Why do so many people hide their food Diary?

My question is - why do so many people on here seem to think they should have access to my food diary? Do you want to come over and go through my pantry, too?

To be honest, mine is closed because I neither want nor need any feedback on it and when it was open, people would comment and I'd either have to be rude and ignore them, or engage with their comment, and neither option appealled to me. Having it open is an invitation to comment, which I find unneccesary.

Alatariel75 wrote: »

My question is - why do so many people on here seem to think they should have access to my food diary? Do you want to come over and go through my pantry, too?

To be honest, mine is closed because I neither want nor need any feedback on it and when it was open, people would comment and I'd either have to be rude and ignore them, or engage with their comment, and neither option appealled to me. Having it open is an invitation to comment, which I find unneccesary.

Exactly! What I eat is what I eat and it isn't up for debate! I've been down that road and I'm just not willing to do it again. Here's the thing, I've kept this weight off for years so what I'm doing works really well for me. What I eat, or how much I eat, may not work for someone else and they may feel the need to judge me and I may feel the need to be rather blunt when I tell them where to stick their judgement...so it is best for all if I just keep it closed

I keep mine private. I don't want to feel shame if I'm not eating what someone else thinks is acceptable. I made the mistake of admitting to making separate meals for myself & my family. I was crucified by the group I was apart of. Needless to say I am no longer apart of that group.

Because they don't wanna be judged by the food critics around here

kmccann357 wrote: »

If your diary is bad enough to be private then you're only cheating yourself!

@kmccann357‌ - what is a bad diary? Is it full of bad foods? I don't classify my food as good or bad (unless we are talking taste).
Is it being over in calories, not logging consistently or being under calories?
If I am not consistently logging, or eating too much, my weight loss will suffer. There is no cheating that. If I am not eating enough, my performance will suffer. I don't need someone else to point these things out for me. I've been around long enough to know where the blame lies. I am completely responsible for the outcome.

Alatariel75 wrote: »

I love the assumptions here that a diary will only be closed if it is 'bad' or people are afraid of bneing judged. That's so patronising and presumptuous.

Yup.

My diary is open to friends, and I do look at friends' diaries for a couple of reasons - 1) because they have similar macro splits to me and I'm interested to see how they go about meeting them, 2) yummy food ideas (like if I see that they had something I like the sound of I'll ask for the recipe), 3) I have some friends in ED recovery and I want to make sure I'm not 'liking' a restrictive day (there's a big difference in being a few cals under and a few hundred!), and also to provide encouragement where I can see that they are trying really hard to meet their calorie allowance.

usmcmp wrote: »

onatboosh69 wrote: »

usmcmp wrote: »

I think that some people are more accurate knowing that others can't judge their choices. They can admit to themselves that they had mostly cake that day, but they don't want others knowing they ate 1000 calories worth of cake.

W
This is why I keep mine hidden

That's what is important! Just logging and admitting to yourself. Now you have the numbers and trends and can see what is going on. Nobody else needs to know. Sometimes we eat 1000 calories worth of cake. It's far from the end of the world and it's not a failure. Getting healthy, losing weight and improving our fitness isn't going to be a perfect process and that's okay. Progress, not perfection.

Well said!

Alatariel75 wrote: »

runnerchick69 wrote: »

Alatariel75 wrote: »

My question is - why do so many people on here seem to think they should have access to my food diary? Do you want to come over and go through my pantry, too?

To be honest, mine is closed because I neither want nor need any feedback on it and when it was open, people would comment and I'd either have to be rude and ignore them, or engage with their comment, and neither option appealled to me. Having it open is an invitation to comment, which I find unneccesary.

Exactly! What I eat is what I eat and it isn't up for debate! I've been down that road and I'm just not willing to do it again. Here's the thing, I've kept this weight off for years so what I'm doing works really well for me. What I eat, or how much I eat, may not work for someone else and they may feel the need to judge me and I may feel the need to be rather blunt when I tell them where to stick their judgement...so it is best for all if I just keep it closed

And let me just clarify - my friends list is lovely! I don't think anyone would outright judge. I just don't even need the positive feedback and I'd feel bad just ignoring it, so I'd rather remove the option for them to comment at all. Though I see on my friend's diaries a lot comments like "Good day, but watch your sodium!" or "Ohh, hope you enjoyed that ice cream!", all of which would trigger my '*kitten* off' response.

I had a comment from someone on my newsfeed the other day...after I had finished my entries for the day and the automatic status popped up in my newsfeed, someone commented, "Good job, but try to up the protein!" and, like you, my "*kitten* off" response was triggered. I didn't actually end up saying that, but it does highlight the fact that people never really know if there is a reason for why someone may be eating a certain way (in my case, I have had some kidney issues recently and have to keep my protein levels lower than normal until we can figure out what's going on.) But the fact is: I shouldn't have to explain that to anyone, because the amount of protein/carbs/fat I eat is no one's business but my own.

_SKIM_ wrote: »

Nony_Mouse wrote: »

My diary is open to friends, and I do look at friends' diaries for a couple of reasons - 1) because they have similar macro splits to me and I'm interested to see how they go about meeting them, 2) yummy food ideas (like if I see that they had something I like the sound of I'll ask for the recipe), 3) I have some friends in ED recovery and I want to make sure I'm not 'liking' a restrictive day (there's a big difference in being a few cals under and a few hundred!), and also to provide encouragement where I can see that they are trying really hard to meet their calorie allowance.

See that would be my reasons for looking to and I don't get why it's called creeping in much the same way as I don't get why private diaries are assumed dishonest. If your diary is open then you are also open to the obvious fact that people can/will see it and the sometimes dumb comments this can bring.

Having said that I rarely look now. They're all grown ups looking after their own. Closed/open I don't give a damn. Just do what needs to be done for you and if it stops working change it.

To many people use a diary as some sort of backward source of guilt for "motivation" when it is just a tool for collecting data.

I like that a lot. Very well said. Actually, I could go back and bold your second paragraph too.

I also get your point about creeping. I'm guilty of using that word. I do it more as a joke. I refer to myself as "creeping" a friend's facebook pics if they put up an album even though we are friends and I'm doing exactly what they expect people to do when they post those pics. I'll tell a friend "oh I was creeping your photos and….". Just a habit I guess. I don't really consider it creepy.