To ask how does slimming world work?

[MoonStar07]

I'm thinking of joining but seems too good to be true. I've dieted successfully in the past, basically I've cut out refined carbs. I've still had whole grains and stuck to small portions of carbs and had plenty of protein and veg. Once a week I allowed myself a national trust cream tea lol! I lost pretty much 20kgs doing that! Now it's slowly creeping back on going back to old habits and overeating and large portions. Help! Lots of people say slimming world is ace!

I love it!! I also thought it was too good to be true but I have lost 1st 5lb in 5 weeks. I don't know how it works! It's some sort of voodoo magic if you stick to the plan the results can be amazing..I love looking on the fb pages & Instagram at people's journeys for motivation

There is a whole topic devoted to Slimming World you know...

Personally I like SW, it works if you stick to it. I have done it lots of times and do lose weight, my problem is sticking to it. I have a bad week, put weight on, think...oh I won't go this week, I'll wait till I've lost this bit of weight etc etc and its a slippery slope back to fatness.

You get free food such as fruit veg salad pasta rice meat and/or fish

You get 2 heathy extras HEA which dairy based, HEB which is fibre based (or the other way round)

Then you get 15 syns a day.

You have as much free food as you like, 1 HEA, 1HEB and then 15 syns.

Within the free food is speed food which speeds up weight loss and you should have 1/3 of your meal made up of speed food then the rest made up of other free food, HEA, HEB or syns.

I am a big fan of slimming world and still follow it now while I'm pregnant. It works by keeping you full on nutrient dense, filling foods rather than chocolate, crisps etc which are allowed in limited amounts. Foods such as pasta, rice etc are 'free' so you can eat as much of them as you want.

It's just basically heathy eating. Eating the foods low in calories but fill you up, and limiting the foods which don't fill you up but is high in calories.

I do think sometimes it needs tweaking, for example I stayed the same for ages, then I cut out bread rice and pasta and my weight loss kick started again. So for me, even though SW allows it carbs don't really work for me

You're best off going to a new member talk and hearing a consultant talk you through the plan

Slimming world is great I've lost 3stone so far 2 more to go.

Good points-

You can eat a lot and still lose weight
No weighing or measuring
Very healthy as majority of food is cook from scratch

Bad points-

Doesn't address psychological issues around food
Doesn't teach portion controlling (but be sensible you not going to lose loads if you eat ridiculous amounts!)
Does push sweetners, muller lights, low fat stuff but you don't have to eat it just have full fat and use syns.
Sometimes the group meeting is a bit cringey!

I feel it works for me as its a lifestyle change rather than a diet.

It works because their research has shown that we generally eat the same volume of food each day.

If you make sure most of that food is low energy density (ie free foods) you eat fewer calories and lose weight.

You have to eat a third of the volume of superfree food (mostly fruit, veg and salad) and drink plenty of water. You are also supposed to eat to stop feeling hungry not stuff yourself silly or binge on free foods.

It's not within the spirit of the plan to eat an enormous mound of pasta with no veg/salad or 10 jacket potatoes for example, so if you did this you might not lose weight.

But you can have a big jacket potato with unlimited tuna and fat free cottage cheese and salad which would be a good filling meal for not that many calories.

Thanks guys that gives me a good
Idea! I will track down the topic. Wow well done to those who have lost weight. I need to understand my psychological reasons behind overeating. I can't seem to control
It. I crave sugary foods a lot too. Feel such a failure if I was to regain all this weight I've lost

I do find it is good and it does work but you need to be organised.

It's really good - I've lost 2 stones and have been at target 6 months Ish .
I Wd avoid Muller lights etc as full of sweetners .
I eat some good fats such as advocado n nut s as I think they are good for you - I just syn them .
At first I did get really angry as I missed my prev diet of cheeses and wine !
There is a useful Facebook page !

I find the weight loss very slow with me, but I'm 5'2".

It didn't work for me at all, and yes I did it properly and yes I tried several times. WW is just as useless.

It's bollocks IMO. It demonises healthy fat-rich foods like avocado whilst encouraging you to eat limitless amounts of artificial sweetener laden crap like Mullerlights, which I think may breach trades descriptions laws by passing themselves off as food. It does nothing to address portion control and emotional eating which were my main issues.

Save yourself the money and the heartache, spend a fiver on the virtual gastric band app, eat real food and learn to listen to your body. I'm 4.5st down and counting using that.

You don't need to follow it to the letter though. Some people seem to think it is a magic spell where it doesn't work if you don't have exactly the right kind of yogurt etc, whereas it is just a way of reducing calorie intake.

I always had full fat cottage cheese or Greek yogurt, probably 2 or 3 times more dairy than 'allowed', never had muller lights or mugshots and still lost weight - the only thing I restricted was white bread, fat in cooking and stuff that is synned like choc, booze and other treats.

But I didn't eat massive SW style portions though - all their recipes the portions were far too big, so swings and roundabouts.

I like it because there is loads you can eat and don't need to weigh and measure and it is easy to adapt normal food - just cook without fat.

Other main downside not mentioned yet is that it is very difficult to get low syn food out for quick lunches etc. Restaurants OK because you can get meat or fish with plain veg, but there is very little low syn from sandwich shops, supermarkets etc unless you buy plain meat, fruit and salad and just eat it like that - most prepared sandwiches and salads etc very high in syns. You really need to be on cooked from scratch home made food, which isn't always practical.