Ex Slimming World Disordered Eating Recovery #2 Underestimating Our Desire To Eat Pasta

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Weirdly one of the 'positives' of lockdown (I use that word extremely loosely considering the absolute devastation caused) was it took me away from a dangerous SW obsession that was forming post giving birth. My logic was I'm not counting syns during a global pandemonium and if I want cake I will damn well eat it. I never went back.

My child is now nearly 4 and I'm only just beginning to recover and losing weight at a healthy rate thanks to some education on genuine good nutrition.
 
Mr Krabs said:
A friend of mine lost about 11st on Slimming World. IIRC, she won some kind of biggest loser award in group, and then some sort of regional award. She then got approached by SW‘s PR team and they asked if she wanted to be in the Daily Mail with a few other women who’d lost a similar amount. Her weight loss story had a certain angle, and that’s pretty much all they focused on for the whole piece. And yeah, they banged on a LOT about pasta. Like she mentioned in her interview she liked pasta and they went on about how she could still gorge on pasta, making her sound really greedy! She also featured in a bunch of other papers as syndicated content and got into like three of those really crap women’s magazines. Think Take a Break but worse.

She did keep the weight off but she lot it in her early 20s and became very active, so I think that helped a lot.
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Because the eat unlimited pasta tags is part of their unique selling point, that's the part that draws desperate people in to their Web of lies

They fail to mention that you get smaller so feel like eating less, so you're in a natural deficit. That's how it's supposed to work, but sadly people become obsessed with losing and are spurned on with all the marketing and psychological crap they push on you, so very often it ends up in an eating disorder
 
Honestly, this may be dramatic but I really feel like slimming world ruined my relationship with food and my life tbh. I actually featured in one of their magazines at one point and was so extremely focused on the diet. I developed bulimia and restricted food so much I was severely underweight, I weighed about 6 and a half stone at my lowest. My mum suffered with an eating disorder too (not as a result of slimming world) and so nobody in my life really stopped me, I also had a job where the desired look was to be skinny.
I had a baby two years ago and found my relationship with food improving, I practically recovered and gained about5 stone overall.
I recently re joined slimming world and all those toxic habits have come flooding back. I allow myself treats on weigh days only which usually result in bingeing and purging. I recently went on a holiday over Easter and gained 1/2lb whilst I was there, I had had some extra treats but was still staying ‘on plan’ whilst there. My’consultant’ text me the next day as I don’t usually stay for group and said she’d noticed I’d had a gain, I should stay for group if I’m wanting to be serious about this and to remember ‘Rome wasn’t built in a day’. I have decided to stop going to group and to continue to try and lose weight in a healthier way. I can’t understand the mind set of these consultants who are completely brainwashed into texting someone to force them into staying to their cult group and making them feel guilty over a 1/2 pound weight gain?

sorry for the depressing post but I thought I’d share some of my fave slimming world meals I used to eat religiously 🤢
- scan bran crushed with yoghurt 😭
- quark with options hot chocolate powder
- fat free cottage cheese on scan bran
- Weetabix muffins 🤢
- crustless quiche 🤢
- Lynda mcartney sausages (not a vegetarian and I was somehow convinced by other members that they were delicious)
- quorn chicken nuggets (that Harry lad on insta convinced me they tasted like Maccies ones!)
- frozen muller yoghurt as ‘ice cream’
-I also remember furiously googling whether I could have mashed banana in my porridge or whether I would need to ‘syn’ it 😭

thank you ladies for helping me see the light ♥️
---
Mr Krabs said:
A friend of mine lost about 11st on Slimming World. IIRC, she won some kind of biggest loser award in group, and then some sort of regional award. She then got approached by SW‘s PR team and they asked if she wanted to be in the Daily Mail with a few other women who’d lost a similar amount. Her weight loss story had a certain angle, and that’s pretty much all they focused on for the whole piece. And yeah, they banged on a LOT about pasta. Like she mentioned in her interview she liked pasta and they went on about how she could still gorge on pasta, making her sound really greedy! She also featured in a bunch of other papers as syndicated content and got into like three of those really crap women’s magazines. Think Take a Break but worse.

She did keep the weight off but she lot it in her early 20s and became very active, so I think that helped a lot.
Click to expand...
This happened to me too!! I was in one of their magazines, I don’t want to put myself but they basically made me out to be some fat virgin and thanks to slimming world I had found the love of my life etc etc, couldn’t be further from the truth considering I had a baby at 16 and didn’t join slimming world until I was 20 😭 they didn’t even mention my child in their interview! Just wanted to suit their narrative that slimming world had made me ‘attractive’ and now I’d finally found a boyfriend, something chubby girls could NEVER!
 
It’s bananas! I’m on a calorie deficit plan and 5kg away from my goal. I’ve “put on” 2.1kg this week because I traveled for work (flying, less walking than usual) and this weekend been mostly in bed as I have a cold/flu bug. My eating habits haven’t changed dramatically. I know that in a few days time the weight will drop back down again. I haven’t “failed” and my coach isn’t texting me to ask me why this has happened. It’s so frustrating that these consultants have 0 knowledge of science, nutrition or fitness 😤😤
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ChubClubThug said:
Because the eat unlimited pasta tags is part of their unique selling point, that's the part that draws desperate people in to their Web of lies

They fail to mention that you get smaller so feel like eating less, so you're in a natural deficit. That's how it's supposed to work, but sadly people become obsessed with losing and are spurned on with all the marketing and psychological crap they push on you, so very often it ends up in an eating disorder
Click to expand...
It’s a hangover from the 60s/70s and even 90s culture when carbs and pasta were seen as the devil. Their main demographic is women in their 40s and 50s who grew up hearing this message. And so when they get told they can eat as much pasta as they like, it sounds like some magical fairy potion. You can eat as much as you want with calorie counting too, you just then have to have willpower and restraint to balance it all out
 
Just having a nose said:
Honestly, this may be dramatic but I really feel like slimming world ruined my relationship with food and my life tbh. I actually featured in one of their magazines at one point and was so extremely focused on the diet. I developed bulimia and restricted food so much I was severely underweight, I weighed about 6 and a half stone at my lowest. My mum suffered with an eating disorder too (not as a result of slimming world) and so nobody in my life really stopped me, I also had a job where the desired look was to be skinny.
I had a baby two years ago and found my relationship with food improving, I practically recovered and gained about5 stone overall.
I recently re joined slimming world and all those toxic habits have come flooding back. I allow myself treats on weigh days only which usually result in bingeing and purging. I recently went on a holiday over Easter and gained 1/2lb whilst I was there, I had had some extra treats but was still staying ‘on plan’ whilst there. My’consultant’ text me the next day as I don’t usually stay for group and said she’d noticed I’d had a gain, I should stay for group if I’m wanting to be serious about this and to remember ‘Rome wasn’t built in a day’. I have decided to stop going to group and to continue to try and lose weight in a healthier way. I can’t understand the mind set of these consultants who are completely brainwashed into texting someone to force them into staying to their cult group and making them feel guilty over a 1/2 pound weight gain?

sorry for the depressing post but I thought I’d share some of my fave slimming world meals I used to eat religiously 🤢
- scan bran crushed with yoghurt 😭
- quark with options hot chocolate powder
- fat free cottage cheese on scan bran
- Weetabix muffins 🤢
- crustless quiche 🤢
- Lynda mcartney sausages (not a vegetarian and I was somehow convinced by other members that they were delicious)
- quorn chicken nuggets (that Harry lad on insta convinced me they tasted like Maccies ones!)
- frozen muller yoghurt as ‘ice cream’
-I also remember furiously googling whether I could have mashed banana in my porridge or whether I would need to ‘syn’ it 😭

thank you ladies for helping me see the light ♥
---

This happened to me too!! I was in one of their magazines, I don’t want to put myself but they basically made me out to be some fat virgin and thanks to slimming world I had found the love of my life etc etc, couldn’t be further from the truth considering I had a baby at 16 and didn’t join slimming world until I was 20 😭 they didn’t even mention my child in their interview! Just wanted to suit their narrative that slimming world had made me ‘attractive’ and now I’d finally found a boyfriend, something chubby girls could NEVER!
Click to expand...
My darling girl, 1/2 lb isn’t a gain, it’s a poo.
 
Greencatfysh said:
It’s a hangover from the 60s/70s and even 90s culture when carbs and pasta were seen as the devil. Their main demographic is women in their 40s and 50s who grew up hearing this message. And so when they get told they can eat as much pasta as they like, it sounds like some magical fairy potion. You can eat as much as you want with calorie counting too, you just then have to have willpower and restraint to balance it all out
Click to expand...

I actually wonder what will happen to SW as their demographic gets older. Most women I know who are obsessive about it are in their late 50s/60s and I don’t know any younger women who are still signing up for the plan. I can’t imagine that group numbers are very good.
 
Mr Krabs said:
I actually wonder what will happen to SW as their demographic gets older. Most women I know who are obsessive about it are in their late 50s/60s and I don’t know any younger women who are still signing up for the plan. I can’t imagine that group numbers are very good.
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I was wondering this the other day when reading this thread. I wonder if there will be a time when SW is no more. I feel the damaging truth behind SW is talked about more than ever now!
 
I once made a jar of “syn free” ketchup, which probably had more bloody calories in it than the real thing. Just tasted like slightly vinegary passata 🤢
 

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uokhun92 said:
I’ve said it before but I find it mental there’s never been a documentary done on SW considering there’s been plenty made on Atkins etc!

For some reason SW seem to have a massive hold on the media though, anything published is always positive.
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When I worked in journalism I wrote a series of articles on different diet plans including Slimming World, they threatened court action and the article was pulled unfortunately.
 
Slimming World absolutely destroyed my already fragile relationship with food. I lost 5 and a half stone in about 11 months many years ago and I felt incredible. But I didn't have crisps or wine (my two biggest loves :D) for that whole time and I developed some pretty destructive habits. I was one of those who would starve myself on weigh in day. I'd have a black coffee and some melon for breakfast, then nothing but water until 2pm and then nothing at all after that until after weigh in at 7.30pm. I started using laxatives if my home scales weren't showing a loss. I was weighing myself multiple times a day. And, the second I had some time off plan for Christmas, I gained an extraordinary amount back. And never lost it again. In fact, over the course of the next few years I gained it all back, plus an extra 2 stone on top.

I went back to SW numerous times but could never quite replicate my first success, no matter how much I stuck to plan. Clearly because I'd completely screwed up my body and metabolism.

Over the last 6 or 7 years I have gained and lost the same couple of stone multiple times. I've always been a secret eater but it got worse and worse until I was bingeing constantly and then beating myself up about it, always resolving to "start again on Monday." Finally over the last 6 weeks I feel like something has clicked. I've been calorie counting using Nutracheck, aiming for between 1700-1900 calories per day. I've managed to lose a stone in that time, even with a few meals out and plenty of wine. I exercise a lot, for pleasure and not because I want to punish myself. I've finally stopped assigning "good" and "bad" labels to food. I'm no longer scared of white bread. It's been a long road to get here but I'm hopeful that this time I can maintain my new healthy relationship with food.

All that was just to say that it can and does get better. It's a marathon, not a sprint. I've had to make my peace with "only" losing a pound or so some weeks when that would have killed me at SW. Now I see that slow and steady weight loss really is the only way and that it's so important to eat the food you actually enjoy, as opposed to food that makes you miserable just because it's syn free.
 
leoparddolly said:
Slimming World absolutely destroyed my already fragile relationship with food. I lost 5 and a half stone in about 11 months many years ago and I felt incredible. But I didn't have crisps or wine (my two biggest loves :D) for that whole time and I developed some pretty destructive habits. I was one of those who would starve myself on weigh in day. I'd have a black coffee and some melon for breakfast, then nothing but water until 2pm and then nothing at all after that until after weigh in at 7.30pm. I started using laxatives if my home scales weren't showing a loss. I was weighing myself multiple times a day. And, the second I had some time off plan for Christmas, I gained an extraordinary amount back. And never lost it again. In fact, over the course of the next few years I gained it all back, plus an extra 2 stone on top.

I went back to SW numerous times but could never quite replicate my first success, no matter how much I stuck to plan. Clearly because I'd completely screwed up my body and metabolism.

Over the last 6 or 7 years I have gained and lost the same couple of stone multiple times. I've always been a secret eater but it got worse and worse until I was bingeing constantly and then beating myself up about it, always resolving to "start again on Monday." Finally over the last 6 weeks I feel like something has clicked. I've been calorie counting using Nutracheck, aiming for between 1700-1900 calories per day. I've managed to lose a stone in that time, even with a few meals out and plenty of wine. I exercise a lot, for pleasure and not because I want to punish myself. I've finally stopped assigning "good" and "bad" labels to food. I'm no longer scared of white bread. It's been a long road to get here but I'm hopeful that this time I can maintain my new healthy relationship with food.

All that was just to say that it can and does get better. It's a marathon, not a sprint. I've had to make my peace with "only" losing a pound or so some weeks when that would have killed me at SW. Now I see that slow and steady weight loss really is the only way and that it's so important to eat the food you actually enjoy, as opposed to food that makes you miserable just because it's syn free.
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Well done!! Weight should be one factor you consider in getting healthy, not the only metric. SW is sooo toxic with this focus on weight.
 
CrazyGiraffeLady said:
I joined slimming world before I got married and hoped to lose a bit of weight. I hated the meetings and I wasn’t prepared to take a bit of fruit in so someone else could take it home, is that a thing everywhere? Anyway I went to my meeting, hated it went home and ordered a takeaway because the consultant said I’d look better if I lost around 8 stone and I could try to lose 2 stone a month. Honestly I was so shocked because I’d never be able to lose it that fast.
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Bloody hell 2 stones a month is just ridiculous. That’s 7lbs a week. No way could someone loose that amount. Unless they were starving themselves. What an awful consultant.
 
hey all, ex-SWer here. I am giving up the plan entirely, and i am just wondering whats the best source for recipes. I used to use pinch of nom but ive heard bad stuff recently, and i'm not sure whether to just stick to it anyway, or if anyone had any recommendations. i have zero food creativity so cant make my own recipes up!
 
Amyx1518 said:
hey all, ex-SWer here. I am giving up the plan entirely, and i am just wondering whats the best source for recipes. I used to use pinch of nom but ive heard bad stuff recently, and i'm not sure whether to just stick to it anyway, or if anyone had any recommendations. i have zero food creativity so cant make my own recipes up!
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The BBC has a wealth of recipes. Google dinner ideas 500 calories and you’ll be flying. Work out our calorie deficit first and stick to it 👍🏼
 
Amyx1518 said:
hey all, ex-SWer here. I am giving up the plan entirely, and i am just wondering whats the best source for recipes. I used to use pinch of nom but ive heard bad stuff recently, and i'm not sure whether to just stick to it anyway, or if anyone had any recommendations. i have zero food creativity so cant make my own recipes up!
Click to expand...
I saved this post previously, you are right to avoid PON. Money grabbing recipe thieves just cashing in on diet culture Plus their recipes used to be very SW focused so pasatta and stock cubes galore 🤮

Ex - Slimming World Disordered Eating Recovery

I feel the same, I find it tedious logging everything. Being in work, logging everything at work, busy day then I can’t be arsed logging my food and inputting new recipes. I need to decide if i’m going to renew another year or Nutracheck or not bother. I do need to lose weight though, it’s...
tattle.life
 
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