I found the DietPower food journaling program in September 2004, while surfing the net.  I started using it.  I had good success, and still really like it.  

   I have logged all of my food into DietPowerevery day since 9/20/04, today, 2/21/11 makes 2346 consecutive days.

DietPower is my most essential tool for weight-loss and maintenance.……….However, like any tool, it won't be helpful unless………you make, and follow through with, a commitment to consistently use it.

Before using DietPower I tried many times to keep track of my food and calories. That was very hard to do using only paper, a pen, and a calorie dictionary, I was ne...

The focus of DietHobby is the various aspects of Dieting.
However, since DietHobby is my site, participating here
makes you one of my online friends, so occasionally
I plan to share a bit of introductory personal information.

This is one of these times.

Here’s picture of me with my husband at our wedding.
FYI: I spent more than 6 months on a medically-supervised liquid diet
to drop down to 150 lbs, in order to fit into my wedding dress, but I still think it was worth it.

 We’ve been together now for almost 30 years, and I’m still very fond of him.
Here is a recent picture of us, and the card he gave me on Valentine’s day.

I have an adult daughter, an adult son, and an adult step-son,
who are now in their 30s and 40s, but my mind still sees my son and my daughter like this.

     

I'm an Attorney, retired after 25 years of Practicing Family Law.
Here are pictures of my sign and former office.

 FYI - I probably weighed somewhere in the 180s in this office picture.

When the construction on this DietHobby site is completed,
...

    During my weight-loss phase, I participated in a diet forum of people who posted daily weights. Observing the behavior of the others provided me with extremely helpful information. When I neared my goal weight, I decided that it was important for me to set specific Goal weights, and to make them extremely VISUAL.

So I created this Weight Maintenance Chart,

which turned out to be a very successful way to BURN specific goal-weight-range numbers into my mind and heart.

Many people have asked me how and why I chose these particular numbers, for these specific categories.  My "creative" thought process went this way....

Over time, I’d learned that my body weight tends to bounce around quite a bit due to salt/water/waste issues. Three pound gains and losses are frequent. Five pound deviations are not unusual. After a 3 day vacation I can have an 8 to 10 lb up-bounce, most of which recedes after a week of eating carefully. Due to this, I decided to set myself a 10-lb maintenance weight range.

At a height of 5’0”, the "Expert" Charts said my "Healthy Weight Range" was between 95 and 128 lbs, and specifically gave 110 lbs as the most "Healthy" weight for my height and bone-structure. I chose the specific numbers from within that range which were meaningful to me.

I set my permanent Goal weight number as 115 lbs. and decided that more than 5 lbs above that number was unacceptable. Therefore I set the 4 lbs above 115 as a “lose weight” area.

I knew that, due to my love of food, dropping too far beneath my goal weight would never be a problem, however, I watched one of my 5'0" forum members, who was maintaining between 110 and 100 lbs, be continually hassled by her family and by other forum members who were worried she was going to “develop Anexoria” and allow her weight to drop too low.
My own family also began making occasional remarks like: “when will you decide to stop dieting?” So I decided to clarify my entire position by setting limits for my bottom weight,as well as limits for my top weight.

The Charts singled 110 out as the ideal number for me,and my lifetime secret fantasy was to weigh 105 lbs. So I decided to set my 10 lb maintenance range between 115 and 105 lbs,.  which placed 110 lbs at the mid-point of my range.

Even the positioning of my numbers have Meaning.  English is read from left to right, which means thatleft is where one has been, and right is where one is going.  I put my high numbers on the left and my low numbers on the right. because the high weight is my past, and the low weight is my future,

The bottom numbers of the "Hea...

                   

The Scale is a weight-measuring tool

Body fat is only a part of the scale number.
The scale measures the weight of everything in the body,
including all our bones and tissues, along with the
water and waste products that the body contains
at the time that we step on that scale.

Eating salty foods will affect the body's salt/water/waste levels for several days.
So will bowel functions. There are other functions of the body that involve
the body’s water levels as well. This means that the scale will sometimes
register higher numbers than it will at other times.
It is the Big Picture that counts, 
rather than one’s weight on one individual day.

Here is an example of how the Scale can change from day to day,
This is a graph that shows my own daily weights from spring 2009
thru mid February 2011. This weight range is between 109 -128 lbs.




Weight bounces happen.
Everyone has salt/water/waste issues.
Some have them more than others.
It is a RESULT,
a function of the body that is essentially outside one's control.

I’ve been tracking my food and my weight in my DietPower food journal
for more than six years, which has given me an enormous amount of detailed
personal data. As part of my hobby, I play around with that data, making various
graphs and charts.

Weight bounces are so common for me,
that a perfectly consistent weight is unusual.
This morning a comparison chart I’ve been running,
showed something that, for my body, is remarkable.
This graphic shows my weights on 2/19, for the years 2008-2009-2010-2011.

Due to my frequent bounces, the fact that each of these 4 year records show me
in the same lb range on the same date is incredibly unusual.
I was pleased to see this specific evidence of successful weight-loss maintenance.

If you are interested in seeing examples of day-to-day scale variations
You can access a great deal of that data by going to my ABOUT ME page
and clicking the links to the charts and graphs contained there.

 Some of those links show my Maintenance numbers during 2006
through 2010 in detail, and show the differences between my highest weight of
each month, and my lowest weight of each month. This will show you that it is
common for me, during any one month, to have a bounce range of 8 or mo...

                        
What about the Scales? 
Should I weigh? If so, how often?
Should I throw my scales away?

This issue is discussed frequently by those dealing with diet
and weight-loss. After a lifelong battle with food and
with weight (see ABOUT ME),
I’ve established what works for me.

Regarding the scales:
Over the years, I have had every reaction to them possible.
 I've eaten because they showed a loss,
and I've eaten because they showed a gain.
I've eaten because they didn't move up or down.
I've felt bad because they went up,
 I've felt good because they went down. 
Sometimes I've felt bad, and sometimes I've felt good,
when they didn't move at all.

Over time, I tried different variations to my use of the scales.
I tried weighing whenever I felt like it, even if it was many times a day.
I tried weighing once a day, and once a week, and once a month.
twice a day, not weighing myself, but having a club or doctor weigh me.
I spent several years not weighing at all.
I've bought many scales of various kinds,
and I've thrown away many scales.

The scales was never the problem.
I did not like the Reality of the numbers registered by them.
Like many overeaters, I have a strong tendency to lie to myself.
It's easy to lie to myself about how much I eat,
and I can also lie to myself about how much I weigh.

In order to face reality, I have to have an objective standard.
I weigh every morning after using the bathroom, but before I dress.
I write that weight down.
I then record that weight on charts and graphs that I keep.

I feel emotions during this process,
just like I feel emotions about lots of my other daily activities.
I can emotionally eat because I do or don't like the number the scale tells me
or I can emotionally eat over something I hear in the morning news.
............or over anything at all.....
Facts are facts, and emotions are emotions.

I continually work to avoid emotional eating, no matter what the cause.
Not facing the truth of facts isn't a solution to emotional eating.

Some mornings the scale shows me up 2-3 lbs from the prior morning.
I don't like that.
However, I KNOW I didn't really gain 2-3 lbs of fat overnight...
because I'm n...