speech Language Pathologist who is taking time off to raise her kiddos.  She became a geek that fateful day in the 70's when she first saw Star Wars and loves all things sci fi.