To hate slimming world?

[TOADfan]

My 3 best friends are on slimming world and I dont hear enough of how wonderful it is and today I went to doctors who instead of offering nutritional advice said "go to slimming world"

I dont get how anyone thinks it is healthy.

You can eat unlimited muller light yoghurts but only 225ml of milk
Unlimited pasta but no brown bread or wheat ceral (unless its an extra)
Unlimited fruit but an avacado is 16 syns!! (Yes high in fat but bloody good fat)
Not to mention smash, frylight, hi fi bars and chicken made with diet coke.

I get it works for people and yes there are good results but it does not make nutritional sense.

Am i the only one who doesnt understand it?

Nice to see a good discussion with a mixture of replies. I was ready for the YABU.

I think a lot of it does stem from seeing friend's now unhealthy relationship with food. 1 friend yes has stopped eating chocolate but is also skipping breakfast, if he is up late due to other choices not being slimming world friendly and another friend who has baked potatoes, pasta, benas for every meal.

I know i need to lose weight and i know what i should eat but i have a disfunctional relationship with food as it (i tend to skip meals etc) and i dont think slimming world would help me any.

I need to change my mind set and said to my doctor im considering hypnotherapy to be laughed at and told "do slimming world" doesnt help. Especially after my last doctor said im fat because i eat too much, when my real issue is skipping meals/eating cheap convenient food.

I really like My Fitness Pall because it helps me with portion control and making healthy choices regarding food and exercise.

But I have to say that it doesn't help if you need to eat more regularly. I need to eat 3 meals a day because of medicine so it does normalise my diet and works for me. I don'tknow which diet will help with that.

So he was 'eating healthily' before but clearly overweight?

You sound like you're a bit jealous they're actually doing something about it. I think it's normal to go a bit gung ho and strict with any regime when you first start it. SW certainly doesn't promote not eating breakfast and I know you don't believe it does.

I've lost 5.5 stone with SW but I'm a bugger for missing meals. I don't eat any extra or bigger portions when I do eat. I've always preferred grazing - eating little and often. I used to eat a little and often of less healthy foods though. Crisps & a dinky pork pie, toast with lots of butter etc. Now I graze on fruit, berries, crudités etc.

I use My Fitness Pal alongside SW. That way I can keep track of how much I'm eating as well.

I'm with Russell on this one...

I've come to the conclusion that diets just don't work. The only thing that will work is a complete overhaul of your eating habits. SW, WW etc have only ever caused me to have an unhealthy association/obsession with food - and the weight has never stayed off.

I see your POV but I think it's just a matter of horses for courses. I'm a huge advocate of the much-hated-on-MN Cambridge Wight Plan. I was always overweight (not massively, BMI perhaps 27) but then had my first two children and I was problematically large. I needed something easy and, because I'm quite an 'all or nothing' type, it worked wonders. Five stone came off (baby weight plus half a stone) and I kept it off. I then did it to lose subsequent baby weight after breastfeeding and it is always effective for me-I have kept the weight off for years and made a friend of my consultant. Every year I do two weeks after Christmas and two weeks before holidays and then work myself back through the steps. All of that said, I can see why others would say it was the work of the devil himself. For me though, my main concern is my health and I have a maintained BMI of 23.5/24. It changed my life and I expect there are many people who would say SW does the same

I've just joined slimming world online to try and help me kick start a healthier diet and cooking from scratch. I know nutritionally what I should be eating, but do I ever bother? no.

I'm in two minds about how it works. I can see easily how it does work and also how it won't work for people if they won't or don't bother to consider how healthy eating is properly balanced.

They do say you can have unlimited 'free' food, but that is mostly fruit, veg and protein. You can also eat pasta, rice, couscous etc but they do suggest you should be eating more 'speed food' which is the super healthy fruit/veg before anything else. I think it will work for many because they are now cooking properly and eating more fruit and veg. I think there are some people who will try to eat what they normally do on the 'plan' and absolutely carb load on pasta, rice and potatoes and that is probably a lack of teaching on the part of the (and I use this term VERY loosely) 'consultants' and a lack of understanding about carbohydrates and syns.

In basic terms though, I suspect not everyone understands the relationship between calories and what goes in vs what you expend out and so the healthy stuff vs syns stuff is just a simpler way of saying 'stop eating the crap!'.

I do wonder whether they have some sort of sponsorship deal with certain brands, as there are some that are 'free' and some that are 'syns' when they contain virtually the same amount of calories (muller light and onken fat free for example)

On my part I am making a conscious effort to not eat carbs at every meal and eat vegetarian or vegan 3/4 times a week as well and I want it to become habit for life rather than in three months time reach a certain weight and think hurrah pass me a bucket of gin and a 20" pizza.

SW is an overhaul of your eating habits! It's promoting eating mainly low GI vegetables and lean meat, and limiting 'treat' type foods. That's it. Clearly if you're fat you've not been doing it, which is why SW has the rules to follow.

Should also say, I'm actually a much bigger fan of the 5:2 fasting way of eating, it just suits me and has more health benefits for me personally.

It has exactly the same results as long as you are eating healthily in between as well. I lost 2 stone that way and haven't put it back on. Unfortunately at the moment I've got out of the habit of cooking and looking after myself properly, and so many people seem to have huge success on SW that I thought I would try it.

I have twice lost 3 stones, once with WW and once with SW each time the weight went back on a lot faster than it came off!

Of course they have sponsorship deals, as you will see in their magazines and website, but it's just as easy to find another brand. If a person can't be arsed finding an alternative to the advertised item then that's their lookout.

I've given up on it, I found it really hard going mentally.

The leaders do tend to bang on about muller lights constantly (at my group) and are just always constantly talking about finding ways to eat naughty things. The whole session is focused on making quite gross deserts for treats and rarely talks about cooking actual meals - I suppose that's why you are meant to buy the expensive cook books.

I follow it vaguely but don't attend the groups. And I hate muller lights

Slimming world encourages healthy eating if you do it right. I never have smash or any of that stuff, I wouldn't if I wasn't trying to eat healthily so I don't on SW.
IME SW gets in your head and you mostly follow it once no longer strictly following it which for me has led to a diet with lots of fruit and veg, often cooked from scratch, limited bread stc and lower fat but I still have treats and eat what I like. I have had gains and losses but am still around target after 2 years.

Felica are you a SW consultant by any chance? Your posts are very touchy verging on bitchy. Clap on the back that SW works for you but, whether you like it said or not, SW is a restrictive diet that does promote eating crap like Muller Lights which are full of additives and aspartame.

Slimming world makes me want to throw up in my own mouth!
Margret choo the fuck it diet is a good read on Google

What's wrong with fry light?

I am new to slimming world but i dont see it as a diet but a change in bad habits.

There is a lot of focus on fruit and veg. Which can only be a good thing.

"Am i the only one who doesnt understand it?"

The issue is that those things there that you've mentioned aren't how it works...so, um, yes you don't understand it.

It makes perfect nutritional sense, it's a low calorie, low fat eating plan.

1/3 of every portion should be very low calorie veg or fruit...and you're supposed to eat until you're comfortably full. So it's not unlimited pasta, it's 1/3 of a plate of veg, preferably some sort of protein and your carbs, until you're full, paying attention to you being full and the veg control the portion size.

Muller lights are only unlimited if they're of a similar calorie content (and fat and sugar) as plain zero fat yoghurt and fruit - and technically they're not unlimited as again, you ideally want to be having something with it (fruits like raspberries or melon rather than veg) and again paying attention to how much actually satisfies you.

Smash is rank and easily avoided, but if you want to eat that instead of actual potatoes, again, it's similar in calorie content to potatoes and part of a filling meal.

Oh and it'd work fine for you because you can't skip meals and eat junk very well while you're following it, I know that because that was why I was overweight.

The basis of it is that you're eating lean protein, fresh fruit, veg and carbs then limited amounts of bread, milk or cheese and small amounts of the high calorie not filling stuff.

Richie Howey is really good, he has a great facebook page and posted a video about why SW works, and also why it's not a long term option.

There was loads of drama after he posted it though from SW followers, even though he wasn't really having a dig as such, just pointing out factual information.

It was all prompted after someone asked him if it was true a mashed banana had more calories than an in,ashes banana. Because a SW consultant had advised it did.

Lots of funny memes re deep throatung bananas followed. It was pretty hilarious!

"I do wonder whether they have some sort of sponsorship deal with certain brands, as there are some that are 'free' and some that are 'syns' when they contain virtually the same amount of calories (muller light and onken fat free for example)"

Onken has more calories per 100g and about twice as much sugar as muller lights.

Other brands and some supermarket own flavoured yoghurts don't have syns though.

It's a lucrative business, if it actually worked there would be no money in it and everyone would be slim with a healthy bmi.
They want to keep you fat! Simple as. It does work-short term, like all diets. But the majority of people will gain the weight back.
Everyone raves about slimming world to begin with, then they're there again 3 years down the line.

Toad, try a Paul McKenna gastric band cd from amazon ( other hypnosis CDs are available) it will only set you back a tenner. It is very relaxing if nothing else.
Many years ago I lost 3 stone on the ww old pp plan, I worked permanent nights and used to use my points allowance over the week rather than daily as it was easier. Several times, in fact many many times if I am to be truthful, I ate my ENTIRE weekly points for the week over weekend night shifts purely in chocolate out the vending machine. I think it worked out to be something like 8 Kitkat chunkies fri, sat and sun night, each shift. I used to eat free foods the rest of the week to compensate , egg whites omelettes with mushrooms, veg curry and soup , a lot of fucking soup
I lost 8lb one week!

I am obviously not advocating the above I just wanted to give you a sort of high 5? as I understand disorderd eating and I know it's hard. You will find 'something' that works for you I'm sure, but it wouldn't hurt to just pick a random diet club and follow the plan for say 6 weeks as a trial so you can then says it's shit from a place of first hand knowledge and experience.

I think it can be really great if you're a ten tonne tessy and you've got a few stone to shift.

I know what a healthy diet looks like though. I don't need to pay £4.95 a week to be told that a third of each meal should be greens and sugar is bad and I object to anything that lists avocado as "bad".

The problem with any weight loss plan comes if people let their old habits come back when they have lost the weight.

I lost 4 stone with MFP and then became complacent and put a stone back on. That doesn't mean MFP isn't a good option and one that works for many people it just wasn't a way I could eat long term.

Likewise with SW - I joined after putting that stone on and have lost 4 stone with them, 7 in total. I have been at target for a year now however I still follow the basic SW idea, I still go to group - it's free as a target member anyway - so this time round I have made the changes which are long term sustainable. Not just foodwise but exercise and general lifestyle.

It won't work for everyone. Nothing like that will but it does work for many IF you really do want to do the change for the long term.