Well I overcame my cynicsm and headed off to Weight Watchers this morning.
Life is currently more stressful than it’s been in a long time and I’m in serious need of distraction. I feel healthy enough in body and mind to do this out of curiosity rather than believing that I’m on the verge of “the answer”.
What a glorious feeling! I can mess about with the new plan as an experiment because it has no power whatsoever to make me feel either a success or a failure. It might suit me and it might not.
I may not yet have talked off all the weight but I have talked off a good portion of the crazies!
I have to admit that I also wanted to give a bit of information to my North American friends who have to wait a while longer before they get ProPoints. (I’m sure I should be adding a little tm thingy every time I type that….)
So here’s the lowdown:
- You get given your Daily ProPoints Allowance by your leader at the scale. No more little quizzes that can be shared freely on the internet. However, a friend with a ProPoints Calculator can give you the information. Since I have a “no more money to Weight Watchers” policy, I’m afraid I can’t help. Your Daily ProPoints Allowance can be as little as 29 and as much as 71. I’m thinking that WW has adjusted to account for the increasingly obese. Your daily points cannot be carried over to the next day.
- Everyone gets a Weekly ProPoints Allowance of 49. This is a much bigger deal here in the UK than it will be in North America because we have been working on a daily points only. So I’ve gone from 126 points per week (18×7) to 252 points per week. (29×7+49)
- Given that little bit of information, you might have guessed that absolutely everything has a higher points value than it used to. However, there’s a new formula for calculating points so it’s not just a straightforward increase. UK points used to be based on calories and saturated fat. American points were based on calories, fat and fibre. Now, points are based on a combination of protein, carb, fat and fibre because each of these building blocks of food has a different calorific value. You should see the little wheelie thing required for this calculation! Most people at the meeting were getting ready to part with £7.95 for a calculator but, given my above policy, I’m going to do the Luddite version for a week and see how it goes.
- The upshot is that 300 calories worth of food will have different points values. Their example is a poached egg, grilled mushroom and tomato, 2 slices of back bacon and a piece of toast for 8 points but an English muffin with jam is 9 points because it has less protein.
- The big ProPoints news is that all fruit, fresh or frozen, including bananas is now zero points. Vegetables, except the usual starchy suspects, are still zero points.
- I’ve now been playing with the wheelie thing and it has at least one very serious shortcoming. According to it, half a bottle of dry white wine has 2 points and half a bottle of red wine has only 1 point thanks to a bit of protein content. According to the ProPoints Pocket Guide, either of these has 9 points. OOPS!
I’m off to London for the day tomorrow but will report back on Thursday about how it’s all going.
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