Weight Watchers

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Weight Watchers re-invents themselves -- and stays Cutting Edge

Most of us remember Weight Watchers from the Jean Nidetch days. I first joined in 1972 just after they had dropped parts of the original "New York Obesity diet" which had helped the founder to lose a lot of weight.  The original Weight Watchers diet included liver once a week, fish 3-5 times a week, all the veggies you could eat (as long as they were not on the forbidden list), fruits and a longer list of foods you COULDN'T eat than those foods you could eat.  Offering accountability as well as support in meetings, it remained state of the art as dieting goes.

I was an original Weight Watcher (I lost 35 lbs and kept off my weight for a year with the help of 8 cans of diet cola a day but when I had to give up cola because I developed an allergy to it and started to feel serious fatigue,  I dropped off, and re-gained 90 lbs).  Much later, I found out the fatigue was due to an inherited vitamin B12 deficiency.  Taking sub lingual B12's twice a day have done away with fatigue completely!  But I digress...

 Weight Watchers has not stood still.  It is a multi million dollar corporation today, (until recently was owned by the Heinz companies but now is an international corporation separate from the Heinz companies).  Weight Watchers has a scientific advisory committee which includes some respected authorities in dieting and obesity, including Dr. Stanley Heshka, Dr Julie Stern and Dr. Xavier Pi-Sunyer.

Weight Watchers now offers a composite program called "Momentum" which includes parts of the former "CORE" program (where you are limited to a smaller number of foods that are very filling but you don't have to count points) and the Flex points program, which I prefer because you can have any food you want and even a treat every so often - but you do count points.  Points are easier to count than calories because you are working with 2 digits instead of 1000's like with calories. 

Weight Watchers is the only diet which was proven effective at all in any studies.  A Weight Watchers financed study by Stanley Heshka suggested that the average net weight loss over a 2 year period was only 11 lbs which is less than impressive. But one of their studies of people in their computers, found that 80 percent of those who attended meetings kept at least 70-80 percent of their weight off.

I re-joined in 1975, went to several meetings, lost a few pounds and dropped off.

I re-joined in 2002, when it was winning points (which isn't as flexible as Flex points or momentum). I ended up losing 27 lbs but then, starting to cheat a bit and even while exercising every day, ended up regaining 60 lbs putting me at my highest weight ever.  One thing which hurt my program was that I started feeling that fatigue again (the B12 shortage) and another thing was that those in the family who had regained were definitely nicer to me when I was eating more than when I was trying to stay on program - and they are important to me - besides I got tired of getting the cold shoulder from my friends who had regained.

Weight Watchers has remade itself again.  They now tell people coming in up front, that if they want to keep the weight off, they will have to stay on program.  "It's a lifestyle, not a diet" they say.

What might be the one of the best parts of the program are the ten "tools for living", cognitive therapeutic techniques for dealing with emotional eating.  Unfortunately, few of the leaders teach these tools and the member is often left to learn it for themselves (so they don't take advantage of them).

When I was going to meetings, about 50 percent of the leaders attritioned, many due to regain. It's hard to stay on program however you cut it, even with a good strong program like Weight Watchers.

I ended up going back on program for a health reason. When I have about 1200 calories a day, I don't have any GERD or reflux (have a hiatal hernia and have suffered with this all my life. Even on a low fat diet, I would be awakened with a throatful of stomach acid.).  I didn't really think I'd lose any weight since I didn't do too well the three times around but this time, I was very careful in counting my points nightly on the website (they have some really nice tools available in Weight Watchers on line and it's very reasonable to join also) and ended up losing 90 lbs to the lowest weight I've been in 35 years which so far, I've kept off.

Because Weight Watchers has a very strong support system and offers a healthy diet (although there are folks who would argue that ANY low calorie diet cannot be healthy!), most medical providers feel Weight Watchers is the best way to go. 

When I rejoined in 2002, I attended meetings for 2 years but ended up getting bummed at the weekly weigh-in (I do remember my referring to my attending a meeting as a "meeting with my parole officer" and then wondering why I had a parole officer since the only "crime" I had committed is having a genetically obese body).

Also, some of the folks who work there as clerks were less than sympathetic If you had a gain while you have been "OP" or "On Program" - some tell you that couldn't possibly be true.  I was almost asked to leave a couple of times.