Where are the former Weight Watchers??

I have a friend who swears by WW but her success is mainly by eating fruits and vegetables, very small portions, and little carbs besides the fruit. She often eats the same meals every day of the week. Honestly, I think all of that is her decision as far as what/how much to eat. She walks maybe 30 minutes a day so she eats less vs exercising more and eating more. She loves it and has both of her daughters doing it successfully as well.

I myself wanted to join WW but considering I am broke as heck I thought I'd do it my own way. A coworker of mine introduced me to MFP and I love it. It's free, user friendly, lots of support and informatiob, and everyone is free to diet and exercise how they choose. I have learned a lot from people and the articles posted.

I think you could easily do both and get the best of both worlds.

I just started MFP today and I've found so much more freedom with it. I put it in the same amount of food in WW and on MFP; on WW I have 5 points left, on MFP I have 700 calories. That feels less restrictive to me and lets me eat more. I always feel hungry on WW. And honestly, I like knowing the "how" behind my weight loss. WW has a formula that no one is allowed to know; MFP uses calculations anyone can figure out for themselves. There also seems to be much more food on MFP. Since I eat a lot of whole foods I always had to create items on WW, whereas I found them easily on MFP. I also like knowing how many actual calories I've consumed and what my carb, protein, and fat needs actually are, rather than having my food life dictated by the mystery of points.

I have nothing negative to say about WW, it is a great program that has helped change a lot of lives. I myself have used it and lost weight with it as well. But MFP is the greatest of the two in my humble opinion. Counting calories is so much easier than figuring out the points. I like logging my food with attention to carbs, fat. protein, fiber etc. I think tracking these things are more important than just knowing how many points I have left. And as another member mentioned I can exercise and earn more calories. One last thing and this is an important one ,is the community and support found here. I hope you find the same support and joy that I have found here. :flowerforyou:
Gina

I did WW for about six months and lost, at the most, 14 lbs before I decided to stop going to WW meetings and paying for the services. My weight fluctuated between the four month period that it took for me to find MFP and I've been much more successful with MFP in the past couple weeks than I ever was with WW. Initially I stopped going to WW because I was getting frustrated with the points system and felt as though the meetings were not very helpful - I couldn't find a meeting time with people my age or with similar goals and felt as though the meeting was geared to career-focused adults (which is okay, just not what I needed). I had a problem with WW advertising their foods - which were full of chemicals and not healthy in the slightest. I also felt that on WW, I wasn't eating healthy, just working with packaged foods to fit within my daily allowance.
I really love MFP! I feel that I am held more accountable by allowing my friends to view my diary and really enjoy the 24/7 support I receive from my friends and members via the message boards. I also like that I am able to contact people with similar backgrounds (college student, diabetic, food allergies etc) and find how they are approaching weight loss. As a diabetic, I love that I have access to the nutritional information - my blood sugars have been under much better control during my time with MFP. Finally, I feel like MFP is really helping me make this a lifestyle change, instead of a long-term 'diet.' I like that I am learning more about healthy foods and working out, and how our bodies use what we put in them.
At the end of the day though, whatever works for you, works for you. I know a lot of people that have had fantastic success with WW and others with MFP. You'll figure it out eventually! I, though, am a definite MFP convert

I used WW for a while but w/ MFP, I've found much more success than anything else I've tried.

WW does work, there's no denying that. Anything which encourages you to do more while eating less has to work. The problem I have with it is the absolute devotion by its members and leaders that its mathematical formula (for that's all it is) is somehow the only mathematical formula that works and that it is somehow easier than just counting calories. OK, so it takes other things in to account like protein, fibre, fat content etc but so do calories in a way - weight for weight, fat will have more cals than anything else and since MFP makes it easy to see the other stats too, you don't really need to sum up all of them into one magical number.

WW would argue that counting calories is the old fashioned way to loose weight. In reality, they are doing exactly the same, just obscuring it from people.

What upsets me the most however is having paid my weekly subscription, and finding I gained on the scales (entirely self inflicted after an alcoholic bender the weekend before) being told by the area manager no less that "after alcohol, all you really want is high carb foods like bacon and eggs". I may be no nutritionist, but if that's how they train their area managers, I'm out!

My fitness pal is free yet you get the same amount of support if not way more. I did weight watchers on and off for 4 years and yes I did lose some weight but I felt very restricted sometimes. For example, I can go out to restaurants and eat as most have calories information but rarely ever the saturated fat. So I can work out what i'm eating for MFP but i'd always have to guess how many weight waters points it was.

I also like that you can easily log your food on MFP from your laptop or phone and not have to pay £30 a month or whatever they are charging at WW these days.

WW has worked for me in the past but I needed a change - this is so much better! Better database for food, i like that you don't get 'extra' points/cals to play with - it means I'm sensible at weekends rather than thinking I can use my 49 pps.

I also find the forums are much better on here - I just found a lot of the advice on WW was very poor and sometime just wrong. Much more knowledge on here.

I have been on here for 10 days and have lost 4.6lbs - I quit WW online last week and it feels great!

Just started this program and I'm loving it. Was getting frustrated with ww. Too soon to tell just yet, but I'm reading a lot of success stories... plus it's free!!! Wish me luck!

I did WW years ago & lost about 2 stone, cost me a small fortune & took a year, the support was great, BUT on here the support is fantastic & It's free to use, easy to follow, & so far I've lost 3.5 stone too in a year, AND I fell off the wagon fron Sep to Feb & put on a stone & a half..

I'm also a convert from WW online. I lost 70 pounds in 2009-10 on the old Points system, gained some back and had trouble losing on PointsPlus. I just couldn't seem to make the switch to PointsPlus--harder to calculate in your head how many PointsPlus a food was worth. There were some things about the WW online tools that I liked better, butI like MFP because it's free, easy to use, and I find it much easier to track calories than to figure PointsPlus. Plus, I like the Facebook-style feel to the website.

Years ago, I did WW and lost weight successfully. I was within a few pounds of "goal weight," which at that time was rigid, not flexible. No leader ever suggested I was successfully maintaining. Instead, I paid my fees weekly and after 6 or 8 months at a very healthy weight (but not a Lifetime member), I left, and tried going back a few times.

In short, I think WW is a corporation that doesn't care whether I lose weight or not. Their main interest is revenue, which is fine for a corporation, but not for me.

Some of the meetings were entertaining, but now that the world has changed and you can find support here, I find MFP to be much more realistic and helpful.

Here i am!!! no more counting points for me. its P90X all the way

Hey everyone!

This is my second day on MFP... coincidentally I found this site yesterday just as the WW site had a major several-hours-long crash. I know there are other threads on this topic but I would really love to know how WW people feel about MFP vs WW. I've seen people say that it is better and I just want to know what specifically about MFP made you decide that WW wasn't getting your money any longer ? (I know that cost is a reason in itself hehe)

IMHO, the nice thing about WW was the extra weekly/flex points that you could use outside of the daily allowance. Do you find it restrictive to eat the same amount of cals everyday without any wiggle room? I don't know the MFP program well yet so I'm not sure if there is any rollover of cals from day to day if you eat less than your daily allowance, if there are "exercise points," etc.


Please enlighten me!!

I've been on and off weight watchers for years. I used to love it. It was just easy and I lost weight. I switched to MFP because a friend of mine suggested it. I love it. The support from others is amazing. When I weighed in at weight watchers I used to feel judged when I hopped on the scale... especially when they said, "were you expecting that gain.".. MFP is free, and easy. Plus watching sodium and carbs really really helps...

I so identify with this. Many years ago I belonged to WW and would go to the meetings, but I was always, always self-conscious when getting on the scale. Even if they claimed they weren't there to judge, they judged. And they always had this "look".

Anyway, I joined MFP around mid-March and while I haven't lost a super amount of weight yet (I'd lost around 15 lbs. from going to the gym before I was told about MFP), I've found that MFP is easy to use, it makes me more conscious of what I'm eating throughout the day (boy was I surprised!), I can keep track of my exercise, and there is a tremendous amount of support and interesting information here. I'm going to keep trying that's for sure.

Im not sure anyone answered this but you can bank calories on MFP just like saving points on WW. A few people on here have tried it and it worked for them and I tried it and it does work. Lets say you have a wedding on Saturday save a few calories everyday for the wedding but not too many or it doesnt work every body is different on how much you can get away with.