4.4 pounds in 7 weeks since starting WWPP. Last week up a pound due to TOM. This week, down .6. I didn't even lose the damned full pound. I'm beyond frustrated and it has only been 7 weeks. I really feel lost, inconsolable, and am questioning the program. If it is designed to lose a pound a week, if not 2, and everyone else is doing great, then I'm wasting my money. I even walked 3 times in the past week, so I've added that component (which frankly in the past didn't make diddley difference to my weight loss attempts). Am I doomed to be fat? I can intellectualize this all the way...I get it, but I'm disappointed and angry. There were other people there talking about eating fried chicken and drinking margaritas over the holiday, and still lost. If it were an anonymous meeting, I would have sat there, hearing none of that. Since it is at work....well....then they start asking "did you cheat" "did you get all your healthy guidelines" "stick with it, it works. Argh. I did the program, and I don't want prodding from them. I want results. If I'm working the program, and it isn't working for me, I should quit. So then I'm back to square one. Quitting. Help me folks. Help me. I had to leave the meeting; I couldn't even stay for the chat. I wanted them all to just shut up about their cheating weight loss success. Can you feel my frustration?
Firstly, by your signature, it looks like you are dealing with some challenges that others might not. I'd imagine that hypothyroid and menopausal might have some negative impacts on your weight loss... It sure is tricky to compare our losses to others' because you never know what their specific set of challenges are, compared to your own!!
Would it help you to post a few days' worth of food for members to take a look at? Maybe someone can see something you can't. Sometimes certain foods slow certain people down too, such as dairy or wheat.
There are 1,000,000 possibilities as to why this is happening... If you leave WW, do you have an idea of where you'd go? It wouldn't really be quitting if you are just shifting your eating onto another healthy framework.
The other way of looking at it, of course, is that you're 4.4 lb lighter than you would be if you hadn't started WW!
If it is designed to lose a pound a week, if not 2, and everyone else is doing great, then I'm wasting my money.
Well, the average is 1-2 lbs a week, but for an average to work there has to be people above AND below it. And comparing your progress to anyone else will just leave you, well, frustrated. So don't do it We all lose at our own personal pace and there are lots of factors that come into it.
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Originally Posted by 124chicksinger
I even walked 3 times in the past week, so I've added that component (which frankly in the past didn't make diddley difference to my weight loss attempts). Am I doomed to be fat?
A few weeks ago a friend called me, upset because she'd gained a few pounds. And she said "I even worked out for 45 minutes 5 times this week!" She's been exercising more than ever but all she was focused on was the number on the scale. This has to be about so much more than that. Focus on being HEALTHY. As for being "doomed" to be fat, I don't care what the media says: You CAN be fit and fat and it's possible to be fat and be way healthier than some skinny minnie who eats fast food all the time.
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Originally Posted by 124chicksinger
drinking margaritas over the holiday, and still lost.
I might have done that. I had one margarita on Saturday and lost 1/2 lb when I weighed in on Monday. But I worked my freaking butt off all week and an hour after getting home from the restaurant to be able to drink that margarita. It takes work! And had I gained, that would have been okay, too, BECAUSE I worked my butt off. I exercise more now than I ever have in my entire life. Weight fluctuation is part of the process, which is why it CAN'T just be about the number on the scale. I might still weigh 270+ lbs, but I KNOW that I'm in better shape than 6 years ago when I weighed 220. and THAT is what keeps me motivated.
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Originally Posted by 124chicksinger
I want results.
And you're getting them! This is a marathon, not a race. The weeks add up, I promise! Besides: Would you rather lose weight super quick and not be able to maintain it and gain it all back OR would you rather it be lost slowly, but you learn the skills to help you keep it off? Losing is only half the battle. What happens when you reach goal? It doesn't stay off without work.
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Originally Posted by 124chicksinger
If I'm working the program, and it isn't working for me, I should quit. So then I'm back to square one. Quitting. Help me folks. Help me. I had to leave the meeting; I couldn't even stay for the chat. I wanted them all to just shut up about their cheating weight loss success. Can you feel my frustration?
Don't quit! The fact that you came here shows that you don't want to. You WANT help. But to get help, even here, there might be some prodding. You might have missed something and you might get asked questions. The same questions your leaders asked.
I know it's frustrating and I probably am not being as supportive as I could be, but it's coming from a place of love and wanting to help you! And we're all here for you!
I think it would be helpful to see a few sample days of your tracking. As my leader says, no two points are created equal. You could be getting your points in, but some people need to be a little more mindful about what they spend it on than others if they want to lose weight. And because you have some extra factors working against you, losing weight just might unfortunately be more challenging no matter what plan you follow. But hopefully we can come up with some good ideas for you.
Unfortunately the scale doesn't always match up with the effort too. The more time you spend tracking your weight, the more those patterns and cause/effect relationships will emerge. I'm sure many of us have had weeks where we weigh in after working our tushes off and the scale barely moved, and other weeks it mysteriously drops when we know we haven't been on our best behavior.
When I hit weeks where I feel like I'm getting frustrated, the scale gets sluggish, I just try to focus on other goals. Maybe an activity you like that you'd really be passionate about improving. An exercise class you've always wanted to try. Etc. Even if you're sticking to the plan pretty closely, you may have things you recognize that you could work on.
I have been there and done that!
Sometimes there is no rhyme or reason for it ..it is what it is. But in my past I have found that if I changed up my foods that I ate...instead of fruit for breakfast I ate oatmeal, instead of turkey wrap at lunch, have soup and cracker, try different forms of exercise it seemed to get things going again..
Is there another meeting you could go to and try? I never liked at work for the reason you say, not anonymous. Maybe a different group and leader will feel good.
Also, it sounds like there may be some program tweaks coming out soon. I think that would be worth staying for. The changes might be what you need.
Finally. I'm sorry it is so hard. I've been there, I have. And look at me, still trying to lose. If I'd lost 1/2 a pound per week for the last year and a half is be at goal instead of where I am now. I wish I didn't quit before. Even maintaining for a month can be an accomplishment if you were steadily gaining before. You can do this, you want to do this, just keep at it. Just do not quit unless you have a really really solid plan to keep going with a different method. It makes me wonder do you want to quit ww or give up and give yourself license to go back to bad habits for awhile?
Thank you all for the replies. I apologize for my .... whatever this is.
My enthusiasm is gone, as is my faith in the process.
Since I paid in advance, I'll continue through the next 9 weeks. Money is tight...this was an expense. I should not have let the circumstances of the at-work program get me excited because based on the past, and based on this time around, I can't expect stellar results. That reality, however, is more than I can stand today. And I hate myself for acting like a brat...but I can't help it. I guess I have to feel this till I don't anymore.
There is that saying: if you always do what you always did you always get what you always got. Giving this new WWPP program a chance, thus far, was doing something different. So I guess if I continued to do it, I'd lose at a snail's pace, but I'd lose. That written, after 9 weeks, I'll most likely quit and try calorie counting.
Thanks again for listening to me rant.
I want to go crawl into a hole now and never come out.
Dont ever feel bad for coming and looking for support! That's what this forum is all about. I hope you are able to gain some good knowledge and tools over the next 9 weeks and get something out of the money you've paid. It totally sucks at work program when everyone seems to be doing so much better than you but our program ended a year ago and most that lost so quickly gained it back quick too. That's why I say focus on what you can learn and take with you, not the scale.
4.4 pounds in 7 weeks since starting WWPP. Last week up a pound due to TOM. This week, down .6. I didn't even lose the damned full pound. I'm beyond frustrated and it has only been 7 weeks. I really feel lost, inconsolable, and am questioning the program. If it is designed to lose a pound a week, if not 2, and everyone else is doing great, then I'm wasting my money. I even walked 3 times in the past week, so I've added that component (which frankly in the past didn't make diddley difference to my weight loss attempts). Am I doomed to be fat? I can intellectualize this all the way...I get it, but I'm disappointed and angry. There were other people there talking about eating fried chicken and drinking margaritas over the holiday, and still lost. If it were an anonymous meeting, I would have sat there, hearing none of that. Since it is at work....well....then they start asking "did you cheat" "did you get all your healthy guidelines" "stick with it, it works. Argh. I did the program, and I don't want prodding from them. I want results. If I'm working the program, and it isn't working for me, I should quit. So then I'm back to square one. Quitting. Help me folks. Help me. I had to leave the meeting; I couldn't even stay for the chat. I wanted them all to just shut up about their cheating weight loss success. Can you feel my frustration?
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Originally Posted by 124chicksinger
Thank you all for the replies. I apologize for my .... whatever this is.
My enthusiasm is gone, as is my faith in the process.
Since I paid in advance, I'll continue through the next 9 weeks. Money is tight...this was an expense. I should not have let the circumstances of the at-work program get me excited because based on the past, and based on this time around, I can't expect stellar results. That reality, however, is more than I can stand today. And I hate myself for acting like a brat...but I can't help it. I guess I have to feel this till I don't anymore.
There is that saying: if you always do what you always did you always get what you always got. Giving this new WWPP program a chance, thus far, was doing something different. So I guess if I continued to do it, I'd lose at a snail's pace, but I'd lose. That written, after 9 weeks, I'll most likely quit and try calorie counting.
Thanks again for listening to me rant.
I want to go crawl into a hole now and never come out.
First. The hugs.
Please don't crawl into that hole! It's dank and dark down there, and no good ever comes of it.
Even the most patient person on Earth has frustrating and fed-up moments. Even the most level-headed human has times when they need to rant and let it out. I swear that if the Dalai Lama himself were dieting he'd have venting threads.
There's no reason to compound the frustration with regret about a well-needed catharsis.
As you mentioned, you already paid in advance for the weeks. You might as well use them to the fullest. At the very least, by the end of the weeks you can look back and decide whether WW is worth the cost/effort to you.
However, from your progress so far, it could be that for the next number of weeks WW helps you take off a couple more pounds, or even to maintain what you've lost so far. Which I want to point out, even if it's not worth the cost of the program beyond what you've already paid for, AT LEAST you have lost some pounds and have not gained them back or worse... gained more weight. Losing at a snail's pace is better than not losing at all for the moment.
Is it working? That's only a question you can answer. Have you lost some weight? Yes. So in that sense it does work. Has it been far too difficult? ... I don't know. Is the effort too much for the reward? Again, these are very subjective questions that only you'll know what's right.
I both love and hate the "1-2 lb average" nonsense that goes around. What I love about it. It's not terribly a lot, so people won't think they'll lose 5 pounds a week. It talks about average, so people know there will be up and down weeks. And it gives people an idea about what the program might be able to do for them.
What I hate about it. It doesn't mention truly that it's a MAXIMUM HEALTHY RECOMMENDED weight loss on average per week by most doctors. That doesn't mean it's going to be everyone's average. That means that while they say you can expect to lose that, we have to know our own personal histories and how they might affect the maximum healthy average for us. As mentioned, you might have certain medical conditions that either require you to tweak the system a bit to fit your needs or to look at any percentage of a pound lost as an enormous victory (which it is for everyone!)
The other thing is that while being at work is convenient, it might pile up the frustration, because you know these people. It can be hard to have a difficult couple weeks when those we know around us are having it easy. I promise you they will have or have had hard weeks, too. They will have weeks... or months... when the scale is not their friend. When they pray for .2 of a loss. When they bemoan going each week when it's not giving them what they want.
But, what is it that they want? To lose weight? To keep it off? To lose it fast? These things would be nice. But, only the patient and perseverant are rewarded. And they are only rewarded with the first two. No one can "force" a faster weight loss.
I know. I know. I know. We all know. It's a rough time. You have nine weeks left to absorb anything from the meetings that you might find helpful, and to practice, practice, practice. If you decide that counting calories fits your life better after the nine weeks, then perhaps you'll have taken a few tips from things you've learned on WW and proceed along at a much more content pace.
Just keep in mind that we all have rough spots. Not only on WW, but on any program all over 3FC. We're all just... learning and living.
Just remember all of your conditions involve hormones, and hormones can wreck havic with weight loss. I have PCOS and have always lost weight excruciatingly slow--like 4 pounds a month. But as someone said on one of these boards, their doctor pointed out most people gain weight over time. If you stay the same or even lose a little, you are doing better than average. It took me 1 year on WW to lose 30 pounds, and I have been fighting the next 5 for several months, with 25 to go. But your health needs this. The only thing that has made my PCOS better was to lose weight, but the PCOS makes weightloss hard. Life is not fair, but life trying is better than dying from not doing all we can to try and get/stay healthier....
Hang in there, it will get better.
Hi!! Hang in there. It takes 21 days to form a habit, so give WW 21 days and see how you feel then. I'm very guilty of "the grass is greener" with other weight loss plans, so stick with it for a bit and re-evaluate.
So, here's my two cents on the 2lb weight loss. I have lost a lot of weight in the short 4 months I have been deployed. But here's what I have done to do it:
- 1200 calories a day. This looks like:
bfast: egg white omelette w/veggies, oatmeal, banana, coffee w/creamer- 350 cals
snack: apple- 80 cals
lunch: chicken, f/f italian dressing, vegetables, beans- baked, special K bar (440 cals
snack: apple- 80 cals
dinner: pita w/ turkey deli meat, 1/2 slice cheese, onions, tomatoes, plum: 250 cals
dessert: granola bar: 100 cals
This is not very much food, it's boring, and I often went to bed hungry. I also struggled with eating "junk" and cookies during my weight loss. Along with this I had to work out like crazy. Days off (every other day) 3+ hours in the gym of cardio and weights (average 700-1200 calories burned). Days I fly (every other day) 1.5 hours of cardio/weights (500 cals burned). This allowed me to lose a steady 2lbs a week.
My point is that losing 2lbs a week is very very hard and is a lot of work. The only reason why I was able to do it was because I am deployed and have nothing else to do. I have 10 days before I get home and have switched to the WW core plan, and plan on joining the program for a slow .5-1lb loss a week to reach my final goal. It's much nicer and easier to follow WW to lose the weight slowly. Every .5lb adds up, and in the end it won't matter how long it took to lose. WW allows you to eat to satisfaction, not stress about calories and enjoy a slow weight loss journey. I say hang in there my friend!
One last thing, I'm also following the Beck Diet solution which is amazing. It helps with the brain part of weight loss. I hope my example helped, good luck!!
Aside from my first week, where I lost 3 lbs, I've NEVER lost more than 1lb a week on WW. I average between 0.4 to 0.8 lbs a week. It's so frustrating because I see everyone else losing between 1-2 (and maybe more) a week, but I always have to tell myself that THEY ARE NOT ME.
Yes, if I calorie count I tend to lose more, but I also tend to not eat the healthiest foods - WW helps me focus on nutrition.
As others have said, I would stick it out the remainder of the weeks, and give it all that you've got. Ups and downs on the scale are normal for any weight loss journey.
It may be "designed" to result in 1-2 lbs per week, but I doubt very much that is the true average.
Weight Watchers' doesn't release their exact success rates information. I'm not bashing WW, it's just a fact, they do not share this information. And you don't ever see how many people have lost less than you or have gained. You only see the successes. If your leader does read off how many gains and how many losses occurred that week (I remember some leaders doing that in the past) - you can calculate the "real average" for yourself by dividing that number by the number of people who are in the meeting (that's going to be an unfairly high estimate, because the leader probably will not tell you how many people weighed in without staying for the meeting - that's going to make the average seem higher than it is).
Usually though the leaders will only announce how many pounds the group lost. You can still divide that by the number of people in the group - but that's going to give an unfairly high estimate, because it won't count the people who gained.
You might consider trying TOPS (taking off pounds sensibly) either in place of Weight Watchers or in addition to it (you can be a member of both groups if you want to). In most TOPS chapters, more information is shared with the group (not only the total losses, but usually also the total gains, the net gain or loss and the number of people weighing in). You can divide the net gain/loss by the number of people weighing in to see what normal weight loss really looks like (and it's not 1-2 lbs per week, every week for everyone - or hardly anyone).
Independent research at the Medical College of Wisconsin has found that the success rate for TOPS and other weight loss clubs to be as successful as WW. Weight Watcher'scorporate didn't release the information, but the study followed people participating in groups like TOPS, Weight Watchers, OA, First Place, and other weight loss clubs. The study found similar results for people who stuck with the group and attended meetings regularly. The longer the person stayed in the group, the more similar the results.
Again, I'm not saying this to bash WW. It's not in their best interest to point out how many people lose less than 1 lb per week, or how many people lose nothing, or gain once in a while - or how often it is "normal" to gain. Their profits rest on the impression of success. And while true success is still great and amazing success at less than 1 lb per week (most people do not accomplish that), we don't see that as success in our culture. If WW let it be known that the true average was less than 1/2 lb per week, they would lose business, because we don't define that as success in our culture (even though it's a success most don't acheive).
The 1-2 lb average weight loss is largely myth. Many people do acheive it, and some people even achieve more, but many people (more people) don't.
Read the IP thread and you'll even see people who aren't managing the 1-2 lbs average, and IP is an extremely low-calorie diet (so low-calorie, that it's somewhat controversial).
Slow loss isn't failure, and people need to know that. I'm firmly convinced that most people don't quit because they're failing, they're quitting because they feel like they're failing and they can't see their success for what it is, because the see all the people who are doing better than they are, and none of the people who are doing worse.
It's as if we're in a huge marathon, and we see the 1,000 people ahead of us, so we think we're in last place, only because we haven't looked back to see the 50,000 people behind us, envying our success.
It's taken me 7 years to lose 94 lbs, and I'im still constantly amazed at how many people tell me they envy my success. Envy? An average of one quarter of a pound per week? .25 of a pound? Really?
Yes, they envy it, because they did not acheive it. They lost nothing or gained during the last 7 years, even though they may feel like they dieted during most of it.
Any maintained weight loss is a dramatic and unusual acheivement. If you stick with it, you will eventually get to your goal (and even if you don't you will have maintained a 12 lb loss, a 6% body weight loss, which is nothing to sneeze at). If you decide that you've failed, you will quit and you will regain what you've lost, and probably a few pounds more (because it always seems to happen that way).
I'm not saying you have to stay with Weight Watchers, but quitting entirely and not acknowleging the success you've had (it's not failure) will accomplish nothing (except weight gain).
Aside from my first week, where I lost 3 lbs, I've NEVER lost more than 1lb a week on WW. I average between 0.4 to 0.8 lbs a week. It's so frustrating because I see everyone else losing between 1-2 (and maybe more) a week, but I always have to tell myself that THEY ARE NOT ME.
I guarantee you that "everyone else" is not losing 1-2 lbs. There are others like you, far more than you realize, and probably even sitting next to you in the meeting. You just aren't hearing their stories, because they're probably not sharing them (have you shared your results with the group?) It's very likely that someone just like you, is assuming that you are part of the same group of "everyone" losing better than she is. Even the person who you see being recognized for a large loss, may not be losing every week like that.
As much as I loved WW when I was a member, comparing it to my current group (TOPS, taking off pounds sensibly) it makes me very sad that WW doesn't announce what my TOPS group does. Every week we learn who gained, lost, or stayed the same (my current group even shares the amount we each lost or gained). Because of the openness, we all get to see what real weight loss looks like and it's not 1-2 lbs per week, every week (it usually isn't even an average of 1-2 lbs per week).
I know why WW can't share the information, because no one would want to pay for weight loss that "slow" (even though it isn't slow at all, in reality - because it's far more than most people accomplish).
It looks like everyone has offered you some great insight, and I just wanted to add that I did WW at work, and I hated the meetings so much that for most of them, I ended up going to a community meeting and telling them I was an at work member. I weighed in and stayed for the meeting there. I'm pretty sure you are "allowed" do that at least a certain amount of times. I would try that out.
I need help people
