https://www.reddit.com/r/AskUK/comments/1iar42k/does_slimming_world_make_sense/
created by The_Sown_Rose on 26/01/2025 at 21:33 UTC
170 upvotes, 155 top-level comments (showing 25)
A lot of my colleagues are doing Slimming World until they get bored of it, and the amount they talk about it is another question (“Do you know how many sins that packet of crisps is?” “I don’t care, I’m not tracking them.”) But one thing makes no sense to me, perhaps someone can clear it up.
There’s a concept of ‘free’ food, and you can eat as much of it as you like and that’s fine. So in theory, could you eat 5000 calories worth of this free food every day and still lose weight?
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Comment by ChairmanChunder at 26/01/2025 at 21:37 UTC
771 upvotes, 15 direct replies
It doesn’t make sense because it treats food in overly simplistic categories like “free” and “syns,” which ignores actual nutritional value. Eating unlimited pasta and potatoes while demonizing something like avocado or olive oil? That’s bizarre. Plus, it doesn’t really teach portion control or sustainable habits—just following rules instead of understanding food.
Comment by Most_Imagination8480 at 26/01/2025 at 21:43 UTC
302 upvotes, 4 direct replies
There's a woman who works at my company who has also been running a group for maybe 9 years. According to her husband she's 5 stone heavier than when she started.
Clarifying food as sins seems ridiculous.
Comment by Ok_Chipmunk_7066 at 26/01/2025 at 21:37 UTC*
143 upvotes, 4 direct replies
It all feels very multi-level marketing to me.
I've worked in numerous places where there is a Slimming World group constantly trying to get people to sign up. The whole sins thing immediately put me off
Comment by Disastrous_Candle589 at 26/01/2025 at 21:37 UTC
89 upvotes, 5 direct replies
Of course not, but it wouldn’t be a very good model if everyone lost weight and left. They need people to keep going
Comment by sleepyprojectionist at 26/01/2025 at 21:58 UTC
57 upvotes, 2 direct replies
When I was diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis and sleep apnea my GP referred me to Slimming World despite my reservations about it being pseudoscientific bobbins and more than a little culty.
It turns out that there was some sort of funding arrangement with the local council, so the doctor saw it as preferable to any medical intervention that would have been billed directly to the NHS.
I have been ignoring a lot of the oversimplifications and have been counting calories and macros. Some of the stuff that is pushed as healthy and some of the foods that are demonised make no sense to me.
In the last nine weeks I have lost 22lbs, but by mostly using the meetings as an accountability tool.
Comment by dinkidoo7693 at 26/01/2025 at 21:44 UTC
16 upvotes, 1 direct replies
It doesn’t make sense at all. A few of my friends and ex colleagues have tried it. Most lose weight and as soon as they stop it all piles back on quickly, some of them get to a certain weight loss and just plateau and can’t seem to shift any more.
The free food thing makes absolutely no sense. Neither does saying a mashed up banana has syns but a normal banana doesn’t. One of my friends found the 0 syn yogurts on a very cheap offer and basically ate them all week.
Comment by Personal-Listen-4941 at 26/01/2025 at 21:41 UTC
59 upvotes, 3 direct replies
Slimming World groups food into 3 main groups.
Free food - most fruits/veggie, low fat meat, etc
Healthy Extra - a set amount of fibre & dairy every day, so bread/cereal & milk/cheese
Syns - unhealthy food, different foods have different syn values. A chocolate bar could be anything from 5 - 30 syns depending on the type.
You get a set amount of syns a day you are allowed. The basic idea is that you swap out high syn foods for low syn foods & low syn foods for free foods.
It’s more complicated & complex than that, but that is the basic idea.
Comment by great_blue_panda at 26/01/2025 at 21:38 UTC
68 upvotes, 3 direct replies
Laws of thermodynamics enter the chat
Comment by Lunaspoona at 26/01/2025 at 22:08 UTC
40 upvotes, 4 direct replies
No.
It's also demoralising having the 'slimmer of the week'. If you have a lot to lose like I do, you obviously have bigger losses than those who are near their target. It's horrible to hear those who only have a little to lose basically be shamed into not doing it 'properly' as if that's why they aren't losing as much as the bigger people!
If people maintain or gain that week, they get told to EAT MORE FOOD!
Exercise is also not encouraged. They say they have 'body magic' but I've never seen it actually be promoted. In fact, some girls had started going to the gym and were so happy they made that step. They all gained that week and were basically shamed and told they needed to stop going if they wanted to lose weight!!
Comment by LJ161 at 26/01/2025 at 22:44 UTC
28 upvotes, 2 direct replies
If it worked the company would have gone bankrupt.
They're also known to put syns on brand named products once they bring out their own version of that product.
Comment by MadamKitsune at 27/01/2025 at 01:06 UTC
6 upvotes, 0 direct replies
A member of my extended family has been going to Slimming World on and off for years. Her whole kitchen was papered with "encouraging" weight loss certificates to the point where if you added all of the losses up she should have vanished from existence years ago.
She's now easily double the size she was before she started but plenty of ££ lighter.
Comment by xthrowawayaccxx at 26/01/2025 at 22:08 UTC
34 upvotes, 2 direct replies
Slimming world in my opinion is the recipe for unhealthy eating habits.
My auntie has done slimming world… in fairness, she did lose weight, but she saw me eat a banana and told me that I shouldn’t have eaten it because I have to ‘sin’ it. Yet theory stands, that pasta is ‘free’. Makes. No. Sense.
Weight loss does need to be ‘move more, eat a calorie deficit’. I’ve recently lost weight, and simply tracking my calories and moving a bit more has worked wonders.
Comment by ra246 at 26/01/2025 at 21:42 UTC
15 upvotes, 1 direct replies
My Mom does it and I asked her does she feel like it's a bit of a cult/MLM scheme.
The sins shit can piss off. I understand people need to be motivated in different ways and held accountable in different ways, but, it's literally science. Burn more calories than you eat.
Comment by Fitnessgrac at 27/01/2025 at 00:47 UTC
10 upvotes, 1 direct replies
There’s a lot of misconceptions in this thread. Whilst I agree CICO is the fundamental basis for any diet, slimming world can provide people with a framework and support network in which they thirve and change their relationship with food rather than stressing about calorie counting.
My Aunt has lost over 9 stone and kept the weight off since pre COVID. She has actually been featured in magazines for it. I would have a hard time telling her it doesn’t work.
Comment by Longjumping-Act9653 at 27/01/2025 at 04:35 UTC
5 upvotes, 0 direct replies
I lost 6.5 stone on it, then my dad died and I piled it all back on plus more. It doesn’t at any point consider the emotional and psychological reasons behind why weight loss can be difficult. Also because it encourages an essentially fat free diet, my gallbladder packed in and I had to have it removed.
Comment by elgrn1 at 26/01/2025 at 21:49 UTC
13 upvotes, 2 direct replies
I've done it before and it's actually very simple. However, it doesn't work for everyone. Possibly things have changed since I did it but this was the crux.
There are super free and free foods you can eat as much as you want of. These are most fruits and veg (minus the high sugar ones), lean meats and fish, eggs, pasta, rice, potatoes, noodles, baked beans, some condiments/sauces, etc. At least 1/3 of your daily intake must be from this list.
There are 2 types of healthy extras you have to have each day, one is dairy (or was when I did this, not sure what the vegan options are now) and the other is either fibre (bread/cereals) or fats (oils, nuts, etc).
The term syns is meant to be a tongue in cheek take on 'cheat' food, and you have both a daily and weekly allowance. Meaning you can still treat yourself and lose weight.
The free and super free foods are low in calories and fat, but high in fibre and protein, therefore they fill you up for less calories (5kcal per gram of protein and carbs vs 9kcal per gram of fat). Meaning you may be eating the same quantity of food but with less calories than before. Though with the extra protein and fibre you may find your portions are smaller anyway.
You're also eating less processed foods as you're meant to cook from scratch and drinking less alcohol and snacking less on crisps and chocolate etc so your calorific intake is less for those reasons, too.
Comment by strawberrypops at 26/01/2025 at 22:44 UTC*
14 upvotes, 0 direct replies
The wording isn’t great, a lot of people will fixate on words like “free food” and eat a shit ton of pasta or potato as a result. You can’t eat that much and still expect to lose weight but that’s on SW for the wording.
I’ll admit that I like Slimming World though, it works well for me. Started last June and am 6 stone down already. I’m strict with it though and only eat what I need but I hear plenty of stories from people justifying eating junk and then wondering why they don’t lose weight.
Edit: Just wanted to add something as I’ve seen a few comments here along the lines of SW being pointless and to just move more and eat less. Yes to the last bit but SW does genuinely help some of us. It gives you a starting point which is a big thing, they literally give you a book with good guidance and suggestions plus access to thousands of recipes. It helps get you started when your journey feels overwhelming. Some people won’t need that and that’s great but some of us benefit from a bit of hand holding at the start!
Comment by BackgroundGate3 at 26/01/2025 at 21:44 UTC
19 upvotes, 1 direct replies
No, you can't each as much as you like. The phrase SW use is 'until you're satisfied'. It's not a licence to eat until you feel sick, just until you're no longer hungry.
Comment by T_raltixx at 26/01/2025 at 22:08 UTC
10 upvotes, 2 direct replies
My mum swears by them and it worked.
Comment by Silvagadron at 27/01/2025 at 06:21 UTC
3 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Yeah I’ve got a friend who won’t hear a bad word against it, then says it’s perfectly fine that she has a big portion of curry, chips, rice, and peas for dinner because apparently the cult says it’s fine. It’s a horrendous institution to teach someone about nutritional value and portion control, because all that goes out the window.
Comment by mostly_kittens at 26/01/2025 at 22:19 UTC
5 upvotes, 1 direct replies
There is an algorithm for calculating how many sins are in a food based on calories and fat etc. if you apply it to any of the free foods the sins value is not zero.
Comment by Historical_Spare_945 at 26/01/2025 at 22:01 UTC
5 upvotes, 0 direct replies
It is bizarre, you're right. Bananas are free, mashed bananas are not. My other half did it religiously for two months and lost zero. My mum and sister had much more success. But if you look on social media there are a lot of nutritionist tearing it to shreds. All of these commercial diets are designed to keep you beholden to them
Comment by PartyPoison98 at 27/01/2025 at 00:51 UTC
2 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Speaking anecdotally as someone who's done SW before...
It never made any fucking sense to me. But I followed it religiously and lost a decent chunk of weight. My theory is that it makes most people eat less carbs and dairy than they normally would do, and that's the source of most peoples weight.
Mind you it also gave me gallstones.
Comment by Phenomenomix at 27/01/2025 at 03:01 UTC
2 upvotes, 1 direct replies
I don’t see how SW or WW can work. They’re based on sins or points but finding out what makes a food a sin or certain point value seems arbitrary.
A friend of mine lost loads of weight on WW and now works as a personal trainer - only she’s deathly afraid of gaining any weight and has the most disordered eating I’ve ever seen. She went travelling across Europe and SE Asia and couldn’t eat anything as she didn’t know what the points value of things were. She was only saved by there being a Tesco in Thailand.
The other thing I’ve seen is people saving sins up for the weekend. Once worked with someone who, every week, would save her sins up and have a chicken kebab on a Saturday night. Surely that is just binge eating?
I don’t think these schemes teach people how to eat better or instil the mindset change needed for long term weight loss. It’s about you sticking to a regime they know is unsustainable so you’ll keep coming to the meetings.