Vegetarians: Loose Weight with Weight Watchers

Different people find success (and sometimes, failure) at weight loss by following a diet plan. Dozens and dozens of plans, regimens and boxed and bottled meals abound. I know a woman who has lost more than 30 pounds by ordering all of her boxed dinners from an online seller. She has been successful, and for her, not having to decide what to eat and then get to work cooking it was helpful. But diet plans such as these assume that we all want pre-packaged steak and chicken cutlets mixed into alfredo pasta. I spent several years trying to find a diet plan that I could alter to make it fit my vegetarian lifestyle. I replaced steamed broccoli, rice and chicken with steamed broccoli, rice, and Quorn brand “naked cutlets.” But it’s hard to constantly look for ways to modify a diet that wasn’t meant to fit my food choices and my lifestyle. Forcing something on myself that wasn’t meant for me never worked out well; I did not see success when trying to diet by that method.

When I found Weight Watchers, I was embarrassed at the idea that friends and family would think I needed a support group to overcome my weight difficulties.

But my neighbor, who was already enrolled in Weight Watchers, was insistent. She gave me coupons, told me stories, asked me to ride there with her, and didn’t take no for an answer. I was skeptical, but she was so persistent, I thought the only way to tell her “no” would be to try it and then tell her it wasn’t right for me.

One meeting changed my attitude. On the Weight Watchers Flex plan, I could eat anything my heart (and conscience) desired. Vegan meatballs, frozen Pad Thai with tofu, Amy’s pasta bowls, soy cheese… everything I typically ate was fair game. That’s because the Weight Watchers Flex plan doesn’t tell you what to eat. It helps you determine how much to eat. There are no restrictions on foods, as long as you can determine its POINTS value.

Let me illustrate how it works by using myself as an example. When I joined, I weighed 154 pounds. A standard chart uses weight to determine how many daily POINTS each member is allotted, and at that weight I could eat 22 POINTS per day. The less you weigh, the fewer POINTS you get.

Every food has a POINTS value. You can determine a food’s value by finding its calorie, fiber and fat content and entering that information into the online points calculator, or by using the (very low tech and portable) paper calculator members receive upon registration.

Here’s an example of how daily POINTS work

If I calculate that 1 slice of whole wheat bread is 2 POINTS and a slice of soy cheese is 1 POINT, I can have half a cheese sandwich for 3 POINTS. Vegetables are 0 points, so I can add lettuce and tomato to my sandwich and still have a 3 POINT meal. If I have 22 POINTS for the whole day, and all I’ve eaten in this sandwich, I have 19 POINTS remaining. Fattening comfort foods are not off limits. Let’s say I know I want veggie lasagna for dinner and I know each serving is 6 POINTS. With 19 POINTS to spare, I have can eat 2 servings and still have enough POINTS for a dessert.

This method of planning and calculating food POINTS values doesn’t emphasize meats or other unethical foods over all others. In fact, it encourages consumption of vegetables by making them 0 POINTS. You can have as many in a day as you want. The POINTS system allows vegetarians the freedom to incorporate anything into their daily diets, provided they have access to that food’s nutritional information.

I encourage all vegetarians who want to loose weight to drop the diets that weren’t made to fit the vegetarian lifestyle and give Weight Watchers a try.