IS anyone trying to lose weight by following the food exchanges. I am follow the old ww plan and would like to meet others who are also

I LOVED the old plan. unfortunately, I can only remember parts of it. I lost 110 pounds on that plan. I am not really fond of the points, I belive it gives too much leeway on eating things that are not good for you. I liked the 4 proteins, six breads etc. Most of the old ww cookbooks have the breakouts in them.

I find it so much easier than the points. I have never been able to lose any weight with points.

You can eat exactly the same exchanges and count points. Planning is the key to weight loss. Contrary to what many believe, if your read your Week 6 Booklet you will see guidelines on how the points are to be spent - not on just any thing your heart desires today.

The only problem I find with doing this is that there's no booklet to break down the points for the foods I eat. For example, if I eat a slice of pizza, I can go to my exchange book and know how many breads, protein, fat, etc I had but I can't go to my points book and figure out how may points I used for bread, protein, fat, etc in that slice of pizza. I might know the total number of points for that slice of pizza but I don't have any kind of breakdown. That's what makes booklet 6 not very helfpful for me.

There are plenty of sites that will give you the exchanges for foods - just do a search.

Pizza, cheese, is 2 Bread, 2 Protein, 2 Fat and 1 Veggie, by the way.

Thanks, but that's not what I meant. I know how to get the exchanges for food but if I am following the points program I don't know how to break those into points. So if a slice of pizza is 6 points how do you know how many points to attribute to bread, protein, etc.

I agree with prettnpink. The points is too vague. Even the week six booklet and the points program is not nutritionally sound. The commercials on TV lead you to believe you can eat anything you want anytime you want as long as you are in your Points range. I think that this really hinders weight loss. I think you need to know more of the nutrition side of it. I am a TOPS leader and am definitly having better results with the exchanges than I ever did with Points. And always have. I'm also a lifetime member of WW, but can't make the points work for me. It's toooo slowwww! I don't feel productive loseing .2 pounds a week. I have to see results for my hard work. It took me 3 years to lose 12 pounds on the Points. Its taken me 5 months to lose 20 pounds with the exchange program. More rewarding to me.


Week 6 booklet is only guidlines. Not enough sound nutriti onal advice an how to make this balance work. Its too vague for most people, whish is why some are struggling with this program. There are also people who aren't to be fair, but I feel like the Points plan should give better nutritional information. I also think week 6 is too late in the program to hand this information out. I think they whould give you this info in week one so that you don't establish bad habits right out of the gate.

Sorry about my spelling.

the old ww diet is a lot like the diabetic diets now, which is basically what I am following

Starches servings= 6
Each serving contains 80 calories

Fruit servings= 3
Each serving equals 60 calories

Milk servings= 2
Each serving equals 90 - 150 calories

Vegetables servings= 2
Each serving equals 25 calories

Meat and Meat Substitutes servings= 5
Each serving equals 75-100 calories

Fats servings= 4
Each serving equals 45 calories

Free Foods
Each serving equals less than 20 calories

if anyone wants more details let me know.

I think this is the healthiest way to eat. If you count calories, you don't necessarily make healthy food choices. Same with the points. If I'm going to count anything and try to lose weight I'm going for the healthiest way possible. What it all comes down to is calories in calories out. It matters to me where those calories are coming from. If they are all coming from carbs, that is probably going to slow your weight loss down. High protien will make you lose faster, but is it healthy? Not from what I've heard. I read boards on the ww site and several other sites and people are downing skinny cows and all kinds of other junk food in the low fat versions. It still has calories and food values. Which are important. I think that eating food exchanges forces a person to eat a healthy balanced diet. In the long run this will save you from heart disease, diabetes and what ever else a person ends up with from an unhealthy diet.