Why do you care if people read your food diary?

psychod787

Mine is open to friends. It's pretty **kitten** boring.....

ChristopherLimoges

domeofstars wrote: »

This is a question for the people who have their food diary set to private. I'm just wondering why you care if people read it?

I don't to be quite honest, if they read it, they still can't understand or interpret much from. I just made mine private recently, and noticed you also have a private food diary. Why so?

sgt1372

It's not anyone else's business.

Noreenmarie1234

Mostly because I would not recommend my diet to anyone. My sodium is sky high and I eat an excessive amount of fiber and artificial sweeteners.

NovusDies

domeofstars wrote: »

Deviette wrote: »

Why not? Why do you care if people have their diary set to private?

I sometimes find it interesting to read food diaries, to see what works for others in their weight loss journey.

Thank you to the people who have answered my question. 🙏
Some really good points have been mentioned, ones I didn't even think of.

This is why I do not share. The answer to what works is not in how I eat but the calorie number at the end of the day.

I think it is a great diagnostic tool for anyone who is truly failing to meet their loss, maintain, or gain goals to open their diary at least temporarily for assistance.

A point might be made that a person with a highly specialized and medically required diet might should share to help others finding themselves in the same boat. Not talking broad diets like carb controlled, low sodium, low fat, low protein, etc. I am thinking things like gluten avoidance. However, these newly diagnosed people really need to in nutrition counseling/education with an RD or similar.

eatyogarun

domeofstars wrote: »

This is a question for the people who have their food diary set to private. I'm just wondering why you care if people read it?

And I wonder why people care that I have it private. So we're even.

Edited to add: thank you to all of the other people saying they'd be more likely to fudge if it was public. I'm the same way. There was a thing here for a while where people insisted you were hiding/lying if your diary wasn't open. Weird hill to die on.

Chef_Barbell

eatyogarun wrote: »

domeofstars wrote: »

This is a question for the people who have their food diary set to private. I'm just wondering why you care if people read it?

And I wonder why people care that I have it private. So we're even.

Edited to add: thank you to all of the other people saying they'd be more likely to fudge if it was public. I'm the same way. There was a thing here for a while where people insisted you were hiding/lying if your diary wasn't open. Weird hill to die on.

Agreed... I also find it weird for random people to send unsolicited messages about what folks eat. I have never personally have that happen or seen that happen in all my time on MFP (almost 10 years), but have always heard stories of it. So weird to be that involved in strangers.

snowflake954

When I joined around 7 years ago, diaries were automatically public. Then there was a change where new people automatically had their food diaries private. Mine is public. I was just too lazy to change it to private, besides not many understand it since most of my foods are Italian (I live in Rome). I've had very few comments on it over the years, but I wouldn't care. I also rarely look at someone elses unless they're posting about a problem. I don't care one way or another, and don't understand people that do. It's a personal choice and I respect the decision.

John772016

Mine was private and I changed it to locked with a key as I was working with an RD prior to joining and already was sharing a food diary with her. Not sure that anyone else's opinion was important enough for me to change it to public.
Since moving to maintenance, pretty sure my mostly created recipe entries would be pretty useless to everyone.....so no real point in sharing it.

bigblues11

Mine is open to friends only. I don't really browse randomly through food diaries of other members. I do support my friends here by looking through quickly and personalizing comments on the daily. I can say that I do get some great new dish ideas from their log

ninerbuff

Private is the default setting and I post all the time about my "dirty" eating and how it almost doesn't matter what you're eating as long as your macro/micro nutrients needs are met.


A.C.E. Certified Personal and Group Fitness Trainer
IDEA Fitness member
Kickboxing Certified Instructor
Been in fitness for 30 years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition

paperpudding

eatyogarun wrote: »

domeofstars wrote: »

This is a question for the people who have their food diary set to private. I'm just wondering why you care if people read it?

And I wonder why people care that I have it private. So we're even.

Edited to add: thank you to all of the other people saying they'd be more likely to fudge if it was public. I'm the same way. There was a thing here for a while where people insisted you were hiding/lying if your diary wasn't open. Weird hill to die on.

Yes there was too.

Along with that other thing that bothers some people : if your avatar is not a photo of yourself.

It has happened to me once when my diary was open, in a thread about daylights saving or doctors being overweight or people wearing make up to the gym or something* and someone posted why should I value your opinion when you only eat x amounts protein per day.



* can't remember exact thread topic but absolutely nothing to do with my diary or how I eat or anything about me personally.

Katmary71

I don't mind people looking at my diary, I think it's pretty interesting seeing what people eat but I get hungry doing it and I'm normally (not the last couple weeks) eating an anti-inflammatory diet so all the sweets give me cravings for things I can't have! The comments every once and awhile throw me, I think I'm so used to thinking of what I do as private that when someone notices little things it surprises me. My favorite comment in the last two years was after I had a major sugar craving and only had apples in the house and ate like 4 in a row, I logged it as one apple and someone commented that I ate huge apples. I weigh everything so it was like a 600 gram apple! That had to be a sarcastic comment, right? That would be like a watermelon!

Luke_rabbit

Katmary71 wrote: »

I don't mind people looking at my diary, I think it's pretty interesting seeing what people eat but I get hungry doing it and I'm normally (not the last couple weeks) eating an anti-inflammatory diet so all the sweets give me cravings for things I can't have! The comments every once and awhile throw me, I think I'm so used to thinking of what I do as private that when someone notices little things it surprises me. My favorite comment in the last two years was after I had a major sugar craving and only had apples in the house and ate like 4 in a row, I logged it as one apple and someone commented that I ate huge apples. I weigh everything so it was like a 600 gram apple! That had to be a sarcastic comment, right? That would be like a watermelon!

Wait, was that me? That sounds like the kind of joke I would make! 😁

springlering62

I have mixed feelings. I feel terribly judgey.

I try to stay brutally honest in my own diary. If I’m not sure, I choose the highest calorie entry. If I have a binge day, its out there in big red numbers for the world to see. Sometimes, having it public actually makes me stop, so that’s a benefit. Other times, it’s an intentional overeat because my weight has dropped too low.

But, OTOH, I used to look at friends’ diaries, particularly those who seem to be automatically posting unusually high calorie burns for comparatively low energy or short workouts. If I see on my feed that someone burned 800 calories for 15 minutes on an elliptical, and the next item says their diary is closed and public, well I have a look.

It kills me to see users who are surviving on protein bars and shakes; on junk food, coffee and nothing else; even alcohol and very little solid food. So many are way below their goals, often even consistently below 1200. I know, I know, there’s no such thing as a “bad” food, but you and I are both bright enough to recognize an unhealthy meal plan. I’m sure there’s a lot of fudging going on, too.

I want everyone to succeed here. It saddens me. On the one hand people ask for friends for support, but otoh it’s not kosher to reach out to a stranger, nor am I trained - if I were even willing- to do so.

I seldom look at others’ diaries these days because it’s so often disheartening. I’ve never had feedback about my diary myself. I’m sure someone would have something to say about the cumulative quarts of balsamic I drink every month, lol.

AnnPT77

What I don't understand is people who send friend requests, but have closed diary, closed profile page (can't see anything they might post on their page or any status updates), never send PMs. Whazzat about? 😉 I don't care, still accept the FR, but . . . mysterious!

My diary is open to MFP friends. (I'm a terrible MFP friend, pretty much ignore that feed.) From comments and occasional questions, it's clear that some people read it. On threads where people have asked about getting protein as a veg, I've told folks they can FR me if they want to see what I eat, as a long-term ovo-lacto veg with a moderately high protein goal who dislikes protein powder/bars. (I don't think that explains the mystery people.)

I'm not likely to posture via fudging my diary; that seems silly to me. I post what I eat: That's simpler, and food shame is not really my thing. I skip logging the occasional day (and it's usually a high day, because eating a bunch of usual stuff is logistically more complicated/time-consuming, and skipping the rare day is NBD in long-term maintenance, I've learned). But I've logged any number of ill-advised eating/drinking choices, and not gotten criticism. Maybe my MFP friends know how that would turn out? 😉 ( I haven't even had judge-y questions . . . I think someone asked me how I liked a particular flavored vodka or something like that once, but that's about it).

Other people can open or close their diaries, mostly I don't care . . . but people who evangelize in an aggressive/obnoxious way about a particular eating style and how we all ought to adopt it, I admit I'm kind of amused when they have totally closed diaries, though there's no rational basis for amusement.

I think it's nice when someone has a profile photo that isn't the default gray face, because the uniqueness makes it easier to follow threads sometimes. I find it confusing when the profile photo is of a human that I don't recognize (may be a celeb I don't know, maybe), and the photo is wildly different from the person who's posting. (I don't think it's wrong for them to use those profile photos, though. The confusion is my problem, not theirs.) I'm suspicious - perhaps also irrationally - in the rare case when someone posts repeatedly in a pseudo-oracular way about their glorious fitness routine and its amazing physical benefits for them, but never posts a personal photo anywhere (profile or threads).

cwolfman13

domeofstars wrote: »

This is a question for the people who have their food diary set to private. I'm just wondering why you care if people read it?

I haven't logged anything in over 7.5 years...but when I did, my diary was private, namely because that was the default setting and I never bothered or felt any need to change that. The net impact on my life by not making my diary public was ZERO...never thought about it, never cared.

suzij27

Thank you. I really enjoyed reading through this thread. Lots of personal insights.

I am someone who doesn’t participate in social media and appreciates anonymity, which is getting harder and harder to achieve. I have nothing to hide (most days 😋😝🤣). I just don’t need or want to be judged by, acknowledged, recognized by random people.

Back to the topic at hand... if someone wants to see my food diary I would most likely allow them access. Why they would, is beyond me. Unfortunately I too have struggled with an eating disorder and too many comments on what I am doing get in my head and can send me off course.

ChristopherLimoges

I haven't seen anyone talking about or taking Ashwandha on here after I started inputting it into my diary anyway. Who cares, the health industry is a highly competitive and deceptive place. 😴

angelexperiment

I don’t care that’s why it’s open and why I’m here for accountability. I’ve gotten very good advice by having it open by many experience people here when I’m struggling they say ok this is what I’d work on, or cut out or back.