There are so many weight loss plans out there it can be quite daunting when you decide that you want to lose weight. Structure is what lots of us thrive on so having a plan to follow can result in better success than if we were to just 'eat healthy'. I have tried lots of different diets including shakes and 3 day 'chemical reaction' diets... most of them have all had that magic little word in them which makes us go 'ahhhhh I can't do it', that little word is 'diet'. As soon as you mention diet lots of people imagine hours of hunger and treat deprivation, that's where Slimming World is different.
Slimming World is a way of life, you must be willing to change your attitude towards eating if you are going to succeed with this plan. The thing with Slimming World is that you can eat lots of filling food, you can eat until you feel full and you can still have the treats that you love. I will openly admit that I am a pig where food is concerned, I don't like child size portions, I like a decent plate full of food and Slimming World allows for this. As long as you fill at least 1/3 of your plate with non-starchy veg/fruit you can eat until you are full. All lean meats, seafood, meat replacement pieces, potatoes, eggs, fat free cottage cheese, fat free natural yoghurt and fromage frais, beans and pulses are free which means you can have as much as you like without having to weigh or count anything. You see it's the weighing I cannot stand, when I did Weight Watchers you literally had to weigh and count 95% of what went in your mouth (it might have changed since I went) and I cannot stand this. I love being able to snack on veg and fruit without worrying about weighing or counting.
Then there's arguably the most important bit... treats. Syns are what you use for the little luxuries that you love, I tend to use mine for a splodge of mayonnaise or a bit of chocolate but it's ultimately up to you what you use yours on. Women can have up to 15 syns per day and men are allowed up to 20 (lucky sods); as long as you stay within this every day you won't go far wrong.You also get one choice of Slimming World approved high calcium foods (HEXA) and one choice of high fibre foods (HEXB) to help maintain a balanced diet.
Another thing I love is that because of the nature of the plan, you can still go out for meals. Admittedly some places are more Slimming World friendly than others but a plan friendly meal is possible in most places (I will exclude Pizza Hut from this now, that place is a very Synful place!).
Ultimately, Slimming World has taught me that losing weight does not have to mean that you no longer have a life, you can do the things you love and find a way to eat the things you want and still lose weight. I love the support that the group brings every week and I won't lie the competitive fairy inside my head forces me to try and lose weight every single week because I HATE feeling like I've failed.
Common questions about the Slimming World plan (I follow the Extra Easy plan so I am answering this assuming you are following the same):
Why do I have to have the 1/3 Superfree on every plate?
The extra easy (EE) plan enables us to put more calorific, filling foods on our plate at the same time, when I say calorific I mean potatoes/rice/starchy veg as well as meats and fish. If we were allowed to fill our plates full of potatoes, meat and rice without adding any veg/salad/fruit we would not get the weight losses we want. The original Slimming world plans (red & green) would not allow meat and potatoes on the same plate without weighing and counting syns for one of them which meant that there was a degree of control over how many calories you were taking in per meal. Extra easy gives us more freedom to have different foods on the same plate but we must have the 1/3 super free to control and reduce the calorie intake.
How many Healthy Extras can I have?
1 healthy A and 1 healthy B.
Healthy A's are for your calcium intake and can range from 250ml semi skimmed milk to 30g cheddar cheese (there are lots of other choices!)
Healthy B's are for your fibre intake and you can choose one from a selection of wholemeal breads, to cereal and cereal bars (again, there are lots of other choices).
You MUST measure/weigh these as these to get good weight losses, do not estimate because 9 times out of 10 you will find that you are having far more than you are actually allowed! A full list of Healthy Extras can be found on the Slimming World members website.
Can I really eat as much as I want?
Yes, you can. Every meal you can have a good plateful of food. You can eat as much as you want until you are full, however once you are eating beyond feeling full you are eating too much. When you feel full it is your body telling you that you do not need to eat any more, if you are eating when you are full just for the sake of it (through boredom or otherwise) is like eating syns. Lots of people snack on oodles of fruit in between meals without thinking about it, just because it's super free BUT if they are not actually hungry they are ploughing more calories into their body than needed which can reflect on the scales. So the key to eating lots on Slimming World is knowing when you are full!
I hope this little post has introduced the Slimming World plan quite nicely and I hope the short Q&A has helped anyone with any questions. If you have anymore questions please don't hesitate to ask me on Twitter, you're probably asking something which someone else is also dying to know!
Common questions about the Slimming World plan (I follow the Extra Easy plan so I am answering this assuming you are following the same):
Why do I have to have the 1/3 Superfree on every plate?
The extra easy (EE) plan enables us to put more calorific, filling foods on our plate at the same time, when I say calorific I mean potatoes/rice/starchy veg as well as meats and fish. If we were allowed to fill our plates full of potatoes, meat and rice without adding any veg/salad/fruit we would not get the weight losses we want. The original Slimming world plans (red & green) would not allow meat and potatoes on the same plate without weighing and counting syns for one of them which meant that there was a degree of control over how many calories you were taking in per meal. Extra easy gives us more freedom to have different foods on the same plate but we must have the 1/3 super free to control and reduce the calorie intake.
How many Healthy Extras can I have?
1 healthy A and 1 healthy B.
Healthy A's are for your calcium intake and can range from 250ml semi skimmed milk to 30g cheddar cheese (there are lots of other choices!)
Healthy B's are for your fibre intake and you can choose one from a selection of wholemeal breads, to cereal and cereal bars (again, there are lots of other choices).
You MUST measure/weigh these as these to get good weight losses, do not estimate because 9 times out of 10 you will find that you are having far more than you are actually allowed! A full list of Healthy Extras can be found on the Slimming World members website.
Can I really eat as much as I want?
Yes, you can. Every meal you can have a good plateful of food. You can eat as much as you want until you are full, however once you are eating beyond feeling full you are eating too much. When you feel full it is your body telling you that you do not need to eat any more, if you are eating when you are full just for the sake of it (through boredom or otherwise) is like eating syns. Lots of people snack on oodles of fruit in between meals without thinking about it, just because it's super free BUT if they are not actually hungry they are ploughing more calories into their body than needed which can reflect on the scales. So the key to eating lots on Slimming World is knowing when you are full!
I hope this little post has introduced the Slimming World plan quite nicely and I hope the short Q&A has helped anyone with any questions. If you have anymore questions please don't hesitate to ask me on Twitter, you're probably asking something which someone else is also dying to know!
Hi Jade, thank you so much for explaining things so eloquently, it makes much more sense to me now. So I have a question or 5 about HEX's. If I use the milk as my HEXA and it isn't enough to last all day or I want some cheese with a meal, do I count the excess as SYNS? Do you have a bigger weight loss if you avoid SYNS or are you supposed to have them? Can you save the SYNS for a night out or a big bar of chocolate on a Friday night? Sorry to bombard you :) Jude xx @jadlgw
ReplyDelete- If you want more milk/cheese than included in your HEXA then YES you do have to syn it, for example if you use it on cheese but you want milk in your cuppa then you'd count 0.5 syns for a splash of milk.
Delete- I have tried going without syns for a week and it didn't give me a bigger loss, and it was a very sad week haha. However, you don't have to max out to 15 syns every single day if you don't want, don't force them down you if you don't want them, but don't deprive yourself. If you look for bigger losses then the best thing to do is to fill half of every plate with super free rather than just the 1/3.
- Some people do save syns, yeah. It works for some and not for others. You technically have 105 syns every week so you COULD have them all in one night and not have any the rest of the week but what SW suggest is that you implement 'flexible syns' where you set a certain amount, say 60 for the night and you count down from 60 (that would get you 15 Vodka and Diet cokes ha) and when you get to 0 you have no more syns, but you would carry on as normal with 15 syns per day for the rest of the week. The idea behind flexi syns is that you are still keeping a degree of control :)
hope that's helped a bit! And by the way, I actually enjoy answering questions so don't worry about asking haha xx
Amazing, thank you Jade, you really should become a group leader, or set up your own little group on Twitter, like a little hashtag chat ever week, that would be fab, I would definitely be up for joining in on that one to get hints and tips :) Jude xx @jadlgw
ReplyDelete