My point was simply that if you are an "emotional/boredom grazer" like me, filling up on "free foods" isn't going to solve that problem-only learning to stop eating when you are bored or emotional will stop the weight issues long-term.
I totally agree.
I think there are many people who eat when they're bored or emotional, though. I'm not sure it's easy or often even possible to stop this . I know lots of slim people who eat when they're bored or emotional. Our relationship with food is complex and difficult and SW can't resolve everything. Nor can any other diet for that matter.
And, if you're going to do that, I think the point remains that it's better to do it with free foods than with syns. Even if they are of the same calorific value.
It's important to address our relationship with food and how we feel about it. But it's also a reality that a natural 'human' relationship with food often means eating when we're stressed or emotional or whatever.
As coping mechanisms go, it's not too bad to eat some yoghurt and fruit if you're emotional. It is a problem if you eat chocolate when you are emotional... even if the calorific value of that food is the same as yoghurt and fruit.
However emotional one might get, eating free foods will result in, say, a binge of 500 calories. It'd be tough to beat that on free food alone without becoming uncomfortably full, or bored. Eating syns could result in much more than this... and even if you limit the calorific value.. the fact that you are not full at the end of it (because of the low energy density) means that you are likely to binge more/again.
So, yeah, it's important to address why we eat and when we eat and try to only eat when we need to. But that isn't all that easy for many of us. And when it's not... eating free foods (even over and above what we 'need') is a better option that eating syns - even if the calorific value is the same.
A case in point was me, last night. I wasn't really hungry but I was tired and a bit grumpy. I probably should have had a glass of water and gone to bed.
But, instead, I had a jacket potato with half a tin of beans at about 10pm. That isn't particularly healthy... and it was a 'waste' of calories. But it won't affect my weight loss in any real way and is sustainable long term.
But following Slimming World enables me to do that... and it's something that I need to do from time to time. If I was counting calories, I'd be depriving myself of that (actually quite small) emotional eat. I might have had a few calories left and had a bag of crisps instead of my potato.
But that wouldn't have filled me up... and it would have left me still feeling empty and as though I hadn't eaten.
It's important to make this diet work for you. To tailor it, slightly and if necessary, to ensure your 'trigger' foods or whatever don't cause problems. I do it with Mullerlights.
But, the point remains that for the vast majority of people... calorie counting on this diet is not necessary and will serve to complicate matters and potentially lead to eating unnecessary 'synful' foods that don't fill us up and lead to more binges.
PS
I think it would be a really good experiment to work out from my weekly food diary how I did it on SW, whether it would have fitted into WW and how many calories in total I consumed/burnt.
I guess that it could have fitted into both WW and SW... and it would have been a low number of calories. If I get time tomorrow, I'll try and work it out. I think SW will have naturally reduced my calorie intake to a healthy, but low enough level to loose weight. As such, there's no need for me to count calories, even if I eat 'emotionally' with free foods.
)
