Tallmadge is a nutrition and weight loss expert, author and president of the D.C. Metro Area Dietetic Association. How did you become interested in nutrition?

I started thinking about weight and nutrition issues when I was a child. One evening I found my mother weighing peas. I asked her what she was doing and she said, ‘I’m fat and I’m on a diet and I have to lose weight.’ My mother was a beauty and all she could think about was how fat she was. She spent her whole adult life battling her weight.