Why I left Weight Watchers new "Freestyle" Program
Replies
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The UK also has a petition that started before the one in the US. Freestyle does not work for a lot of people so don't feel bad if it did not work for you.
https://www.thepetitionsite.com/432/867/993/smart-points-to-be-re-added-as-an-additional-option/1 -
I joined WW on Jan7! because I wanted to eat more carbs . I also logged the free foods . I stayed within my point range , exercised, drank
the water and did not use all of the weekly points. I lost 0 . I was afraid it would not work for me . I am giving it one more week but am also logging everything on MFP and eating within their mscro suggestions .Bummet
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I am a WW member, and I use both MFP and WW app to ensure that even on free foods I am not over indulging - its pretty easy to do it that way - and for me personally I enjoy weight watchers so I am clearly bias here
I think the new flex system is aiming to encourage people to eat better and more nutritious meals - I get that WW is about flexibility and 'eating what you want', in a way, but you see a lot of people on connect still eating pretty nutritionally poor meals.
By 0 pointing fish/chicken/egg and all veggies people can technically eat more and feel fuller on fewer calories. Thats what I have found anyway.
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Hello to all ex-WW people. Welcome to MFP.5
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I am a WW lifetime member from years ago, losing my weight back when the plan counted food exchanges. I also did well with the points system in the early 2000s (winning points? Flex points?) . Once they started putting what I call a "sin tax" on certain foods, the plan stopped being right for me. I attempted the new Freestyle program, but the daily points dropped so far that the penalty points were even more noticeable. I really liked WW at one time, but calorie counting suits me much better at this point in my life and MFP has so many inspiring success stories!3
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I quit WW after the switch from momentum (in which the app let us track everything) to Points Plus where fruits first became free. I had lost weight on momentum but the free fruits caused me to start regaining. Myself and many others quit after that change. And even our leader left! That is when we jumped the shark6
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I’m confused. The zero
Point food list basically has everything i eat on it. So is the new goal not to eat any points? Because i would consistently be at zero. And those foods aren’t zero calorie so how would you know if you are at a calorie deficit? Granted, I’ve never done ww but...3 -
angiemann2007 wrote: »I’m confused. The zero
Point food list basically has everything i eat on it. So is the new goal not to eat any points? Because i would consistently be at zero. And those foods aren’t zero calorie so how would you know if you are at a calorie deficit? Granted, I’ve never done ww but...
I actually know several women who have made that their goal. It seems their zero points protein portions have also doubled when they share their meals with me.3 -
angiemann2007 wrote: »I’m confused. The zero
Point food list basically has everything i eat on it. So is the new goal not to eat any points? Because i would consistently be at zero. And those foods aren’t zero calorie so how would you know if you are at a calorie deficit? Granted, I’ve never done ww but...
That is part of the problem. People are eating too much of the zero point foods and inadvertently gaining weight.
The other problem is if you don't eat a lot of the zero point foods then you end up starving, because you have to skip a meal in order to not go over 23 points for the day.2 -
I am a WW lifetime member from years ago, losing my weight back when the plan counted food exchanges. I also did well with the points system in the early 2000s (winning points? Flex points?) . Once they started putting what I call a "sin tax" on certain foods, the plan stopped being right for me. I attempted the new Freestyle program, but the daily points dropped so far that the penalty points were even more noticeable. I really liked WW at one time, but calorie counting suits me much better at this point in my life and MFP has so many inspiring success stories!
I did it with the Flex Points. They worked okay for me except I kept concentrating on low points foods rather than making sure I got enough protein and carbs2 -
Hi - Just leaving WW myself, tired of plan changing constantly having to readjust. I actually like the "foundation" of freestyle, but not logging or tracking ZERO food is not realistic. Going to give calorie counting a chance. Done giving WW $$ - my health app would not sync, not very motivating to exercise and have to hit "sync now" and nothing syncs!!4
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How can bananas be 0 points?? I buy these big bananas that are each 200 calories. I can eat 5 bananas no problem. That's 1,000 calories or almost 65% of my daily calories. I also used to binge on grapes, cherries, and apples when I was gaining weight.
It is only since joining MFP that I realized that eating so many bananas, apples, watermelon, grapes, etc each day was adding calories. I assumed because they were healthy I couldn't get fat on them.9 -
Exactly..... they should rename it Weight Watchers Free-For-All plan5
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WW is just a glorified way to count calories!2
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Tacklewasher wrote: »Nony_Mouse wrote: »"The list" https://www.weightwatchers.com/us/sites/default/files/freestyle_zero_points_foods.pdf
I just bought a kg of cherries. I assure you, I can eat a kg of cherries in a day no problems (I have to have a little bowl to put the pits in to count later, b/c I will just grab a few every time I wander past). That's 500 calories right there.
I have a cherry tree in the backyard that s stupid with the amounts of cherries it produces. So I have bags with ~3kg in them frozen in the freezer. I've got no problem thawing and eating one of those. It doesn't fit my calories, but no way could I consider cherries non-calorie.
Or apples. I noticed they are listed too.0 -
Ryansworld84 wrote: »WW is just a glorified way to count calories!
Not with the new program. They don't have so much to track now. Free foods.2 -
Ryansworld84 wrote: »WW is just a glorified way to count calories!
Not with the new program. They don't have so much to track now. Free foods.
Wow that is crazy!
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This wasn't my experience.
The zero point foods account for some of my diet, the rest was covered by the points.
I never skipped a meal to keep in my points.
There are weekly points too, plus points gained by exercise.
The sole reason I left WW was to save the costs. When I did dual tracking a couple of days, I found that the calories came out really low.2 -
I am not really a fan of freestyle. I was on it a bit and actually lost just fine. I had learned from when they changed to points plus that you have to severely limit free foods of you won't lose. 2or 3 servings a day is usually good for me. Weighing and tracking is good too. I found another app that offers the classic points program that was called Momentum or Turaround and it is working well for me. I just downloaded Mfp on my phone because I like the community and I have been kind of checking out what I prefer. I don't know why WW started offering free foods and giving huge false penalties for foods deemed unhealthy. It's crazy.3
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I was super hungry on freestyle, not satisfied, and it wasn't sustainable. So I quit.1
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Years ago I did WW, back before smart phones and apps. My points calculator was the cardboard sliding thing, you wrote all your meals down on a little flip card thing, you went to meetings once a week and looked things like apples and chicken up in books you had to buy (I didn't have them, which meant I was afraid to eat them). I lost weight, but I found myself eating a LOT more processed foods, simply because it was easier to find out how many points were in it when it had the nutritional information on the label. I stopped after a few months.
I joined MFP (it's been a 'few' years now) because I couldn't justify the cost of WW, and counting calories wasn't all that difficult when there's a database, and later on a much better app you can use daily. I've lost weight using MFP on several occasions (lack of discipline, exercise and periods of going way off the wagon have me coming back time and time again when I should just stick to it once and for all) and have really no complaints about it. I've learned so much about CICO, Macros, Nutrition, Exercise etc. than I ever learned about health and nutrition from a WW meeting.
A week or so ago, a large group of people in a group I'm in on Facebook were going on and on about the new Freestyle system, and the commercials were on all the time. It was free to join, so on a whim I invested $20 for the first month (online only, no meetings) to see what it was all about. So many foods I eat normally are 'free' now, so it seemed like a great idea at the time. As you can tell, after only a week, I'm already looking forward to cancelling my membership and coming back to MFP.
I know how easy it is to think "Bananas are free, so I'll have 7 today" and think you're doing a good thing when really you've eaten hundreds of calories, so I've been trying to use both WW and MFP to see which system I liked better and also to hold myself accountable for even the 'free' foods. Their food database is so much smaller it can be hard to find things, and often when you search for a keyword the list of 'top hits' has nothing to do with what you're looking for, which I find irritating. One day I splurged more than I normally would, but was only just over my daily calories and still within maintenance but was way over on my points. Chicken may be free, but they penalize you for things like rice or pasta, and if you use any sort of fat to cook with forget it. I joined a few groups on FB for support, and once again I see a LOT of posts / recipes for packaged or processed food hacks or exclusive sugar or fat free items when the 'real' item really isn't that high in calories if you can control your portions. Plus, I'd rather use a small amount of actual butter (5 points) or olive oil (4 points) than something I have to spray on. They say nothing is off limits, but the reality is that the hit to your daily points can be so high on something so small that you find yourself thinking 'Is this worth it?' And worse, going grocery shopping without proper research is a bit of a nightmare when you're used to looking at labels to know whether or not it's going to be OK for your daily allowance.
All in all, I think it's a learning curve and I'm sure if I stuck with it long enough I could feel comfortable with it like I am here...but for the monthly cost I don't want to wait and see if that's the case. I'd rather spend the $20 on something fun, and use this app that I already love and feel comfortable with.8 -
I'm cheap - WW charges you a fee to count points. MFP doesn't charge anything to count calories.
Counting is counting so i'd rather count for free. Plus, when i go to restaurants they have their calories on their menus, not the points values. When i look at food packaging it's the same. Why work to convert calories into points when i can just stick with calories?
I also think the idea of zero point foods is ridiculous and misleading. How can a chicken breast be zero points when it has 110 calories per 100 grams? Kidney beans have 330 calories per 100 grams but are zero points???
With the WW program i could theoretically make a ground turkey chili that would be 500-600 calories per serving but only 1-2 points.7 -
Years ago I did WW, back before smart phones and apps. My points calculator was the cardboard sliding thing, you wrote all your meals down on a little flip card thing, you went to meetings once a week and looked things like apples and chicken up in books you had to buy (I didn't have them, which meant I was afraid to eat them). I lost weight, but I found myself eating a LOT more processed foods, simply because it was easier to find out how many points were in it when it had the nutritional information on the label. I stopped after a few months.
I joined MFP (it's been a 'few' years now) because I couldn't justify the cost of WW, and counting calories wasn't all that difficult when there's a database, and later on a much better app you can use daily. I've lost weight using MFP on several occasions (lack of discipline, exercise and periods of going way off the wagon have me coming back time and time again when I should just stick to it once and for all) and have really no complaints about it. I've learned so much about CICO, Macros, Nutrition, Exercise etc. than I ever learned about health and nutrition from a WW meeting.
A week or so ago, a large group of people in a group I'm in on Facebook were going on and on about the new Freestyle system, and the commercials were on all the time. It was free to join, so on a whim I invested $20 for the first month (online only, no meetings) to see what it was all about. So many foods I eat normally are 'free' now, so it seemed like a great idea at the time. As you can tell, after only a week, I'm already looking forward to cancelling my membership and coming back to MFP.
I know how easy it is to think "Bananas are free, so I'll have 7 today" and think you're doing a good thing when really you've eaten hundreds of calories, so I've been trying to use both WW and MFP to see which system I liked better and also to hold myself accountable for even the 'free' foods. Their food database is so much smaller it can be hard to find things, and often when you search for a keyword the list of 'top hits' has nothing to do with what you're looking for, which I find irritating. One day I splurged more than I normally would, but was only just over my daily calories and still within maintenance but was way over on my points. Chicken may be free, but they penalize you for things like rice or pasta, and if you use any sort of fat to cook with forget it. I joined a few groups on FB for support, and once again I see a LOT of posts / recipes for packaged or processed food hacks or exclusive sugar or fat free items when the 'real' item really isn't that high in calories if you can control your portions. Plus, I'd rather use a small amount of actual butter (5 points) or olive oil (4 points) than something I have to spray on. They say nothing is off limits, but the reality is that the hit to your daily points can be so high on something so small that you find yourself thinking 'Is this worth it?' And worse, going grocery shopping without proper research is a bit of a nightmare when you're used to looking at labels to know whether or not it's going to be OK for your daily allowance.
All in all, I think it's a learning curve and I'm sure if I stuck with it long enough I could feel comfortable with it like I am here...but for the monthly cost I don't want to wait and see if that's the case. I'd rather spend the $20 on something fun, and use this app that I already love and feel comfortable with.
So WW is still on the "fats are bad and will make you fat" bandwagon?
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Former WW employee here...I left the fold a couple of years ago after the last big change...I believe from Points to PointsPlus and then SmartPoints. I was crabby at learning a whole new system, again, and encouraging my members to purchase new books, new journals, new food, new scales, new devices, etc. in order to be successful at the new program.
WW works! Don't get me wrong, I love the program and will be forever grateful for the education and support I received while on my journey (lost 60 pounds!). It's the constant schilling and pocket-picking that gets me...and quit buying those stupid bars and eat a damn banana! (You don't know how many years I avoided bananas because the point value was higher than a small bag of potato chips!).
MFP is a fantastic alternative to points tracking. Good luck.
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Not necessarily anti-fat, or anti anything really, but the points do seem excessive on some things. Like you're being punished if you eat chicken thighs vs chicken breasts lol0
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I actually got banned from ww for “losing weight to quickly” no support what do ever. I’ll never go back to them4
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Not necessarily anti-fat, or anti anything really, but the points do seem excessive on some things. Like you're being punished if you eat chicken thighs vs chicken breasts lol
I would say that charging 5 points out of the typical 23 for day is quite an excessive penalty and definitely implies that fat is to be avoided. That's over 20%of points for an entire day.2 -
Years ago I did WW, back before smart phones and apps. My points calculator was the cardboard sliding thing, you wrote all your meals down on a little flip card thing, you went to meetings once a week and looked things like apples and chicken up in books you had to buy (I didn't have them, which meant I was afraid to eat them). I lost weight, but I found myself eating a LOT more processed foods, simply because it was easier to find out how many points were in it when it had the nutritional information on the label. I stopped after a few months.
I did that plan too, and attended meetings. The slider made it easy to figure out foods at the grocery store. I liked the little weekly booklets - I'd write the date and my gain/loss on the front cover and keep them, so if I was struggling I could go back to a week that had been successful and see what I had done. I lost 36 pounds on it, then gained 15 of them back while still going to meetings. Just couldn't stop the slide, so I ended up leaving. I tried the WW online about a year ago and that was a disaster. As a runner and triathlete, I believe in carbs.4 -
Well I am newtral for now WW free is not working eating 200 free items they have calories so for me it's not working
I am back to smRpoints for now.facebook is like exploding with WW free overs and those members WW free not working
The meetings are filled with so much hope and the new members expect the weigh to fly off.also they do not emphasize exercise.i do at least 60 min a day since dec 30 my mini goL exercise1 -
Yes I agree, 5 points is a lot and does feel like a punishment. Things with carbs, fats, sugar, etc all get higher points than I think it's really 'fair', so saying that nothing is off limits isn't completely true in my opinion. Yes, you can have avocado toast, a cookie and some pasta... But not on the same day lol. Also, a banana may be 'free' but if you puree it and put it in a smoothie there are points in it. It's too much for me to sit and figure out.
I did well way back in the day, but like I said I felt I was eating way more processed and pre packaged foods than I was things that were actually healthy. I find it easier to count the calories in an apple, and know that using olive oil or full fat cheese won't ruin my whole day.4
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