IIFYM- How Healthy is it?

A popular method of keeping track of how much you eat, and what the macros are of each meal is by using apps such as myfitnesspal (I personally love the app and I use it every day) but I have seen almost every one of my favorite fitness guru’s on Youtube (i.e. Maxx Chewning, Matty Fussaro, 1FitAshMom, Michael Kory) depend on a program called “If It Fits Your Macros” to make gains. Basically all there is to it is calculating all of your macro needs. If you can fit it into your macros, you can eat it. That piece of cake worth 86 carbs? Sure, you can have it. Just as long as it “fits your macros”. That greasy slice of pizza from the food court in the mall worth 36 grams of fat? Sure, just make sure to eat a lower fat dinner so you can make the pizza “fit into your macros”. If you haven’t caught on yet, you can eat whatever you want and still make gains. It seems too good to be true! While all of my favorite Youtubers are making gains and getting lean, I can’t fully jump aboard to the If It Fits Your Macros bandwagon. A lot of things are overlooked when following If It Fits Your Macros. Many people who follow this way of eating often eat processed, packaged meals along with fast food items too. One of my biggest concerns are the sodium content (the answer as to why I get concerned with sodium is in my post about Gatorade) and additives. SO many food additives are present in so many of our foods today that are often toxic, yet still allowed and viewed as “safe” for consumption. Many have been found to cause cancer and mutations in lab animals. (A future post will discuss my thoughts on food additives so I’ll save it) If It Fits Your Macros is a number game and instead of focusing on eating lean proteins and whole foods, are focusing on how much crap they can fit into their diet and still be “healthy”. IIFYM can be helpful to gauge your efforts and to try and help give you a more broad outline on how much you should be eating to make gains, but not if you pack your days full of frozen weight loss dinners and reduced fat ice cream. (400)