My Diet, by request

I spend a lot of time on this blog talking about exercise, specifically running and Crossfit, mostly because I think it's way more interesting than food. But as we know, our bodies are made in the kitchen, not the gym. I got a request to talk about my diet, so here we go.

The short answer is Weight Watchers, but that's not even close to a real answer. At this point I don't even consider WW a diet, but rather a holistic framework for healthy living. I get really sad in meetings when there is a member saying, "I'm just not losing weight, I can't get motivated, I don't like to track, etc," and all anybody else wants to talk about is how many points are in this or that, or where they can buy the lowest-point tortilla. If all there was to it was tracking the points, there would be no need for meetings, or for the majority of the tools that WW offers. But the rest of that particular rant is a topic for another post.

Whatever diet you are on, if it is an actual healthy diet (as opposed to some crazy vinegar and honey diet or whatever) it's likely it can be worked from within the framework of WW. The diet says what to eat, the framework says how much.

Fortunately for me, I don't have any medical need for a special diet, other than weight management. Mentally or physically (is there a difference?) I do not have the ability to tell when I have had enough food to eat. So barring some sort of counting system to tell me when to stop (be it points, calories, carbs, whatever) I would eat from wake-up to bedtime, and in fact that is exactly how I put the weight on in the first (and second) place. I'm hopeful that with enough practice and maintenance I will be able to stop tracking some day, but after only five weeks at goal I am in no rush. I find the WW Mobile app on my iPhone to be totally convenient and fun and I don't mind tracking with it at all.

Ironically, the fact that the points only tell you how much to eat, but not what to eat, is a lot of people's biggest complaint about WW. Sure you can lose weight eating nothing but Twinkies, but it's not very nutritious. Since they retooled the points system last November, the values on the food have shifted a little bit so that processed junk rates higher than whole foods, but it still has some bugs.

Good thing that's not how Weight Watchers works! I would tell somebody that if all they are doing is counting points, then they are not really doing Weight Watchers. Even putting aside all the aforementioned tools for living that have nothing to do with food, since I'm saving those for another rant, there are other mechanisms in the program that encourage nutritious eating. They encourage choosing power foods (pdf) whenever possible, and we have the daily healthy checks.

It used to be, on the old plan, that if you wanted to get all your healthy checks for the day, it was likely to take up almost all your points. Although most power foods are low in points, the daily target was as low as 18, and all the fruits, dairy, and oil took a huge chunk out of that. Once you get in a serving or two of lean protein, you're basically done. No sandwiches, only salads. It was pretty grim. When the new plan came, the daily points target went up to at least 29 (I think some of the bigger men went up to more than 70), fruit went down to zero points, and most of the rest of the power foods stayed the same. Pretty much the only things that went up were processed carbs and alcohol.

The effect that I observed was that if you were already using alcohol and processed carbs on the old plan and doing so successfully (and bless you if you were) then you didn't have to change anything and you could still lose weight. The points on the food went up, but so did the daily target, so the net effect was nothing. But! If you were getting all your healthy checks and eating mostly just salads and grilled chicken and barely scraping by on your 18 points (that was me) then suddenly there was room to breathe! I got to add more food (mostly power foods, but also less nutritious stuff on occasion) and still the weight came off easily. I was already a cheerleader for Weight Watchers but the new plan really sealed the deal for me.

Now that I am on maintenance, I get 37 points daily, and I have even more room. After adding in activity points and flex points, I eat anywhere from 40 - 60 points per day. I had wine last night for about the third time this year. Here's what a normal lunch looks like for me (I just happen to have a photo of today's lunch because my Mr. Bento arrived last night and I was very excited):

Points breakdown: veggies & hummus: 3; turkey dog & cheese: 4; almonds: 5; Luna mini: 2; fruit: 0; pop chips: 3; TOTAL: 17. It is obviously way high in sodium, but sodium is not something I pay attention to other than to be aware that I am consuming it.

For breakfast I usually make an egg sandwich on a bagel thin with laughing cow cheese for 6 points, plus a banana. I stopped getting my daily nonfat latte for money reasons. Dinner tends to be a low-carb affair because I cook and eat with Grady, but WW is so flexible and low-carb is so nutritious that it's easy to work it right in. Usually some kind of meat, a green veggie on the side, and a salad.