Slimming World Secrets

A bad week – but I’ve won my 4½st award!

Every now and then, you have a terrible week Syns-wise and you fully deserve a big, fat gain. But, sometimes, the Slimming World gods are on your side and, when you step on the scales, you nick a sneaky loss. This was to be one of those weeks – and it landed me my 4½st award!

My week

• Average Syns per day: 29.4
• Average Speed foods per day: 9.3
• SP days: 3
• Body Magic days: 5
• Result: -½lb
• Total loss: -4st 7lbs

Nine times of ten, if you’ve overdone it on the Syns front, you’ll get what you deserve. Take last Christmas. I was completely off-plan, I ate and drank for all I was worth and I deservedly had a monster gain.

But sometimes, for no apparent reason, you get away with it. This week, we enjoyed a bank holiday weekend – and I partied hard on the Saturday with the girls, dining out in the big city and then back to town for beers in a local micropub.

The Sunday was much the same. My food was all on plan, but the Shiraz and pints of real ale were certainly not. Even with Flexible Syns, I averaged 29.4 Syns per day over the week – almost triple the ten I usually aim for. But I got away with it. It was one of those weeks.

It’s like Slimming World karma. I’ve had loads of weeks just lately when I probably deserved a decent loss, but I’ve just plateaued, losing (or gaining) half a pound here and there.

This week was yet another ½lb loss, but when you consider the weekend I had, I’m absolutely delighted with it.

I’ve finally got my 4½st award!

And the main reason I’m so pleased is that I finally won my 4½st award – something I’ve worked so hard towards over the past year or so.

I got my 4st award (the first time) almost four years ago, going on to lose 4st 3lb in the summer of 2017. Then life got in the way, I regained all but 7lb of it and I had to start again in January 2020.

But I never gave up. Even when I was struggling, I kept turning up every Thursday, knowing that my consultant and my group friends were helping me with damage limitation and that, one day, I’d get my head back in the game.

So to finally get this 4½st award (and a new PB, let’s not forget) four years after my last one means the world to me. If you’d said, in December 2019, that this would happen, I’d have guffawed in the most ungainly manner.

Oh, and my whopping ½lb loss also landed me the Slimmer of the Week honours – for the second time in three weeks! I think it’s fair to say some of our members may be struggling a little – but we all keep supporting each other to help us through the bad times.

Half a stone to Target

Winning my 4½st award also means I’m now just 7lb to my Target weight. And yes, I’m fully aware that averaging 29.4 Syns per day is never going to get me there!

But then it’s the first week I’ve gone over my Syns since Christmas, so I’m not going to beat myself up about it either. It may have been a proper Get-Out-of-Jail-Free result, “but a loss is a loss”, and this one has led to two new shinies and two new certificates.

I just need to stay focussed now, keep up with the SP days, keep my Syns down and step up the exercise. And I’ve literally been doing just that the past ten days or so – doing more step aerobics instead of just counting housework as Body Magic.

Sure, putting the Hoover round raises the pulse a little, but nothing like the #BodyMagicMoments week four step class, which I’m now trying to do four or five times a week. It only lasts about 37 minutes, including the warm-up and cool-down.

Members can find it on Lifeline Online. Just do a search for It’s A Kind of Magic or click the link below. I’m not sure how long the videos will remain up, but they’re still there at the time of writing, getting on for a year after the Body Magic Moments (aka It’s a Kind of Magic) fitness campaign of lockdown 1.0.

Layered Learning Week 6: Motivational Tools

This week was the final week of layered learning – Slimming World’s campaign to remind members about the plan and how it works – a sort of back-to-basics programme to get people who may have been struggling over lockdown to get back on plan.

As the title suggests, we looked at what tools are available to motivate members. Here are a few highlights:

• Food Optimise 100%: Healthy Extras, Syns and stuff! You all know what they are, right?!
• Food Diaries: Use them to count your Syns, your HEs and your Speed. It’s only recommended to count them in the first few weeks, and when struggling, to avoid “obsession”. I count everything every week as it keeps me on plan (well, usually). It all goes down in my trusty SynsTracker spreadsheet. If that makes me obsessive, I’m find with that!
• Visualisation: Not something I’ve used myself, but it involves “visualising success”. For example, you’re going to the pub on Saturday night, so spend five minutes per day in the week visualising ordering a Diet Coke instead of the bottle of wine you really want. Yeah, OK, ice and lemon?
• For and Against List: I’ve not used this tool myself either – but I probably should have done at certain times over the years. Fors: looking amazing in a bikini or that summer dress. Againsts: not being able to order large meat feast pizzas after a night on the beer every weekend. Sob.

Flexible Syns approach gets a 40-Syn tweak

• Flexible Syns: I shall write at length about these in a future post, but it basically means saving a few extra Syns up for a special occasion. Apparently, we’re now allowed up to a maximum of 40 Syns on that day – and the usual amount on others. I think I’m gonna stick to the old way, which may see me go beyond 40 but then allowing for that on the other six days of the week, averaging out at five to 15. It might not work for some, but I can easily survive on zero Syns, using my Healthy Extras and free foods to get by.
• SAS Log: Similar to a food diary, but far more involved, helping you to see where you’re going wrong. Basically, you write down everything that passes your lips for a week. I do that anyway.
• Personal Eating Plan: A new one on me, this one. It involves sitting down with your consultant and planning out a week’s menu – all 21 meals, plus any snacks and drinks – and then sticking to it. Give it a go if you have a consultant with lots of time on their hands – yeah, right!
• Fast Forward: This is the strict plan I mentioned in this post. Syns and Healthy Extras go out of the window and you get various “units” instead. It’s a proper DIET – and only intended for one week for members who are really struggling. My consultant, Jackie, who’s been at the helm of groups for eight years or so, gave it a try recently and lost 5lb. Sounds good, eh?

Layered learning conclusion

I’ve found it a really useful exercise as I look for any slight tweak I can make that will give me the edge and help me to shave off those final few pounds.

Much of the plan I know by Gospel anyway as I’m a seasoned Slimming World member, but even I learned a fair few new ideas and was grateful for the opportunity to go over other parts of that had slunk away to the recesses of my brain.

That’s all for now, folks, I’m going to polish my 4½st award shiny! Don’t get to follow me on Instagram if you don’t already (see below). Bye for now – and, as the consultants say in village and school halls across the country, have a good week!