Any Weight Watchers Out There?

i have not done weight watchers, but i think its one of the programs that works provided you treat it as a lifestyle and not a short term "diet" From what i can tell, they teach portion control and how to balance your nutritional needs. This is a good thing if you can incorporate what they teach you to become life long habits.

I tried ww in 2009 and I hated it. They had me on basically 1200 calories a day and told me I couldn't eat back my workout points because I was working out before I started ww (i was running 3 miles a day). Obviously I lost weight but I was starving all the time, when I went to the meeting leader with my problems she told me it was because I was eating the wrong foods. I needed to stick to only whole foods and ww products.
I will never pay for a service like that again.

I like it - I really like the focus on healthy eating. I have an amazing leader too. My biggest issue is their database is so limited that it makes logging difficult and then I don't and then I eat too much and gain weight! But if you're eating the foods they emphasize that won't be an issue.

I realize this is a huge rant, but I just quit WW for the second time, yesterday and have a lot to get off my chest.

TL/DR: WW has changed a bit, while encouraging healthier lifestyles, the diet itself felt like, well, a diet. It was inflexible, low calorie, and unsustainable. There are also a lot of weird technical problems that are taking some time to fix.

Several years ago I started weight watchers then switched to MFP because it was free. Even though I was on WW and MFP for roughly equal amounts of time, I lost most of my weight from MFP. I never had much to lose and unapologetically eat a high fat diet, so WW was difficult to say the least.

I had a rough summer and gained some weight back. I tried off and on to track calories, but I just had no motivation. I joined WW in January because I figured that paying for it would motivate me. It was a disaster.

WW has recently redesigned their program to help "nudge" people into eating healthy by making lean proteins low in points, fats high in points, and sugars (not including the free fruit), extremely high in points. In the end, this did not work for me, though I did like how they tried to get people away from sugary snacks.

During the two months I was on WW, I dont remember a single day where I was not ravenous. I would keep vegetables and fruit around the house and fill my stomach up with fiber, but would still want to eat the entire fridge. When I went out for runs, my legs felt deadened, like they had already exercised that day. My alcohol consumption went up because when I wanted a treat, a glass of wine was 4 points compared to a tiny cookie which was 5 points (unholy trio of butter, sugar, and flour), and what a rush that wine gave! When I would add up my daily calories it would be between 1000 and 1200 calories with the days where I "lost control" and ate through my dailies, weeklies, fitpoints, plus more, about 1800-2000.

I kept fantasizing about the foods I would eat when I switched back over to MFP. Then I started making my own rules. I could pay 2 (of my allotted 30), for 30 calories of butter or maybe condiments under 30 shouldn’t count as points. Since sugary foods are so expensive, maybe counting that Hershey kiss as half a Hershey kiss to bring it in line with its caloric value. A couple weeks ago I stopped tracking binges, then I stopped tracking altogether. Since the only reason I joined WW was to motivate me to track, I figured I should call it quits before I completely lose momentum.

Last time I lost weight, I lost at a rate between a quarter and half pound a week, it was agonizingly slow, but, I didn’t start to gain any of that back for well over 3 years. As someone who did not have much to lose, it was sustainable. The last 2 months, I lost at a rate of a pound a week. I was hangry, and spent way too much time thinking about the things I would stuff my face with once I was off WW.

Given several months, I probably might have adapted my tastebuds and stomach to a high protein, low carb, low fat diet. I would have taken multivitamins to make up for the low calories. I would have resigned myself not eating cake ever again. But there have been technical issues as well. The new plan came with a new site that is non-intuitive and full of bugs. Personal recipes aren’t searchable. If you have something favorited, it doesn’t just show up when you type it in, you need to go to the favorite section to select it. To make my exercise “count” I need to manually enter that I walked 3000 steps that day. On top of all this, the android phone app rarely works. This is unacceptable for a service that I am paying monthly for.

TL/DR: WW has changed a bit, while encouraging healthier lifestyles, the diet itself felt like, well a diet. It was inflexible, low calorie, and unsustainable. There are also a lot of weird technical problems that are taking some time to fix.

I am doing WW again for the second time. I did it back in 2010 (Momentum Plan) and lost weight. The plan changed to Points Plus and I gained some weight. I got really frustrated with it, tried to do a mix and match of Momentum and PP and ended up stalling. Then I just quit altogether. Six years, a marriage and two pregnancies later, I'm back on WW. I really love the Smart Points plan. It focuses on healthy eating. The prior plans focused on fiber. So, you could eat a lot of processed foods for very few points. Now, most of the time, the more processed the food, the more points it will have.

The new plan also steers you toward lean proteins (those are the lowest points foods other than fruits and veggies). I really like that. Protein and veggies are so filling that I rarely feel hungry on this plan. I distinctly remember always being hungry on Momentum.

I like MFP for a number of reasons. One big thing for me is that I'm a type 1 diabetic, so I need carb counts. I can't get those on WW. But, I always find it harder to count calories than points. Maybe it's the lower numbers, maybe it's that I hate the thought of dieting and counting calories feels like dieting. I'm not sure.

Good luck with WW and/or MFP. Feel free to add me!

Hi,
I also just joined WWW, b/c I feel I need help w/ boundaries. I need something that will keep me in check. So, we'll see what happens...

WW has always worked for me in the past. I took a long break and relied solely on MFP. Ever since I joined MFP, I don't know what it is about it but I haven't had a whole lot of luck. I have pretty much bounced up and down the same 5 pounds. I've tried more calories, less calories, carb cycling, you name it. I think one of my biggest issues is my weekends because we eat out quite a bit. I feel like WW will help reign all of that in a little more for me plus actually paying for a service will give me a greater incentive to stick with it. I've actually been eating pretty close to Smart Points for awhile now aside from the weekend splurges so this isn't not a huge change for me. I'm excited to see if it actually helps! Also, although it's a bit extra work I log my food in both programs to keep an eye on my daily calories for curiosity sake and also I enjoy the community better here than on WW.