Let me just start this post by saying that Weight Watchers (WW) works. I know it works. I've seen it work for my friends, my mom, and other meeting goers. That being said ...
I have a long history with WW. My first experience was when I was 20 years old. At 20 years old I was 5'6" and 120 pounds and thought I was huge. Oh, if only I could go back and slap my 20-year-old self in the face and tell her to wise up ... My mother and her best friend were attending WW and I decided to tag along. I paid the fee, filled out the paperwork and climbed onto the scale. The person recording weights promptly looked up at me, told me I wasn't allowed to stay and refunded my money. In 1990, WW did not allow you to join their program unless you were 10 pounds over the lowest recommended weight for your age/height. I was only five pounds over. Today, I don't believe WW cares. I think they will take even the smallest person you can find as long as they have one pound to lose and are interested in maintaining the loss of that one pound for a lifetime.
My next tale from the scale came 3 months after the birth of my first child. If you read my blog you know that I gained a significant amount of weight while pregnant. I knew I needed to do something when I was getting dressed to take the baby out to a well-baby visit and threw on some jeans ... thought it was weird that they were so long ... took them off and realized that they were my husband's. My husband is 6'4" and weighed somewhere in the vicinity of 195 pounds at that time. I had not only put on his jeans in my haste, I had fit into his jeans and they were a tad tight. I sat on the bed and cried (not the first or last time this has happened in regard to my weight). That following week I signed up for the WW at-work program.
For you younger readers and for those of you who have never jumped on the WW bandwagon ... there was no "points" system in 1994. WW had an "exchange" system. For example, you had a certain number of "exchanges" for each food group ... dairy, meat, bread, vegetable, fruit, etc. The number of "exchanges" you received each day were determined by your age, height and weight. I don't quite remember what my particular number of "exchanges" were for each day ... all I know is that after the first day, I had checked off all of my "exchanges" by luncthime, went home and was in bed by 7:00 p.m. I did this regularly. Allow me to let you in on a little secret ... the "exchange" system worked ... because it starved you to death. I literally went to bed hungry every night. But I did it and I was pretty successful. I never got back to my pre-baby weight, however, because I got pregnant with my next child very soon after.
After my second child was born I was back on the WW program and started attending meetings with my mother at a WW center in Erie, PA. My mom and I went to the meeting every Saturday. At this time they were still on an "exchange" system but the center offered prepared foods for you to purchase. So that's exactly what I did. I purchased one week's worth of breakfasts, lunches, dinners and snacks. It was a perfect relationship for me because at the time, I was a stay-at-home mom with a one-year-old and newborn. I lost a lot of weight. I really did. Nine months after my daughter was born I went back to work part-time and was at my lowest weight since my first pregnancy. I looked and felt fantastic. And then ...
WW broke my heart. They stopped carrying the prepared meals. I had to learn how to eat on my own. I had a husband who traveled all week for his job, I was working part-time and was basically a single mother to a toddler and a baby. Without the structure of the prepared meals ... I threw the towel in and let the weight pile back on.
Throughout the years I've tried a lot of diets. One time I purchased a "patch," kind of like a smoker's "patch" that promised to burn calories (or something like that) throughout the day if you wore it. I tried HerbaLife diet pills which proved to be the cause of several trips to the doctor and many painful urinary tract infections. I tried Atkins. I tried South Beach. I tried living on rice and beans (that's actually true ... you can ask my poor husband). I tried everything except eating less and exercising more ... hmmmmmmm.
After moving to Corry and hooking up with my "peeps" (according to my kids, this a very uncool reference to my best girlfriends), we all decided to give WW a go and joined the 12:00 p.m. group here in our home town. We were all stay-at-home moms of school-aged children. We had all sat and complained about our weight for years and decided to go together.
My "peeps" were crazy good at WW. WW had now changed to a "points" system and they were rocking it out. Every week they lost 4 pounds, 3 pounds, 2 pounds, 5 pounds. Me? I lost every week ... but my losses were a lot less significant. My average weight loss per week was ... wait for it ... .2 ... yea ... that's not a typo ... I said .2 pounds per week. A green bean. I worked my butt off every week. Stayed within my points balance. Walked 3 miles, 5 times per week with the "peeps." And I lost an average of .2 pounds per week.
One particular week I met the peeps at our meeting and I was dressed to the nines. I had a zebra print skirt, thin black turtleneck, black stockings and hot black high-heeled boots. I was going to rock this weigh-in. I had lost .2 pounds per week for 3 weeks in a row. I had upped the exercise, upped the fruits and veggies and was waiting in line to prove to everyone there that felt sorry for me (because they did) that I could kick WW's ass. The next thing that happened has gone down in history as one of my "peeps" favorite stories to repeat and made me a legend among WW in this town ...
I pulled all of my 5'6" frame onto that scale looking hot and feeling good .. my WW leader recorded the weight, looked at me and said "0." What? "You didn't lose anything this week." Sorry? "But you didn't gain either so that's good." Good my ASS. I looked up from the scale and screamed (actually screamed), "Son of a .... (paused to look for small children) BITCH." Got off that scale, put my high heels on, grabbed my purse and without saying another word, "clicked, clicked, clicked" right out of that meeting without looking back, without saying good-bye to my peeps, without passing GO and collecting $200. You could have heard a pin drop. I didn't go back for 3 years.
The fact of the matter is ... I did lose weight. Just not very much every week. If your average weight loss is .2 pounds per week ... it's going to take you 5 weeks to lose ONE pound. Where's the incentive in that? I decided there had to be something wrong with me medically. I had my thyroid checked. I had my sugar checked. I went through a battery of blood tests and every one came back fine. So the problem was not with WW ... it was with me.
I'd like to say that I came to that conclusion after my first battery of medical tests declared me healthy. I didn't. I just came to that realization recently. You see, the points system works. It basically allows you to eat anything you want ... in moderation. Well if I could eat everything in moderation I wouldn't be fat, would I? No. I wouldn't.
Did you know that you can stay completely within your "points" balance on WW and eat a chocolate donut three times per week? You can. You can also add potato chips and nachos and stay within your points balance. You can. You shouldn't. But you can. And I did. As a matter of fact, when the peeps and I used to attend WW meetings together, our favorite part was leaving and going to McDonald's afterward for a "12-point lunch." Every Friday. We ate McDonald's every Friday because we could. For them, adding the junk didn't hurt. For me, it was a disaster.
I continued to go to WW on and off for years and years and years. As a matter of fact, my WW leader keeps my card on file because she knows no matter how long I'm away ... sooner or later I will be back. It's my addiction. I've tried WW online. I subscribe to their magazine. I cook from their cookbooks. I exercise to their DVDs. Nothing works. Nothing over .2 pounds works. I may lose a pound per week here or there but I continue to stay at an average of .2.
So, after 20 years of my on-again/off-again relationship with WW, I finally had to make the break. WW had become like an abusive boyfriend ... lifting me up only to beat me back down again. On November 29, 2010 I officially broke up with WW and don't ever plan on going back no matter how many times he tries to lure me back in ... asking for "one more chance."
Isn't it ironic, knowing my disdain for the "W" clothing line, that I would stay in a relationship with a company that has "WW" as their initials??? Good-bye WW. It was quite a ride ...
© 2010-2011 Melanie L. Miller All Rights Reserved
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