Tag Archives: weight watchers

The silence of shame

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Link courtesy of Anderz Printz via flickr.

So.

It has been a while since I posted here. Two months to the day, actually. After making all these bold statements about how I was changing the way the site was going to be presented and talked about how things were going to be different I just kind of…went away.

I wonder how many of you I even have left at this point?

I wish I could say that the reason I’ve been gone is because I’ve been so busy whipping my ass into shape that I couldn’t even squeeze time to write a post because I was too busy squeezing awesome out of every second of my day.

I wish I could say that.

I can’t.

Truth is? I’m struggling, friends.

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Equivalencies

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Photo courtesy of Archigeek via Flickr

I recently celebrated my 10th anniversary with Weight Watchers.

Honestly, I can’t say that I really “celebrated” it. Hell, I didn’t even go to my meeting that week (not from a lack of desire to do so, but we have been down to the final few weeks of a show that I’m in and I haven’t had the time). One would also think that, after ten years, I would have hit Lifetime status and that my relationship with Weight Watchers would be restricted to maintaining my goal weight.

That, unfortunately, is not the case.

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We fear change!

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On Friday, November 5th, 2010, Weight Watchers made a pretty major announcement.

They are changing the POINTS system.They haven’t given out any details yet, but if the video below is any indicator this isn’t like the changes we’ve seen in the past where they have given you options other than POINTS to track your food intake (options such as Core or Filling foods). No, from the sound of it they are going to fundamentally change the way POINTS are calculated.

This scares the crap out of me.

January 21st, 2011, will mark my 10 year anniversary on Weight Watchers. While I have not yet hit my ultimate goal weight, I have managed to lose and keep off approximately 170 pounds. I know the POINTS system like the back of my hand, and I can tell you the POINTS values of many foods without having to look them up. Now? All of that may change. I’m going to have to re-learn the program all over again.

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Thar she blows!

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You discover some interesting things about yourself when you are trying out a colon cleansing program for the first time. You’ll find out whether or not you have enough fiber in your diet, whether you’re drinking enough water, and (perhaps most interestingly) that you’re fully capable of taking a close look at the toilet to see if anything interesting is going on down there. When you’re doing this as a review for a web site, you’ll also find out that you’re going to have to write about that particular part of the experiment.

The things I do for you people.

I have completed my first two weeks of the DrNatura Colonix Advanced Internal Cleansing Program. From the point on the post may, at times, devolve into some slightly graphic discussion. I’m not going to get too terribly detailed in those sections, and as I promised before there will be no pictures, but I figured it was wise to get that particular disclaimer out of the way before we went on.

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The end times are here

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I browse through a lot of health and fitness related news every day in order to try and find things that can help our readers here improve their lives. In doing so I come across a fair number of unusual topics, but more often than not most of the things I read tend to get repetitive. That’s why, when I opened up my reader this morning, I darn near spewed a mouthful of coffee all over my dual monitor setup after I saw one of the headlines.

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Slow and steady wins the race

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Bugs Bunny and Cecil Turtle are registered trademarks of Warner Brothers

Dieting is a touchy subject. We all have our own ideas as to what is the “best” way to lose weight, and with very little research we can often find studies that back up our claim. What’s more, we’re all pretty defensive of our choices. Getting together in a room full of low-carb and low-fat dieters and asking them which is the better way to diet is as fraught with danger as standing in the middle of the lobby of the Marriott at Dragon*Con with a bullhorn and asking what the best Science Fiction series is.

In the spirit of full disclosure I have to admit that I am a low-fat, calorie counting dieter. That’s what Weight Watchers® really is, when you get right down to it. They just wrap it up in a convenient system and assign food point values. I’ve been on Weight Watchers for over 9 years now and while the amount of weight I have lost has varied consistently I have managed to maintain the large majority of my loss following that program. As a result, I am obviously biased toward low-fat diets and a big proponent of them. I truly believe that portion control, exercise, and healthy food choices are the key factors in losing weight and keeping it off.

A study released in the Annals of Internal Medicine seems to back me up on that.

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User Queries : How many calories?

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Image courtesy of db*photography

Image courtesy of db*photography

I’d like to lose the 20lbs that stand between me and a size 12, or  even the 50lbs that stand between me and a size “Wow!”.  I know that to do so I need to make calories in less than calories out. But how many calories should I shoot for in general?

I’ve used a number of calculators, with so vastly different results.

Here’s two examples:

The American Cancer Society says I need 2318.

The Mayo Clinic says I need 1550.

What gives? Where can I get a reliable number?

Thanks,
Naomi

Ok.  Wow.  You guys have really decided to stop throwing softballs at us when it comes to these questions, haven’t you?  Next time why not ask us how to perform open heart surgery or something?  Sheesh.

Seriously, though – The reason this is a difficult question is because the first (and most honest) response is “it depends.”  It depends on a lot of things.  It depends on how old you are, how tall you are, how much you weigh currently, how active you are, what your sex is, and what type of calories you’re putting in to your body (a 1200 calorie a day diet consisting of nothing but Snickers bars isn’t very likely to warrant positive results).  With all of those factors in place it is no wonder that you’re having a hard time finding a solid answer to your question.

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Five breakfast options for 100 calories or less

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Powdered Toast Man!Breakfast is the most important meal of the day.

When it comes to healthy eating battle cries this has to be one of the most common ones. However, despite the scientific evidence proving the statement above to be true quite there are a great deal of people who choose to skip off on breakfast before starting their day. For some folks it is simply because the allure of sleeping an extra 30 minutes is too great to pass up. If you’re trying to lose weight you may skip off on breakfast because you’re not sure of the healthy, low-calorie options that are out there. Many of the popular breakfast options that we’re familiar with such as pancakes, doughnuts, fried eggs, and biscuits with sausage gravy really don’t fall into the “light” category.

Not every breakfast has to be a big bowl of Chocolate Frosted Sugar Bombs. If you’re looking for a healthier way to start your day I have five options that may just tickle your fancy.

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Walking to Seattle

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Image by Ken Lund

Image by Ken Lund

Over the last few months I’ve been taking part in the Weight Watchers® Walk-!t Challenge.  The program is a partnership between Weight Watchers and Active.com that encouraged Weight Watchers members to sign up for and complete a 5K walk for charity.  As part of the program Weight Watchers provided trainers to those who signed up for the challenge to help prepare them for the 5k.  I’ve never taken part in any kind of event like this before, so while I already walk considerably more than 5k on a daily basis I thought it was a great opportunity to get some more exercise in to my routine and I signed up.

I got an email this morning from my trainer that got me thinking.  Amusingly enough it wasn’t part of the email itself but her signature that sent the wheels in my head spinning.

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User Queries : The Dreaded “D” Word

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Questions

Image by marcobellucci

I recently got my Diabetes status alert level to “OMGITSNEAR,” which means that I have to both lose weight and be pickier about what I eat. I was wondering if there are any common drinks or foods that I should avoid which might seem healthy at first glance but are not.

For instance, I’ve heard that sports drinks like Gatorade and Cereals like corn flakes should be be on my “do not consume” list because they contain lots of sugar, even though they’re supposed to be alright for consumption for a healthy body. At the same time, it seems that eating chocolate flavored oatmeal with nonfat milk might be bad, but is supposed to be alright. As you can guess, I’m a bit confused.

Any advice for people trying to avoid diabetes while eating right?

– Victor

I can certainly understand the confusion you’re dealing with at the moment.  Diabetes is a scary and intimidating disease and there is a lot of misinformation out there about it.  To many folks a diabetic is someone who isn’t allowed to eat candy bars, but the reality is that not only can a diabetic person eat a candy bar if they want to there are times when a candy bar could be the best thing to keep them from going into a coma!  I could go on at length about Diabetes here (and my original response to you started down that path), but I’ll do my best to stay focused so that Krystalle doesn’t beat me with the editor stick.

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