Hi, everyone... I just started back on WW Saturday, hopefully armed with all the knowledge to keep me from failing at it -- AGAIN. I have a specific question. Before starting WW, I was trying for three 8-ounce servings of dairy a day, mainly ff milk. That's like 12 points a day for milk alone. How is everyone else handling the dairy thing?

Personally, I shoot for 3 servings of FF dairy a day too, especially after reading that this level boosts weight loss, on WebMD.

From http://my.webmd.com/content/article/85/98720.htm
"What that means is that if you're including three to four servings of dairy in your diet, you can make a modest degree of calorie restriction as effective as a severe degree of calorie restriction," Zemel tells WebMD.
In addition, researchers found the high-dairy group lost significantly more body fat than those in the other groups, particularly from the midsection. Excess fat in the abdominal area has been linked to a higher risk of heart attack and other health problems.

A serving in the WebMD article quoted above is 1 cup of milk or yogurt, 1.5 oz. hard cheese or 2 oz. processed cheese (like cellophane-wrapped slices.) This a little bit different from the WW servings of 1 oz. hard/semisoft cheese or 3/4 oz. processed cheese, so Points need to be increased accordingly.

3 cups of FF milk is only 6 Points. Not too bad! But then, 3 cups of WHOLE milk is 12 Points.

Choosing fat-free products makes a big difference in Points. And sugar-free, for that matter. I just noticed that my fat-free Stonyfield Farm vanilla yogurt has a lot of sugar in it: 33 grams per 1 cup. It's the second ingredient after the non-fat milk - yikes! Gotta shop better next time heh!

Thank you, Berk. I was accidentally looking at evaporated milk points. Half a cup of that is 2 points, but a whole cup of regular skim is 2 points. Whew!

I also try really hard to get the milk in my diet, a smoothie, a glass of milk, then some cheese somewhere!

Bear in mind that the recommendations for dairy intake are really recommendations for CALCIUM intake.

There are many non-dairy whole food sources of calcium that are low in points (see this useful list at http://www.vrg.org/nutrition/calcium.htm). This page also talks about how calicum in different types of foods are absorbed, osteoporosis, etc. It is written by Reed Mangels, a well-known Registered Dietician who specializes in vegetarian and vegan nutrition.

I eat almost no dairy (for both ethical and health reasons), but have a very calcium-rich diet.

I also strive for 3 servings of dairy a day. Luckily, I like dairy products and I don't have any adverse side effects from eating them. I think you can also get calcium-enriched OJ and other products in addition to other foods that naturally contain calcium.

The way I do it is by eating nonfat pudding (2 points for a snack cup), a BabyBel Light (1 point), and either nonfat yogurt (Breyer's, 2 points) or some 1% chocolate milk. I also sometimes drink 1% milk (hate skim!) or mix it with cereal or oatmeal and fruit.