How do slimming world and ww work?

[WhyamIdoingthis99]

Just interested in the concepts, thanks.

Slimming world works for me, I think initially it's about what you eat but over time it does talk about portion size. At my last class one woman had maintained for 2 weeks and the leader went over her food diary, talking about portion sizes etc. I think for what you pay the advice and motivation is good (but then I go to a good class). If I was paying out for a dietician then it would be more expensive and I wouldn't be able to go more than once or twice.

The class leader has never mentioned mug shots or muller lights or anything like that. I don't even know what a mug shot is! Maybe there are some bad leaders out there giving rubbish advice but if that's the case - find another class. I changed before settling at my current class.

The class has about 15/17 people in in and lasts 90 minutes in total if you go at the start time - (about 35/40 minutes for weigh ins/new starts and 50 minutes for the class).

Your MIL lost 6 stone & kept it off? Massive achievement. No wonder she wants to keep it off. You sound a bit mean.

I did Slimming World a few years ago with a lot of success, but I didn't go to any classes, just used the app and I have to say the dietary advice seemed fairly sound to me. The basic message I followed was fill at least a third of your plate with veg, eat plenty of lean protein, and treats in moderation. I didn't eat anything weird, never had a Muller light in my life and I've never bought any Slimming World products either. Maybe this stuff is pushed at some groups, but everything online seemed rational. At first I thought some of it sounded a bit nuts, like why would a whole apple be free food but apple puree have syns, but actually that does make sense. It takes time to eat an apple, and you feel fuller after it, whereas the same amount of apple as puree is probably a couple of spoonfuls and you are less likely to feel satisfied and to eat something else, so it is preferable to choose the full apple if you want to cut your overall calorie intake.
Yes, technically you can eat as much pasta etc as you like, but if your starting point is that a third of your plate should be veg, unless you eat absolutely massive portions then it won't be too much. Obviously you have to apply some common sense too. Whatever diet you follow you won't lose weight if you don't reduce your overall calories so you do have to have portion control, whatever you're following. I benefitted from having a structure to follow though, and it's easier not to have to weigh things. I agree syns is maybe not the ideal word, but the concept worked for me as I'd, for instance, be more likely to choose "free" fruit over a biscuit with lots of syns as a snack. Of course I already knew fruit was the healthier snack, but recording what I was eating and allocating a value to it did encourage me to make better choices and I think my diet improved as a result. I don't think there's anything magic about SW and I would probably have had similar results with something else, but I had a lot of weight to lose and I just needed a structure to keep me on track, so it did the trick for me,
I have put a bit of the weight back on this year unfortunately but largely because I have been almost housebound due to illness and slipped back into bad habits. I've not rejoined Slimming World but have gone back to the same basic principles and am losing again fairly easily.

I lost a couple of stone in 4 months using The Hairy bikers diet book ( really delicious recipes that H enjoyed too) and cutting alcohol to 2 glasses of wine Friday and Saturdays only-but still went to SW for the weigh in and occasional groups , as I found it kept me motivated.

I eat loads and definitely until I'm really full at meal times because I really like food basically 😂I'm doing it online as I don't want to go to classes, I can't think of anything worse tbh and never eaten any SW foods. Lost another 1.5 kilos last week so I'm happy and will keep going as it doesn't feel like a diet at all.

@Iamthewombat you absolutely have been sneezy at several posters. Your subtext is that we must all be stupid for
A- needing to be told what to do to lose weight
B- paying for group to tell us what to do
C- eating processed crap

And on and on and on.

There's no point reasoning with you because you don't want to understand anyone's post, you just want to prove they are wrong.

It's the equivalent of me claiming that calorie counting causes eating disorders, and alcoholics might think it's ok to drink their calories because calories in/calories out etc.

Total codswallop.

As everyone here who has had success with SW has said, it's not magic, it's not cutting edge science. It's just a tool that helps a lot of people, but not everyone. No need to sneer about that.

I joined WW a few years ago (I did it for 3 months when there was an online membership offer)

It worked for me - it helped me kickstart things & it kept me motivated enough so I started losing about 2 lbs a week.

The concept isn’t rocket science. Most people know that being in a calorie deficit, adopting healthier eating habits, eating less fat & sugar will = weight loss.

For me, I liked having an app I could go on to check certain foods, I liked the recipe ideas and found it easy to stick to. I didn’t do the in person weigh in thing.

I lost 2 stone over about 4 months & kept it off. I didn’t feel I needed to be a WW member for any longer than the 3 months , as by then I had adopted sustainable & healthy eating habits and it became every day life.

They operate on the false notion that all calories are equal and 100 calories of processed food will give your body the same nutrition and store the same fats as 100 calories of fresh fruit and vegetables. They focus on points instead of actual nutritious to ensure that your weight yo yos forever and you come back at least once a year because your overall health never improves and thus you never actually lose excess weight. This ensures repeat custom exponentially because self-loathing feeds consumerism.

Ermmm. 100 cals is 100 cals.

Also, SW encourage fresh food, cooked from scratch.

They are the same amount of calories but can be used by your body in totally different ways.

Yeah, lettuce eaten as part of a SW weight loss plan behaves completely differently to when it's part of a MN Massive Salad.

SW is like McDonalds it would seem. Any mention on here brings out armies of posters who would never in a million years use them, but know an awful lot about a version of it that doesn't exist in the real world.

No, that's nothing like what I said.

I said food equal in calories is not equal in nutritional value and will not be broken down in the same way by your body. And a food that is the same amount of calories as another can cause you to store excess weight whilst the other may not.

But you also said "instead of actual nutritious (food)" SW on the whole encourages good, nutritious food.

They aren't suggesting you fill your plate full of sawdust and Pringles

You seem to have no actual idea of what the plans are?

Actually relying on processed foods would make slimming world very unsustainable, though it doesn’t differentiate between fresh, frozen or tinned vegetables... anything more processed than that though, you can only have in limited amounts.

The things you’re not having to weigh or measure are ingredients.

True.

People who still think their chicken nuggets are made of cardboard and burgers from mud.

Sw isn’t processed food! The food you don’t weigh and measure (free and speed) is ‘food your granny would recognise’ eg lean meat, eggs, veg, potatoes, fruit.
Processed food is very limited.
Example would be cod - fresh cod is free/protein. Battered cod from a packet you put in oven isn’t free.
They build in an allowance of up to 300 cals a day (target/men/women over16 stone get more) for things like sauce, wine or chocolate as realistically most people eat these as part of a healthy diet. You don’t have to eat this and can spend how you like. Mine often goes on a Kit Kat but some ladies in my group have nuts or walnut oil. You could do a zero crap version if you wanted.
The bulk of your diet is home cooked fresh food.
Thanks to poster for reminding me to dig out hairy dieters book their lentil bacon soup was lovely I recall.

@Dixiechickonhols Yep- that's a really nice one- I also really like for breakfast the crumpets with dry fried and wilted raspberries and blueberries fried with cinnamon -with a dollop of zero fat thick Greek yoghurt on top - utterly delicious

That sounds delicious too thank you.

That is the exact opposite of my experience with SW. A criticism that is often levelled at the plan is in fact that foods of the same calorific value score very differently on the syns and that that isn't logical. But of course it is logical, for the reasons you state.
I have just come in from a walk. It's freezing and i've expended quite a lot of energy so I came into the house feeling absolutely ravenous. There is currently a big pot of Cadburys Roses in our kitchen. I could have eaten 2 of those or a banana with pretty much the same calorie content. But I know the chocolates would hit the spot but leave me feeling hungry and probably craving more of them, and the banana will tide me over to my evening meal. Plus obviously there is a lot more benefit to eating fresh fruit than the empty calories in the sweets. I chose the banana, and that is exactly what Slimming World would encourage you to do as all fruit and veg, including the higher calorie ones like bananas, are "free food" if eaten in their natural form. I don't know off the top of my head how many syns 2 chocolates would be, but I'd expect it to be quite a lot. If the message was that all calories are equal, then that wouldn't be the case.
Of course none of it is rocket science, but if all that was required for weight loss was to know what you should be eating then hardly anyone would be overweight. Different things work for different people. SW didn't tell me anything I didn't already know, but it gave me a tool to take my somewhat chaotic eating habits in hand, and enabled me to break some bad habits which have stayed broken so far at least. It won't suit everyone and some of the groups and leaders do sound completely bonkers, but if you look at the online plan, it's basically a fairly standard reduced calorie diet.

Utter nonsense. SW encourage you to eat as natural foods as possible. There are no calories or points associated with most fruit and veg. They allow about 300 cals of processed crap per day. The rest is real food.

300 calories on crap a day? You think that's a good diet? It really isn't. I attended once. They told me it was a no no to eat avocados but I could eat some awful rubbish instead. I never went back. All calories are not equal. If there is no nutrition in a food, don't eat it.

You can eat avacados,you just have to account for them and not eat loads.

Well if you never eat food without any nutrition, so never want cake, crisps etc you can use your 300 calorie allowance on an avocado.

That's the whole point, you can have whatever you like, providing you stay within the basic allowances. You can have a whole avocado every day if you want to.

I'd love to be a fly on the wall of all these SW meetings that don't exist where they hold a gun to your head and force hifi bars washed down with Muller Light yogurts into people while shouting that avocadoes are banned.

I think if you really need a 'kick up the bum' in terms of weight loss, then these classes can give you hope that change is possible! I did SW in the earlier times of 'red and green days' and I found that really simple and effective. Since then I've rejoined a few different SW classes but I've yet to find one that ISN'T like that Fat Fighters sketch on Little Britain.

At one group there were two women who were in charge of checking books/weighing us in (they were volunteers) and they were on this bizarre power trip. When I nervously approached 'The Scales of Doom' and tried to explain I'd been on holiday and had probably gained a bit, she actually tutted at me. This despite the fact she was no lightweight herself and was sitting there occasionally drinking from a can of full fat coke on the shelf behind her. 😂 I never went back.

If anyone knows of a nice weight loss support group that is full of people who want to shed the pounds and not just go for a chit chat each week, let me know. 😊😊

Interesting when they promote unlimited fruit, vegetables, pulses, beans and unprocessed meat (protein) as the basis of the plan.
Yes they have their own products but in no way do you have to buy them if you don't want to.
But then I guessing its like all these healthy vegans buying highly processed rubbish to imitate meat but will spout on about how its the healthy way of eating and better for the planet.