Losing weight

jfoster1968

I need suggestions.. I like to have a glass or two of wine at night and I really think this is my barrier from losing weigth.. does any one have any suggestions or substitutions that they have used..

kshama2001

I did WW back in the 90s and seeing how many empty calories were in wine was eye opening.

I'm not saying your 1-2 glasses of wine constitutes problem drinking, but my alcohol consumption definitely was. One meeting each of Smart Recovery and Rational Recovery (now defunct) helped me stop self-soothing with alcohol. I also started yoga about that time.

I'd recommend yoga or tai chi or a warm bath or something similarly soothing at night.

Rockmama1111

I had to just break the habit of having daily cocktail hour at home. No substitution for me; there is none. Drinking a seltzer water with a squeeze of lime still felt like me not getting my wine. Now I only drink when I’m out for an occasion.

Hiawassee88

jfoster1968 wrote: »

I need suggestions.. I like to have a glass or two of wine at night and I really think this is my barrier from losing weigth.. does any one have any suggestions or substitutions that they have used..

AnnPT77

jfoster1968 wrote: »

I need suggestions.. I like to have a glass or two of wine at night and I really think this is my barrier from losing weigth.. does any one have any suggestions or substitutions that they have used..

Some people say drinking alcohol was a barrier to weight loss for them. I don't question other people's self-perception. I drank some alcohol while losing weight, and drink it a little more frequently in maintenance (but not daily).

For me, weight management works out about the same whether I consume alcohol or don't, in a context of moderate alcohol intake. What matters is accounting for the calories in the drink, whatever it is.

Two glasses of wine per day, every or most days, is somewhat beyond moderate. That's true even if the wine is an official serving size, around 5 ounces (147 ml) . . . and most people serve more than that per glass. I'm not saying 2 drinks per day is "alcoholic" or necessarily "problem drinking", but just that it's "more than moderate".

Moderation recommendations for women tend to be one serving of alcohol per day, or less . . . and that's talking about that standard serving size. That's about health, more than about calories. Health is important, right?

For weight management, the calories matter. Some people find that drinking alcohol reduces their self-discipline, so they can't stick with a calorie goal, or they forget to log foods, so they go over calorie goal without really realizing. Some people find that regularly drinking alcohol makes them a little draggy, and even relatively small decreases in daily life activity can make it harder to lose weight, because we burn fewer calories than we otherwise might, if we spent those calories on good nutrition instead of on alcohol. Alcoholic drinks tend to not be very filling, so reduced calories with relatively more alcohol can be tougher to stick with, too.

Ultimately, you'll need to decide what's best for you. If the habit of the wine or the taste of the wine is important to you, you could consider no-alcohol wine. If the buzz is important . . . well, exercise-triggered endrophins are a little buzzy, but that usually requires relatively intense exercise, a thing a person ideally needs to work up to gradually. (In the short run, even milder exercise can be a distraction or a stress-reducer, so helpful in other ways with reducing alcohol use.) In some place, there are other buzzy options that may or may not be great for health in other ways, but we don't talk about those here.

There are also "mocktails" that are getting pretty popular, kind of fancy non-alcoholic drinks that some people enjoy. There are lots of recipes online. Some are high-calorie (usually from caloric sweeteners) but not all. Toward the end of this thread, there's quite a lot of sharing of ideas for non-alcoholic or low-alcohol drinks, even though it wasn't the official thread topic:

https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10627133/dry-january/p1

All of this is your call, right? We're not the boss of you, can't tell you what you should do. You will need to decide what constitutes a happy life for you, and that's very individual.

If you want to reduce your alcohol consumption, but not give it up altogether, there's a thread here where people support each other in doing that:

https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10885242/less-alcohol-march-2023-one-day-at-a-time#latest

They start a new thread each month, so if this sits for a few days, you may want to look for the April one (or whatever is current) in this area:

https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/categories/motivation-and-support

There have also been some full-sobriety threads or groups here, for people who want to stop drinking alcohol entirely, which is also a reasonable option. Maybe someone else will know a good, active one of those, but with apologies, I don't.

Wishing you the best with sorting out what's right for you!

paperpudding

Drinking wine in itself will nto stop you losing weight.

My father drinks a glass or two every night and is skinny as a rake, has been all his life.

yes his drinking is probably 'more than moderate' too, but hey, he is 83, so what the heck

I am presuming you are not 83 yrs old so perhaps heeding alcohol recomendations is more important for you

From a purely weight loss point of view, your choices are - drinks something with less calories or cut calories from somewhere else to make it fit

Like anything not so nutritious that people are cutting elsewhere to make it fit - don't over do this and cut too much nutrition from your day to fit in wine (chocolate, candy, cake - any other not so nutritrious treat)

Sinisterbarbie1

I think people know themselves and have a sense of what their weight loss barriers are, so if OP is saying that they want to cut out the daily wine drinking, I don’t think we should be talking them out of it. For one thing the health recommendations have recently been revised to suggest that no amount of alcohol is heathy for anyone, but that certain very low level consumption at the level of 1-2 drinks a week (not a night) is in the low risk category. Yes, we can all cite all sorts of anecdotal stories about parents and grandparents living to 100 drinking every day, but we can also all cite equal anecdotal stories of people with alcohol use disorders that were hidden or not so well hidden and who died prematurely in various tragic ways. But that is neither here nor there and it is not the OP’s question….

I wasn’t so interested in the buzz from alcohol as the ritual. But you do get used to what alcohol tastes like over the years so I would caution not to expect anything you drink as a substitute to have the mouth feel or bite of an alcoholic beverage. If you are a daily drinker you will likely be most disappointed when trying to replace one for one the beverage you consume most regularly. So if you are a wine drinker and can stomach beer maybe try NA beer - there are many. Or mocktails or the various “adaptogenic” beverages being offered to adults as alcohol alternatives. A good website to explore is https://thezeroproof.com/ they have all manner of alcohol alternatives and I have enjoyed everything I have ordered from them.

If you are willing to try beverages that have some of the properties of wine - meaning they have somewhat complex flavors and aromas and are intended to be consumed with food from nice stemware, and come in wine bottles - you might try some offerings from companies like proxies that don’t pretend to be wine at all (mostly based on tea or verjus) or some of the dealchaholized wines from companies like Lietz. Sparkling NA beverages are usually more convincing substitutions than their still counterparts because of the increased sugar and the lift from the effervescence. A lot of these beverages are as expensive or more expensive than an average bottle of wine - $20-35. I find the stuff in grocery stores absolutely undrinkable in an actively bad tasting way (not just a doesn’t taste like wine way). Calorie wise these beverages have less than 1/2 -1/3 the calories of wine and now that I have been drinking them for several years I think I would actually prefer them over wine. I was at a performance at the symphony the other night and got a whiff of someone’s cheap white wine and it smelled so acrid and alcoholic with almost gasoline elements to it I think I would choke rather than drink (at least that) wine. I would never in a million years thought I would say this a few years ago, and I still have a huge wine collection in my home I have to give away or sell.

I wish you luck in all your health efforts!

lynn_glenmont

If you want something similar to wine but lower calorie, perhaps fruit-infused water (still or sparkling, as you prefer). You can infuse them yourself or buy commercially flavored water.

If you just want something to drink but it doesn't have to be anything like wine, maybe tea or tisanes or herbal blends, which come in a wide variety of flavors, and can generally be drunk either hot or cold.

Bonus: pretty much all of these options should save you at least $10 a week compared to wine, and possibly substantially more depending on what kind of wine you're buying.

neanderthin

There's no reason why you can't, just work it into your calorie regime. It's easier than potato chips. Cheers

AnnPT77

neanderthin wrote: »

There's no reason why you can't, just work it into your calorie regime. It's easier than potato chips. Cheers

True, strictly speaking.

But realistically, 2 glasses of wine daily - even at the 5 ounce pour - is going to be a meaningful chunk of the average woman's calorie goal, when at even a reasonably moderate deficit. It will be a challenge to get optimal - maybe even adequate? - nutrition, and may be a challenge for satiety.

Only OP knows the impact with certainty, though; and it's her tradeoff to make.

neanderthin

AnnPT77 wrote: »

neanderthin wrote: »

There's no reason why you can't, just work it into your calorie regime. It's easier than potato chips. Cheers

True, strictly speaking.

But realistically, 2 glasses of wine daily - even at the 5 ounce pour - is going to be a meaningful chunk of the average woman's calorie goal, when at even a reasonably moderate deficit. It will be a challenge to get optimal - maybe even adequate? - nutrition, and may be a challenge for satiety.

Only OP knows the impact with certainty, though; and it's her tradeoff to make.

Yes, the OP will need to figure it out.

LindaMarieFG

Sometimes drinking a glass of wine after a long day to relax becomes a habit. Its not so much about the wine. I find relaxing with a glass of tea or maybe a non acholic low calorie drink works just as well.

hoodlisa1979

Fellow wine lover here, my suggestion is don't drink it, I was having 110+ units a week and come 6pm my wine was open, it was my way to unwind but drinking heavily caused me to have high blood pressure, now I just have some at the weekend, I factor it in my calories and I'm 20lb down now and on week 10, yes I do miss it some evenings but it passes. Good luck, I'm sure you will decide whats best for you & what fits

laurenthecarts

I feel you! I cut back last month as a step towards the weight loss (before opting to use mfp religiously, which I've been back on for about a week.)

I tend to drink both out of boredom and work stresses. So first steps have been no drinking on a 'school night' - I busied myself with puzzles (surprisingly enjoyable even in your 30s 😅), video games, housework and painting. Things to keep my hands and mind busy - whilst continuously having a warm cup of tea on tap. I cut back a fair bit, though for weight loss it wasn't a huge success.

Now I'm back on mfp, religiously weighing and tracking everything and I already know that my weigh in tomorrow after week 1 is gonna be ace! Weight loss wise, a calorie is a calorie, so I can still factor in the treats when I want, but obviously knowing the exact calories has made me make better choices and most days I'd prefer food over empty calories.

I personally am more likely to have a bottle than a glass, which then leads to being more inclined to snack through the hangovers and be less lethargic. So for me, I know I need to take care in limiting the occasions where I do indulge - cuz it's not just that one day I need to be mindful of the cals! As diet-time goes on, gonna need some new puzzles I think 😅

Good luck though! Not a huge amount of advice there, but hope it helps knowing you're not alone! Dog of a habit to get out of for sure!

neanderthin

It probably comes down to someone's individual lifestyle and health. If someone is obese, insulin resistant has high blood pressure and other comorbidities, it generally comes down to the types of foods they eat and lifestyle factors which pretty much describes the USA/Canada/UK/Australian demographic. I suspect how they view and participate in alcohol will be quite different than other societies and more than likely looked as a detriment to overall health, which is not surprising considering the reductionist view on health and health care. If we look at blue zone's and the Mediterranean demographic, red wine is intrinsically linked to longevity and good health. imo. Cheers.

tomcustombuilder

If it's just a habit, try putting some sort of flavored sparkling water in your wine glass. It's a good placebo as sometimes it isn't the wine that's the focus but the ritual of having that wine glass in your hand at night. Anecdotally, it worked for me.

BlessedGirl0607

@ jfoster1968 there is nothing wrong with the little glass of wine that your drinking . My grandmother had a glass like that every night she lived to 97 .
As far for a possibility weight loss block I definitely can relate with flavored coffee and any type of fluids. So with that I cut down big time. Im extremely proud of you for you are noticing and aware of possible changes in diet tune up as I call them . That’s the whole beauty of the real genuine weight loss journey that your weight will stay off. And I’m speaking from experience and the heart of a proud food addiction survivor.
You Got This !

sarahq81

When I’m trying to lose a few pounds I don’t buy full sized bottles of wine. Just buy one of those miniature bottles or 1-2 tins of slimline gin and tonic/hard seltzer. Then try to have it twice a week instead of every night, sit down and enjoy the treat!
I sympathise - I slipped up today and had a couple of glasses of Prosecco with family, but I chose those because at least they are small compared to a 250ml large glass of wine!