How do slimming world and ww work?

[WhyamIdoingthis99]

Just interested in the concepts, thanks.

To be fair, it’s not 300 calories of crap, it’s 300 calories of stuff that’s too calorie dense to be unmeasured.

How you use that is up to you, you can use it on avocados, olives and nuts if you want to, but most people seem to prefer chocolate, crisps or alcohol - but it’s for whatever makes it sustainable for you really.

I am quite sneezy at the moment, as it happens, but I don’t think that was the word you were aiming for.

Don’t embarrass yourself by announcing what my ‘subtext’ is.

I quite enjoyed your subsequent rant. It bore no relation to reality but at least it was funny. I see that you are one of those posters who loses an argument and resorts to making things up. Like the one who claimed that posters who thought that SW’s methods were a bit odd were “sneering at and shaming people trying to lose weight”.

No, I haven’t called anybody stupid. I challenged an ill-conceived argument that several people tried to make in different ways.

No, I didn’t say that anyone paying to go to a slimming club is stupid.

No, I haven’t mentioned ‘processed crap’ once.

No, I don’t ‘just want to prove them wrong’. I asked a question which nobody has answered properly. The question was, why label a food as ‘free’ when members are supposed to restrict the amount they eat. I concluded that it’s a marketing ploy.

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.

Eh? You’ve invented a load of spurious old nonsense and announced that that is what I think? That’s rather a stretch. You must be desperate to defend your beloved SW, eh?

The question was, why label a food as ‘free’ when members are supposed to restrict the amount they eat

It's free from having to measure or count it, unmeasured, not unlimited. You're supposed to eat until you are satisfied, not stuffed, this is all made very clear.

But you don't need to be hungry and can eat main meals of sufficient size for your own appetite.

That's the difference between other diet plans that will say 'one 100 g salmon fillet with broccoli and 2 small new potatoes and people will eat that and still be hungry and go hunting for the biscuits an hour later.

But on SW, you can have whatever size salmon fillet you like, and as many potatoes as you like, as long as a third of the amount of food on the whole plate is also broccoli (or other non starchy vegetables, salad etc). That's to make sure what you're eating is low enough energy density to lose weight. Research they did decades ago found that the volume of food that most people eat was quite consistent so if you just made sure that most of the food they ate was low energy density, so meat, fish, veg etc, they'd be in calorie deficit and lose weight.

If the ‘300 cals’ refers to syns, it does not have to be processed crap- could be nuts or oil…..

I use mine for full fat yoghurt, nuts, oil, butter for when I'm making soup,salad dressing. Usually I just save them up though so if I get caught out and haven't planned for a coffee/ meal out then I'm covered.

Interestingly SW showed me I wasn't get nearly enough calcium, I'm still struggling to get the correct amount in but I'm getting better.

I'm confused that most PP are talking about ingredient quality & not peer support and lots of structure.

If someone wants an in-person meeting where everything is organised for them, all the big decisions are made ahead of time, there are lots of reasonably clear rules about when & what to eat, with lots of lovely structure & huge amounts of peer encouragement to support their weight loss journey, and they live in a little town in nowhere England that they don't want to travel out of... what service should exist for them if not a local branch of a business like WW or SW?

Exactly as you have, wombat. Rants, and spouting bollox. I guess we're even.

Obviously you are there for a reason, so your diet is shit before staring, irealy don't think 200 or 300 calories on syned food is bad at all, considering that many before stating were probably indulging on fried foods, crisps, chocolate, biscuits etc. We are not talking about people on 'good diets' to begin. Use your brain for God's sake. The people joining SW are not there because they have good diets. What a fucking stupid coment.

Sorry about the typo's, my touch screen is dying.

Up to 300 cals on none free food. Men get more/heavier woman/target to maintain. You don’t have to use it. They recommend you use a few so you don’t get bored as part of a long term healthy lifestyle.
To be fair most people seem to use some on a bit of chocolate or glass of wine or gin.
Some get used on condiments eg olive oil, mayo, ketchup. They encourage you to use some in meals eg sauce on chicken and veg, cornflour in a recipe etc as just eating free food isn’t realistic for life.
Your avocado example - if you want it daily you can you use part of your allowance you must have misunderstood. I eat avocado of course it’s allowed. They encourage using some on things like that or a few nuts etc - savvy syns.

Groups and Consultants vary a lot. I’ve found a Saturday morning livelier and more people stay. A group with a mix of ages and some men is best imo. You also need a few who cook and share recipes. I’m in a village and it’s helped me make friends - we go for walks etc.

I think people underestimate how difficult it is to actually do something about losing weight.
I was obese, knew I was obese and faffed about for ages, tried all sorts but never stuck to it. I should be able to do it but I couldn’t.
If you need support what options are there? I couldn’t afford a personal trainer/nutritionist but could afford £5 a week in village class.
It takes a lot of courage to join. Lots say they didn’t go in first few weeks.

Group support - taking it in 7lb chunks worked for me. I felt better as I was eating healthy food. Wasn’t hungry or deprived.
I went from obese to a healthy bmi within 6 months. I’d been obese for years. And no I haven’t piled it all back on.

@MistyRock interestingly I think I had a very good diet pre SW in terms of quality- just a bit too much of it! And probably slightly over on the alcohol too. I also had my gall bladder out 28 yearsago and struggled weight wise ever since. I don't think everyone going to SW lived on a diet of cakes and crisps pre SW , some like me have just found weight crept on as they got older , probably less excercise too . I actually didn't follow the SW formula (I kept quiet about that) and used a mix of hard calorie counting and hairy bikers diet recipes but I did find that going to SW to be weighed every week and a bit of 'competitiveness' helped keep me motivated. Guess different things work for different people.

Mine wasn't too bad either, but I was using too much oil, eating too much bread and snacking too much. The point I'm making is that if you're following the rules then a 300 empty calories snack isn't going to do harm and isn't a crap diet.

That's brilliant, well done you 😊 Hopefully I'll be the same in the not too distant future.

I had a good diet too! I just totally underestimated the impact of 'a few small treats'. I'd have to seriously under eat 'real food' in order to make room for the treats I thought were normal.

To be fair, my husband and kids still eat them all, with no sign of problems so far. They're the same height as me, weigh less, but are able to eat significantly more. Bastards!
I seem to be what Andrew Jenkinson refers to as 'very efficient at preserving and storing energy'.

And bread! Bastard bread! Basically I can't afford to eat any.

The bastard bread... 😂

As I said earlier my diet was great just way too many glugs of olive oil and waaaaaaaaay too much bread. Weirdly I don't even really miss it now and I don't snack as I'm so stuffed from meals. Basically with me if I eat sugar I get hungry regardless of how much I eat, so cuting out as much sugar as possible is the way forward for me. I cook everything I did before just with spray oil and not half a loaf of bread when I make soup 😂 I really like the SW app, it helps me keep track of everything I'm eating and makes me mindful of what I'm shoving in my gob!

I’m another who cooked not takeaways and ready meals before sw. But yes too much white bread & butter, olive oil poured in, too many snacks. Used to enjoy home baking. Can take or leave alcohol fortunately.
They do seem to choose those I ate 3 takeaways and a 5 mars bar a day type posts for the womens magazine and press though.
People who like cooking seem to do well on sw is my experience.

I agree there is a lot of cooking on slimming world and I spend a lot of time balancing my meals with SS/Protein rather than calories. I'm writing everything down though so it will get easier. I'm in my fourth week and still trying to get my head around it all. Thanks for the inspirational posts. They help!

I use my syns for bread mostly. Healthy option b goes on weetabix. So I don't have any space for any more sugary treats. I think I am close to getting used to that!

Good luck it does get easier as you get going.
I like weetabix done as overnight weetabix with Greek yoghurt or skyr and fruit.
I try and not eat too much bread but do like a warburtons wholemeal pitta as a B choice.

It really does get easier, Kindle!

I've moved on to the 'knowing I've overdone it, so need a few speed days' stage of things, rather than accurate counting.
Basically it's bread or cereal or nuts. Normal food. A few syns as they are offered (cake at someone's house, ice cream on an outing). Cheese I tend to eat measured, as and when I fancy it if I haven't used it in a meal.

I did go to a group myself for a couple of years and it was depressing really, so and so has put on a pound because they ate a Wispa. Slimmer of the week pissed me off too. It was whoever lost the most lbs I once lost half a pound less than the slimmer of the week but they weighed more than double what I did so % I actually lost more. People were just obsessed and this nonsense about having to syn a banana because you mashed it. Stopped going in the end.

Thank you so much @Dixiechickonhols and @picklemewalnuts , that made my day. I am enjoying it really and I feel like I am going about things the way I should have always been doing it. I like my group and I am going to keep going because I do think it is beneficial!

I don't eat cheese! so the 2 healthy A options are wasted on me! I need to up my calcium in general so just have double milk!