With the year just about over, many of us are thinking about 2017, setting goals and mapping out plans to achieve them. I’m speaking for myself here, but at the top of my list are health goals. I’m working toward being the best version of me in mind, body and spirit. I suspect I’m not alone here. With heart disease running rampant through my dad’s side of the family, I’ve spent my entire life watching my dad, grandparents, aunts and uncles struggle with heart disease, Type II diabetes, obesity, high blood pressure and more. It’s the main reason I started running. I know that embracing a healthy, active lifestyle is one of the most effective ways I can avoid heading down the same path. But sometimes that’s easier said than done.
Recently I had the opportunity to test out Noom Coach. Noom uses cutting-edge technology to give you access to your own personal health coach conveniently via your smart phone. A health coach? At my fingertips? Yes please! It was super easy to download the app and set up my profile.
Some of the many reasons a health coach is beneficial:
- Weightloss
- Goal setting and planning
- Building healthy habits
- Overcoming cravings
- Making lifestyle changes
- Motivation
- Accountability
For me the last two are huge. How many of us know generally WHAT to do but get lost when it comes to specific steps? Or for one reason or another, our motivation flags and we let our convictions and healthy habits slip away?
I was paired with a highly-qualified health coach I could interact with daily, as much as I wanted. Noom has an entire staff of lifestyle coaches, each with expertise in nutrition and behavior science. Whenever I had a question or concern, I’d just send Nancy a message via my smart phone and she’d respond in a timely fashion. Nancy helped me set goals, create an action plan and offered helpful ways to go about executing it.
As I navigated around the Noom app, I found a ton of great features. Some of them are fairly standard while others I haven’t seen elsewhere:
- Log exercise
- Count steps
- Track weight
- Track Blood pressure
- Measure Blood Glucose
- Find Recipes
When I log my meals and snacks, Noom immediately tells me whether the food is in the red, yellow, or green category, with green having the lowest calorie density/most nutrients, yellow foods in the mid-range, and red foods the most calorie dense/least nutritious.
There’s also a vast array of recipes at my fingertips, conveniently categorized for those times I need meal inspiration.
There’s more:
Everyday there are fresh, new articles on the app I can read right from my phone. They’re just long enough to be informative and motivational but not so long I have to wade through them.
Topics include motivation, why a healthy weight is important, calculating BMI, building healthy habits, making lifestyle changes and more.
I found the article about the benefits of weightloss to be especially encouraging. While sometimes I tend to dwell on the risks of being overweight, it’s good to be reminded that a healthy weight is associated with many positives:
- Improved cholesterol levels
- Improved insulin sensitivity
- Lower blood pressure
- Reduced inflammation
- More energy
- Fewer aches and pains
- A boost in confidence and self-esteem
- Overall better mood
How’d I do with Noom in just one week?
Let the record show it was my birthday week with lots of cake and celebratory food.
I was still able to lose one pound, and believe me I didn’t starve myself. It was all about being mindful, making (mostly) good choices and modifying my food/exercise based on what was going on that day. Having a health coach “watching” and always there to offer support definitely helped keep me on track. Bam!
Overall I found Noom to be very comprehensive as well as fun and easy to use. I highly recommend it if you’re looking to make lifestyle changes in the new year. Use this link to Try Noom Coach for yourself at a special discounted rate of $39/month or a one-time payment of $119.
Learn more about Noom on their website and Facebook page.
Your turn: Have you used a health/lifestyle coach? Health app? What goals will you work toward in 2017?
Special thanks to Noom for sponsoring this post. All thoughts and opinions, as always, are my own.
This sounds like an interesting idea- I would worry I would poop out after a week or too!
What a great idea! Seems like there’s an app for everything. My issue would be my spouse–he tries valiantly to undermine my healthy eating.
It sounds like a great idea, but if I’m spending that much per month, it would probably be on a running coach. Although there are still just a few pounds I would love to lose, and while I’m pretty good at that after decades of working on it, I still wonder: am I eating too little? Too much?
Someday . . . maybe.
I just read another review and it sounds really interesting and motivating– I can see how this would be really helpful!
Glad that you are finding this helpful! Since I was a nutrition teacher I am generally interested in the food aspect of this.
I red this while munching on Christmas cookies.
I just want them gone. I am good because I don’t buy junk food and eat healthy at home.
Just no will power when they are on my desk.
I actually just tried out Noom too and put my review up today. I also really liked it.