How does Slimming World work if no calorie deficit??

[AlmostAlmondy]

I constantly see on here that weight loss can only be achieved in a calorie deficit - which makes absolute sense. But I've been doing SW for about six months now and have lost 2 stone, whilst eating FAR more than I was before. A third veg, definitely. But the pasta... I eat mountains of the stuff. Before anyone points out how bad this is - I know! My concept of portion control is out the window. But it actually bloody works. A lot better than strict calorie counting did before I resorted to this. And I don't understand how?!

I have friends who have been on and off this for over 8 years. They always manage to lose a substantial amount of weight but in the end it all goes back on. I think they enjoy the social aspect of it. I don’t think it teaches good eating habits, especially portion control.

If you follow it properly you are supposed to have at least a third of whatever meal you are eating be veg or salad or fruit which cuts down your calories. Also you can have loads of pasta or potato but are limited on the topping because of the syns (I love jacket potato but will eat a lot less if I can only have a small amount of butter and cheese for example). I don't follow the diet but can see how it works.

The social side of it makes me cringe,the thought of being weighed in public,no thanks! I just do it on line with the app,it's £3 a week which is a bargain imo.

They want you to put it back on because then their business survives!
do proper research on nutrition and stop eating shit if you want to lose weight.

I tried, for a very long time, to lose weight the "proper" way before resorting to SW. I was bloody miserable, kept going on massive binges due to hunger and never lost any weight.

I now eat really well - very little processed food, tonnes of fruit and veg. Loads of pasta as well, granted! But I never used to want to "waste" calories snacking on fruit so I'd pick those crappy low sugar cereal bars and work out how many I could eat in a day! But on SW I know I can eat fruit without counting anything. My diet is much healthier now.

Whether I pile it back on after reaching my target remains to be seen, but I fully intend to keep going to the group once a month to keep me on track (which doesn't cost anything). I am more than happy to eat this way for life, as I'm never hungry and irritable and I'm actually eating healthy food. And I am finally a healthy weight too.

I am going to count calories for a week as I'm interested to see how many I'm actually eating. All I know is that I no longer feel deprived and have finally lost weight

My friend does it, it’s lack of fat and sugar, the food is on the whole bland and tasteless in my opinion. That’s what causes calorie deficit. The reduction of fat and sugar v before. As you loose weight you will need less calories to maintain so the volume eating will need to reduce accordingly to continue to loose weight.

It is a calorie deficit

SW doesnt work for me because its premise is low fat but it works for many

People just need to find a way of eating that either is in calorie deficit (if they want to lose weight) or calorie balance (if they want to maintain weight)

So when people say 'it doesnt work when you stop' thats because the calorie balance isnt right, and thats the same for all weight loss systems or maintenance systems

Her food might taste bland ,sound like she isn't a great cook as there's no need for the food you eat while on SW to be bland/tasteless.

From personal experience I think you'll find the more weight you lose the more you are going to have to adjust your eating habits.

You'll get to a point where you'll plateau if you are eating huge amounts of pasta because you won't be able to get away with it when you lose more weight.

For me this is the part that SW didn't teach people, mainly because the consultants are just normal people and not qualified to understand. It didn't resolve my issues with overeating and I think that's why most people fail and put weight back on.

Also jumping on the mashed banana bandwagon I never understood why the muller light yogurt suddenly developed syns overnight or why a can of Strongbow dark fruit cider has less syns than an avocado but that's a whole new thread.

my mum has joined slimming world and has lost over 2 st, it’s the slimmest I’ve seen her ever. It does work and it keeps her motivated to eat healthier.

im presuming the mashed banana versus the whole banana is that it’s much easier to over eat mashed banana (a mashed banana probably doesn’t look much compared to a whole banana) due to portion control than it is to eat one whole banana.

yes fruit is the healthier option but over eating fruit isn’t good for you either.

The mashed banana thing is about over eating.

My gripe with SW is the encouragement to snack.
While people are on plan and its a healthy snack its fine. Once people stop following its very easy for those snacks to be crisps, chocolate, cake. And whoomp there's someone's calories bounce up very quickly.

I've tried a couple of groups and they seem to assume all anyone ever eats are fry-ups and full-fat chips.

But a few years ago I did loose a stone following the plan after going to one class and getting instructions on how to make fat free chips.

It has problems for sure.
The sw sausages have less syns than other sausages even though they are higher in cals and fat. Purely to get people to buy them.

Also I don't agree with unlimited low fat yogurt. It's full of crap. Full fat greek is much better for you. But you can't eat a whole pot of that.

When l did it 22 years ago. Syns were sins.

@WinterWitchy you're welcome!

I mean, I just eat a banana like most people but SW will definitely have you scratching your head around all this stuff

Tim Spector isn't without fault but at least it's science and makes sense

Before I say this, I am not a SW fan and it didn't work for me
BUT

the reason it works for a lot is your typical snacks(chocolate, crisps etc...) are high syns so you snack less.

There is only so much pasta you can eat at one sitting and if that's 1000kcal that's fine, because we have already cut snacking and I also believe SW allows 3 meals a day. I don't think you can just whip up a bowl of mashed potato as a snack. Even if you could you are less likely to do that than pick up a bag of crisps.

Also you are very conscious you are paying money and getting weighed each week which subconsciously make you more food aware.

The banana thing is that as soon as you mash, you start to use nutrients. Also fruit is very sugar heavy and where you might have 1 orange, you might use 6 to make fresh orange. You might have 1 banana but 2 plus other fruits in a smoothie. It is NOTHING to do with calories changing. It is all to do with the mental attitude of how blended fruit is seen.

ALL diets work by restricting what you can have so raising the likelihood of being in calorie deficit.

Still in a deficit. It’s far, far too low fat for me though and I’m forever starving on SW despite eating mountains of pasta and rice. I do my own version now whereby it’s the same but I don’t syn my full fat meat etc. I’ll also add olive oil for when I’m frying my chicken. I eat plenty really and combine it with a lot of exercise. Much more sustainable.

@Hecate01 I was a Slimming world member (former Miss Slinky and I still have the sash 😊) when they gave Muller light syns and I was under the impression that it was given a syn value to restrict the people taking the piss and eating 8 a day and wondering why they didn't lose weight.
I'm a big fan of the SW way. It's easy to follow (once you get your head around it) and you don't have to weigh everything. It has changed what the whole family eats

You almost certainly are in a calorie deficit - that's why you're losing weight.

The amount of calories you need each day will depend on your weight/height/age/activity level. So if you're larger/more active you may still be able to eat a surprisingly high number of calories and still be in a deficit.

I'm personally not a fan of SW for many reasons, not least that doesn't really teach portion control and allows for a very carb-heavy diet. That's why a lot of people stop losing weight on it after a certain point.

However, it does help people to choose healthier foods and preparation methods (e.g. swapping chips for boiled potatoes and snacking far less on chocolate bars, crisps etc.).

As others have said, if you work out your BMR and then weigh/track what you're eating over a month you'll see a deficit.

If you actually stick to the principles of slimming world (one is to never be hungry) you won't put it back on though.

People who put the weight back on do so because they stop following the plan.

Slimming world works because it is based on research and it encourages mostly healthy eating. Granted there was a period where it seemed to be promoting horribly processed fat-free yoghurts etc but it has moved away from that now.

@MovedonfromMartin if it was to stop people eating too many surely everything would have a syn value? You can overeat pasta, potatoes etc and they have a much higher calorie content than a muller yogurt.

I guess it's because it's more effort to cook a whole meal than to grab a ready to eat snack. Therefore you're more likely to have excessive yoghurts in a day, than excessive numbers of meals.

You aren't supposed to over eat pasta / potatoes / rice ,they are to be eaten as a meal and only make up a third of your meal ,of you follow that it's hard to over eat.

Agreed, it's about cutting out the easy to snack on stuff.

Same as bread is limited because its easy to munch loads of crusty bread without thinking about it. Where people are unlikely to over eat pasta or rice.

SW does work, but it works because you are in a calorie deficit. I've lost 2 stone on SW this year and have started tracking my calories in conjunction with the SW app this week as I'm finding the last stone tricky to lose and I've been in deficit every day so far (not gone over my syns). I think you just need to find a way that works for you, whatever that is. Some people find SW easier, some CC so you do what suits you. The whole banana debate is about overeating, so I think you have to use a bit of common sense; if I choose to mash a banana and put it with my yoghurt I'm not synning it as I feel that's ridiculous. If I was having 3 bananas half a punnet of strawberries, blackberries and milk in a smoothie obviously that's not going to be a calorie friendly option, so I would syn then.

Also, a smoothie probably contains milk, yoghurt, a big dollop bit of cream, some syrup...and then they'll have something to eat because they've 'only' had a drink with some fruit in it...