Weightwatchers - is this right?

[Postagestamppat]

I have just joined weight watchers. I have just realised that my breakfast porridge with almond milk comes in at 8 points, 3 of which were from the almond milk (76 calories). That is a grand total of 276 calories, which is just under a third of my total of 30 points!!!! Of course I am going to lose weight if I am consuming less than 1000 calories a day - which is stupidly low amount of calories to eat in one day.

I did weight watchers about 5 years ago. Really liked it and lost weight. I don't remember it being this restrictive. I can understand higher fat and unhealthy food being given higher points, but porridge and almond milk! Have I missed something?

1000 cals is restrictive and not enough.

If its the plan with the free fruit I'd add that to your breakfast. If you have to have porridge in the morning make it with water to save points and cals and maybe add cinnamon as it helps regulate blood sugar. I have never understood the free fruit thing though.

Alternatively just look at their sugesstions for breakfasts and keep experimenting until you find something else that fills you up. Lots of people I know who did Ww insist on eating eggs for breakfast but I never fancy them first thing.

Weight watchers works now by restricting sugars and encouraging proteins rather than calories so you could actually have a higher calorie breakfast for less points. The almond milk will contain natural sugars that are bumping your points up and effectively (nice as it is) is a waste of your points. Have a look at low point breakfast suggestions on the website - you could have a full English for less points!

Thanks for the explanation Katurah. Unfortunately I am sodding weight watchers due to high cholesterol. Despite having a healthy bmi the doctor looked me up and down and noted that there was weight that could be lost . So I have cut down on red meat and diary products. I can see how that will result in my weight watchers points being higher if I am including more fibre-rich foods into my diet at the expense of higher protein foods that I would have happily eaten before. Maybe I will have to investigate chicken sausages!

Are you using sweetened almond milk? (going by the cals which would be over 1/2 a litres worth of unsweetened, which seems a lot for porridge!). Unsweetened might be a bit less points.

I think the points get lower for less sugar and more protein so as oats are quite carby, less proteiny they will be higher than say eggs (just as an example, I'm not sure where eggs are re cholesterol nowadays so not saying you have to eat eggs) or something.

Actually, after finding out that my "healthy" breakfast was nearly a third of my daily points I went to myfitnesspal and it is so much easier.

With weight watchers, as I have discovered, they assign points based on nutritional content and I am certain a fair bit of rounding up goes on. Then there are the points for activity and points saved for emergencies/festivities (?!). And would I be right in assuming that they assume you do literally no movement, unless you log it - therefore, reducing your points even further. All too complicated for me to work out. Myfitnesspal automatically adjusts my daily calories after I have logged my exercise. Wish I hadn't paid for weight watchers now.

Then there are the points for activity and points saved for emergencies/festivities ...are you referring to the weekly points? these are to be eaten/used up through the week, I think at some meetings they do talk about using or saving your weekly points if you have a special event coming up.

You can also log your exercise with WW and while they seem to encourage not to use your activity points, it is not actually a problem if you need to.

So pretty much every day I would go over my daily allowance, especially if I had exercised (I would have passed out otherwise...) and I still managed to lose a substantial amount of weight and get fit.

I am the opposite to you and did not get on with MFP, I preferred the speed on not having to log the food that I ate on WW that was 0 points...each to their own though.

The jury is out for me on Almond milk at the moment, if you read the ingredients only a very low percentage of the milk contains almonds...and rice seems to feature heavily. Eating too much rice seems to to be a 'thing' at the moment as it can apparently (please don't go all 'evidence please' on me as I am only just looking into this myself) cause us to ingest levels of arsenic that are dangerously high. And breath. But yes, almond milk scores staggeringly high on the WW point list, especially if you add some frozen berries, oats and chia seeds!