Weight Watchers ProPoints – Overview

 Things to try  2 Responses »
Nov 092010
 
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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.

 Posted by Millie at 7:21 am  Tagged with: ,

Progress, Goals & a Little Bit of Planning

 Last Ten Pounds, Maintenance, Things to try, Thoughts on the Process  No Responses »
Oct 272010
 
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I’ve now weighed a hundred and forty-something pounds for more than year – a feat unheard of since I hit my 40′s.  It makes me think that I’ve actually learned something by writing my little heart out for the past 27 months.

Am I where I want to be?

No – but I’m close and so very very proud of myself for not giving up and gaining back what I’ve lost – and all this in years of grief, living in 2 countries, health worries and just getting older.

I’m chuffed.

I’m also thinking that it would be nice, one day, to write:  “I’ve now weighed less that 145 pounds for a whole year.”

I think that’s a sensible goal for my age, my level of commitment to activity and my level of commitment to wine. But it means losing at least another 7 pounds and I’m so so so so so sick of the process…….

I appear to be, once again, choosing what I want more:

  • to be free of “dieting”
  • to be free of 7 pounds

Good question.  Since losing the weight will also make me free of dieting, I guess that’s the sensible choice. I need to make this as easy as possible for me and those around me.

What 3 small changes could I make for maximum impact?

  • Eating fruit and veg between meals has become part of my “diet” mentality and I need to shift it back into my “everyday eating” mentality.  So there’s a start. Will commit to reaching first for fruit or veg when needing a snack or just something to crunch on.
  • I also tend to be so all or nothing about exercise and I hate both states.  So why don’t I just commit to exercise 3 times a week and see how it goes?  And why is that so difficult to do? Really, why?  But I will take at least 3 walks per week and, if they turn into runs, so much the better.
  • I’ve fallen back into the 5 o’clock glass of wine to signal the end of the working day.  I will commit to having a 5 o’clock glass (or two) of mineral water and then have the glass of wine.  I will consider it a very good day indeed when the first glass of wine coincides with the meal.

OK.  Those are the three things I’m going to do for a week.  If I haven’t lost a pound by next Tuesday Wednesday, I will get back to journalling.  At least, that’s the plan from here.

 Posted by Millie at 3:50 am  Tagged with: ,

Looking Ahead

 Last Ten Pounds, Things to try  No Responses »
Sep 192010
 
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I’m not writing much because my real work has taken over my life for a bit.  That’s a good thing because real work pays real money. In my pretend life, where I write, contemplate and ponificate full time, I get paid pretend money. So there’s no argument about which gets priority just for the moment.

And I can’t quite get the food thing on track – or, at least – on the exactly right track to do this bloody thing that I promised myself oh so very very long ago.

While clearing out drawers and cupboards at my Mom’s, I found a Christmas letter from 2002 which mentions a wedding in the Higlands of Scotland.  The invitation to that wedding was the catalyst which caused me to make a promise to myself to get to a certain (as yet unspecified) weight and stay there for a whole year. So let’s say the invitation arrived in the spring of 2002. That’s eight and a half years of thinking about that promise.

It’s now been over two years since getting serious about working hard and writing my way to a steady weight.  In many ways it’s worked.  Through the most stressful two years of my life, I have taken off 25 pounds and stayed within five pounds of that goal.

But my promise was about something else.  I’m fully aware that the top of the bmi range is still overweight for me.  I’m not as “big boned” as my mother used to say.  I look ok.  I may find that I don’t like what I look like in the middle of the bmi range. I may find that it’s just impossible to maintain that weight while enjoying life.  But I’ll never know unless I get there.

So, I’m going to start Talking It Off again -doing the work and seeing if I can’t keep that promise.  However.

Yep – HOWEVER, I’m getting bored with this promise thing so I’m going to make it “time sensitive”.

If I can’t be bothered to lose those last 10 pounds by my 50th birthday, my new promise is that I will be happy with whatever weight I’m at and put my energy into being the fittest and healthiest slightly chubby 50 year old I can be.

I’m also getting mighty bored with the diet-head conundrum.  I can repeatedly state that I’m not on a diet, that I’m just changing my eating habits – but the fact remains that dropping one to two pounds per week requires a different mindset than maintaining my weight.  The result is that I still find it very difficult to get the weight loss/weight gain pendulum to come to a complete stop. So I’m going to experiment with SLOW SLOW SLOW weight loss and just start eating to maintain a weight that is 10 pounds lighter than I am right now.

The problem I foresee is that it’s going to take a while to tell if I’m being successful or not.  I reckon I will lose around a pound every three weeks which might get obscured by normal monthly fluctuations.  It will probably be two months before I can see any permanent change so I’d better prepare myself for the non-dietness of it all.

More on this through the week………

 Posted by Millie at 6:07 am  Tagged with: ,

So now what?

 Giving up, Starting Again Again, Things to try, Thoughts on the Process  No Responses »
Aug 022010
 
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Starting over. Again. For the bazillionth time. I guess that if you put an optimistic spin on it, I never give up! I have never lost hope that I’d get to my goal weight and maintain it for the rest of my life. To put an optimistic spin on that, the older I am when I finally get to my goal weight, the less time I will have to maintain it… Ok, that really doesn’t work, does it? No.

For my first step, I made a journal in Microsoft OneNote. I love that software. It’s like one of those 5 subject notebooks, but with a Turbo setting. Picture an open notebook, with tabs across the top for the sections, as many as you want. In each section are pages, as many and as long as you want, and when you title a page, the title hangs off the right side of the page on a tab, so you can find it quickly. These pages are not pre-formatted like Word is. You can plop something right in the middle of the page if you wish. You can put anything in this notebook:

  • Copy and paste interesting things from the web
  • Create a chart in Excel, and copy/paste it, and you can add to it on the OneNote page
  • Add audio and video files
  • Add pics and graphics

This is my favorite Microsoft program (and no, they did NOT pay me to say that!). I have one set up with sections labeled “Journal,” “Food,” “Exercise” and “Motivation.” The exercise page is a chart from excel with columns to fill in. Motivation contains separate pages to categorize what kind of files are in there: Ralph Marston, ditties I find on the web, my own personal thoughts, anything I think might have value when I need a boost. And best of all, I got a Windows phone for my birthday last month, loaded with Word, Excel, Power Point, and OneNote. When I make notes on my mobile phone, they automatically sync with my MS Office stuff. So if I hear something interesting or motivational, I can add it. If I change my food plan for the day, I can update it. And when I sync the phone with the computer, it’s all there waiting to be organized into its proper section in my notebook.

If you are thinking that I am a geek, you are 100% correct. I am, and I am proud of it! Maybe that’s why I bought a motorcycle–to balance out the geeky half of me. I don’t think it worked though. I’m really the geekiest biker EVER. But I want to be a slim, healthy, biker-geek, and that is what I am working on. Eating right, working out, taking care of myself, dealing with the overload of stress heaped on me by my employer, doing all the things I need to do. I’m on the right path. I have the knowledge of 10,000 diet books, etc. I just need to make it all work for me.

I see that my eating is not all that bad right now, without really monitoring what I’m eating. This is a good place to be starting over. I’m going to journal what I eat without counting points or calories. I’m just going to do what comes naturally, and try to work enough exercise in there to knock off some weight. That’s my starting point, and I’ll re-evaluate at the end of the week to make course corrections. I’ve always started out with a bang, joining WW or buying into some book or plan, buying new toys. Maybe I don’t need to buy or do anything new, maybe I don’t need to focus on all the “stuff” that’s supposed to “help” me do this. Maybe I have everything I need to make my dream come true. (Could it be that easy? Hmmm…)

 Posted by Gracie at 7:01 pm

Is this a stupid idea?

 Giving up, Keeping Going, Things to try  2 Responses »
Apr 112010
 
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Maybe it’s a sign of my desperation but I’m seriously considering attending a weight loss hypnosis seminar tomorrow. I’m struggling so badly with a lack of motivation and I need something to help me. I have tried rehearsing things in my head, reading motivational stories, I have the house food clean as much as possible etc. None of them are ‘taking’. If it’s not in the house I go out and get it. I’m binging on and off, pretty much whenever I get derailed and I’m getting derailed regularly. I don’t want to change from the Weight Watcher plan because I know it works and it’s practical for everyday life. I just need help on keeping me following it. I know that the meetings aren’t enough to work for me, so going back to meetings won’t help.

I don’t know, maybe I’m just throwing my money away. On the other hand, I quit smoking by using accupuncture, so I’m open to alternative therapies. I’ve done some ‘googling’ but of course there doesn’t seem to be any real consensus as to whether it works or not. I guess if it puts me into the frame of mind where I want to exercise and where I want to eliminate the starchy/sugar based foods then it might be worth the gamble.

 Posted by Donna at 10:24 am

I Thought I Had It

 Things to try, Thoughts on the Process  No Responses »
Mar 282010
 
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The answer.  I thought I had an answer to the question of “feeling fat” but it turns out I only had some disjointed thoughts that didn’t sound all that sensible once written down but I may try later.

Instead I’ll bore on about stress management.

Yesterday went quite well as far as stress relief and food went.

  • I walked and sorted out a few little niggling things.
  • I bought enough food for two days – food that I can look forward to and that requires some preparation.
  • I talked to the absent husband.
  • I let myself get hungry then enjoyed feeding my body rather than my feelings.
  • I did have a glass of wine but it was to go with dinner rather than to “relax”.
  • I made some decisions.
  • I snipped off a couple of dead branches in the garden.

Oh I hate reports of the “What I Did” variety – so here’s the incomplete thought about “feeling fat”.  I can’t trust what I see in the mirror, how my clothes fit, what the measuring tape says, the number on the scale.  When I’m determined to “feel fat”, the only thing I can do is ask myself which direction my behaviour with food is leading me.

Am I heading toward my goal of health and sanity or am I heading away from it?

Rather than putting any faith at all in “feelings” about these things, I am only going to assess how I’m acting.

  • Am I more sane or less sane than I was yesterday?
  • Am I more full or less full than I was yesterday?
  • Have I moved more or less than I did yesterday?

And there can only be one of two responses:  I can keep doing what I’m doing because it’s positive or I can change what I’m doing because it’s negative.

I don’t get to beat myself up or wallow in temporary satisfaction.  I  bang on about hating when other people attach being “good” and “bad” to talking about eating but I realise that I do it in my head all the time.

Little steps on a long journey.

 Posted by Millie at 3:34 am  Tagged with: ,

Post #154 – Cool Eh?

 Things to try  No Responses »
Mar 182010
 
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I didn’t notice #150 passing by so thought I’d pause to celebrate this milestone.  (pause, celebrate)

I got my hospital appointment for April 1st – two weeks from tomorrow.  I was doing pretty well up to that point but now I just feel sick.  Silly, really, because nothing is better or worse than before.  Whatever is or isn’t wrong with me still is or isn’t wrong.  In my logical world I get that.  But in my crazy head, I still feel worried.

Deep breaths.

I stumbled over this BBC article from a couple of weeks ago.  In my limbo state, this is exactly the kind of certainty that I would like.

  • swab
  • test
  • You should eat this amount of protein and this amount of carbs and this amount of fat for maximum, effortless (I added that – it’s my fantasy) weight loss.

Simple.

I need simple right now.

I’m off to London for a couple of days.  It’s work but it should be distracting.  The husband is coming with me  – mostly because I don’t think he likes the idea of me careening down motorways at 80 mph when I’m stressed.  I have pointed out that I did it last week just fine but I’m happy for the company.  (And, actually, my driving was a bit loopy last week but I haven’t told him that.)

I’ve rebelliously put together a one hour workshop that does not contain even one powerpoint slide so I’m going to leave my laptop at home and read a book if I have any downtime.

Till the weekend then.

 Posted by Millie at 1:34 am  Tagged with:

Stress and Hunger

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Mar 162010
 
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This whole battle can be boiled down to

  • what?
  • when?
  • how much?

My normal “weight loss” day should look like this:

7 am – noon: 2 mugs of coffee, porridge, mug of tea, banana

noon – 6 pm: soup and crackers or cottage cheese and fruit, a couple of clementines, mug or tea

6 pm – bedtime : dinner with lots of veg, some carb and protein, a glass of wine, mineral water, decaf tea

My recent, “I can’t be bothered” day looks more like this:

7am – noon: 2 mugs of coffee, porridge, mug of tea, cracker with peanut butter, banana

noon – 6pm : soup and crackers or cottage cheese and fruit, a couple of clementines, piece of cheese, mug or tea, crackers, crackers, a couple more crackers.

6pm – bedtime: dinner with lots of veg, lots of carb and protein, 3 glasses of wine, mineral water, tea, crackers with butter & jam

The difference between losing weight and not is a few crackers,  a bit of cheese, a dollop of peanut butter, a couple teaspoons of butter and some extra wine.

What’s with me and crackers?

The bigger question is what’s with me and needing to feel full when I’m feeling stressed?

Today I’m going to experiment with noting both my emotional feelings and my hunger levels throughout the day.  I’m going to see what happens when I’m both stressed and hungry. I wonder if I really do just cease to exist? Or explode? Or fade away to nothing?

If I’m not back here tomorrow, you’ll know.

 Posted by Millie at 12:50 am  Tagged with: ,

Good Week? Yes thanks, but I ate like a pig.

 Things to try, Thoughts on the Process  No Responses »
Mar 022010
 
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OK. I need the whole world to stop associating Good and Bad with eating. Really. Just like I managed to banish “fall off the wagon“, I want to stop saying things like, “I had a good week” to mean that I ate in a way that would lead to weight loss. And especially to ban “I had a bad week” to mean that I ate in a way that wouldn’t lead to weight loss. People say they had a “bad week” when, actually, they ate in a way that left their weight exactly as it was the week before.  What’s so BAD about that?

Much much worse are the phrases, “I was bad” and “I was good”.   I actually bite my tongue when I hear them.  But this is  (at least partly) my blog and I can be rude, right?  If you kill a kitten, you are bad.  If you eat 10 Mars Bars, you are a person with disordered eating.  If you kill the kitten because you ate 10 Mars Bars, you are sick.

OK  – so what am I going to say instead of “had a good week”?  This week,when asked, I tried, “I worked hard and it paid off”.  Not bad…   It’s what I meant, but there’s more.

Sometimes you work hard and it doesn’t pay off.

Or sometimes it’s all quite easy and you lose weight.

So I figure I need three measures:

  • How easy it is from the inside.  In other words, did I have the motivation to eat well and move? Or was it struggle from the moment I woke up to keep my hands out of the crackers?
  • How easy was it from the outside? Did my schedule accommodate going for walks and calm, planned meals at home or did I actually have a social life?

It’s that last situation that makes me struggle with the good/bad thing.  It’s GOOD to eat out with friends.  It’s GOOD to celebrate around a meal.  But all that goodness makes losing weight harder – at least for that week.

  • Given the above, how hard did I work to lose weight?

If I was going to make this a graph, I’d have two axes- the lines, not the chopping things.  One would chart the hard/easy side of life – an average of the first two questions above.  The second would chart my own effort – from working hard to slacking off completely.

But how do I boil all that down into a one sentence answer?

  • Q: Did you have a good week?
  • A: Yes thanks; it was hard to eat well on nights out and to find time to exercise but I worked hard and it paid off.
  • Q: Did you have a good week?
  • A: It was kind of boring but that made it easier to lose weight.
  • Q: Did you have a good week?
  • It was dreadful – my car/guinea pig/favourite shoes died.  I had no motivation at all to eat well or exercise and I gave into my emotions.
  • Q: Did you have a good week?
  • A: I had a fantastic week.  I had two dinners out and a short break in Paris.  I couldn’t get my head around eating well and had no time to exercise  so I didn’t lose weight – but it really was an amazing week.
  • Q: Did you have a good week?
  • A: Not really – it was boring.  I should have worked harder to take advantage of all the time I had but I just couldn’t find the will to work hard so I didn’t lose any weight.

OK.  Sorry for the excessive Qing and Aing but I needed to know for sure that, even though people are always going to use Good and Bad to talk about a diet – I can deflect and use other language.  At first it will be just language but, as with all things in this search for food/body sanity, it will eventually become how I think and how I act.

I just cannot have weight management define the quality of my life!

So here’s to a good couple of days in London.  I may not always be in control of where and when I eat, but I’m feeling motivated to make good choices and walk miles.

 Posted by Millie at 2:28 am  Tagged with: ,

Choices

 Things to try  No Responses »
Feb 242010
 
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Today I have enough time to choose between writing here or going for an unplanned walk.  As it’s not raining and I don’t have a lot of pressureful work hanging over me, I think a walk is the better choice for today.

I don’t know who is inhabiting my body but they are welcome to stay if this is the attitude they bring.

 Posted by Millie at 6:23 am
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