Hi All! I've just started this WW thing a week ago, and I'm doing it online so I don't have any "leader" to ask, so I'm hoping you guys can help me out!

I'm a nurse and work nights. Many times I sleep during the day, go to work, start my shift and don't get a chance to really eat until well after midnight. When should those "points" be counted? During the day I missed my lunch and dinner or the actual day I'm eating them... I ask because many times due to my schedule I will only end up eating breakfast, sleeping, going to work and then not eating again (anything substantial... I'm lucky if I can get an apple in!) until technically the next day.

Also... with Points + program are we ONLY supposed to be counting points or should we be counting the calories too? I eat a lot of fruits/veggies that count as 0 points, but aren't necessarily low in calories!

Thanks for any help you guys could give me! Really struggling with figuring out how to "count points" on my insane schedule!!

You count points only, no calories. In fact, calories aren't even a part of the mathematical formula which determines the point value.

If your schedule is hectic, make your "day" whatever works for you. As long as you are consistent it doesn't matter if your day is from 12:00 AM to 11:59 PM or or if it's 10:00 AM to 9:59 AM. Just do it the same every day.

Fruits and veggies are zero points, but remember they are ONLY zero points if you don't add anything countable to them. Butter or oil on your veggies? You have to count both the oil AND the veggies. Same thing with fruit. If you add sugar or if you eat canned with extra sugar added (canned in fruit juice and DRAINED is fine, according to the WW website), you have to count the fruit ADD whatever you added to it. Fruits and veggies also count full value if you put them in a recipe, like carrot cake! Dried fruit also counts as points.

Now, they are "free" but 0 point fruit wasn't intended as a way to work the system. If you are eating tons and tons of fruit as a way to fill your belly... like 8 bananas a day or something, then yeah, you are working the system and it's not going to work. I guess my best advice here is to learn what a "serving size" of fruit is. Here's an example.. Most people eat a "portion" of banana,which is one banana. However, when you calculate the nutritional value of a banana, a "serving size" is 1/2 of a banana (about 4 inches or so). Then take that information and plug it into your healthy checks on the WW tracker. You should be getting at least 5, but the checks stop at 8 so I would be cautious going much more than 8 servings.

Here's a rough estimate of actual serving sizes of fruit

Fruits
1/2 banana (or one small, less than 6 inches)
6 strawberries
2 plums
10-12 grapes
1 apple (a small one, eaten off the core. if it's big or if i slice it up, i count it as two because i think i eat more of the fruit when it's sliced. I don't eat too close to the core)
1 peach (not a huge one. think 1/2 cup)

Vegetables
5 broccoli florets
10 baby carrots
1 roma tomato
4 slices of an onion

Remember that corn and potatoes have points, even sweet potatoes.. and also beans (except green beans) definitely have points, including soybeans or edamame (as I learned the hard way this week!)

Putting butter on the veggies doesn't mean having to count the veg.Just count the butter or oil.

Veg servings and fruit servings are 1/2 cup.Leafy greens being an exception.

This might be more of a personal thing... I read when I first started Weight Watchers that you can only count it as free if the whole thing is free. If you are adding something to it, that changes the "experience" of eating it and it becomes a recipe or a "side dish", not a vegetable.

Here's from the website.

"There is an adjustment made in the Daily Target for eating fruits and vegetables with a Points Plus™ value of 0. This adjustment was based on eating the foods in their “natural and singular” state. Once you start combining vegetables and fruits with other foods, you change the experience of eating them. Few people go crazy on plain carrots but might on carrot cake. To ignore that would place our member at risk for abuse potential."

To me, that means if you are adding something with points to the vegetable, it's no longer in it's "natural and singular" state and I need to count it. That's what I was getting at with the comment about "working the system". Depending on the way you eat, you can use Weight Watchers to justify eating an incredibly large amount of food, but you aren't going to lose weight that way.

I think you can interpret the 0 point things in a number of ways. For me, I count it, in part because if put butter or cheese on a vegetable, I'm going to eat a heck of a lot more of it than I am if it's just plain. That's too many unaccounted-for calories for me.

There is a big difference between a carrot cake which is a genuine recipe,and a serving of veg with say olive oil.Tow items do not a recipe make.Sure if you use the recipe builder it would count as points because the recipe builder is not set up to recognize 0 point veggies. This question gets brought up a lot of the message boards on the site.The answer is always the same.

I am sorry if I come off as a pain or anything it is not my intention. Everyone perceives the program differently.

Thanks for the help! I've been simply adding points by the day I actually eat them (which leaves me with some days of 2-5 points for breakfast, but so be it!) Helps me keep track.

I typically eat my veggies raw with 2tbsp of Low-fat dressing. I measure them by weight (3oz of cucumber, 2oz baby carrot.. etc.) and that's how I enter it into the counter. Hoping that's right or I've been doing it wrong for a week! My fruits I do count as 1 serving (I had no clue a banana was only 1/2 the banana!! I hope it wont' screw up my points!!)


Thanks for the help!! :P

I work nights as a nurse aide. What I do is when I wake up, I consider any activity or food as TOMORROW. So, when I wake up at 8pm tonight, I will log it under 1/22/2013 instead of 1/21. What I am so happy about with WW mobile (that's where I track most) is that I can skip to the next day unlike sparkpeople and other apps. Just make sure when you hit add to tracker, that it says the next day. I realized the other day that I added a photo on the wrong day. If I do stay up, I'll have my points roll over around noon to 2. Since that would be like my "midnight."