Day One!

Well, yesterday was interesting. After having been on Atkins, the Weight Watchers program is somewhat counter-intuitive, and I think it's going to take a while to get accustomed to the differences. I certainly get to eat a lot, though, which is pretty cool! I have 57 points to consume each day, and yesterday I only managed 52, but at least I was close. It felt strange, but very nice, to be able to eat fruit and vegetables to my heart's content.

I think the change that's going to be hardest for me to get used to between Atkins and WW is the difference in the way butter is treated. On Atkins, the whole idea is to convert your body from using carbs as its main energy source to using fats, so fats like butter and oils are encouraged and unlimited - within reason, of course. With WW, the program seems to be based more around nutrition density, calories, and the relative difficulty of processing different types of foods. The high nutritive value, fiber, and complex carbs in fruits and vegetables are encouraged and unlimited - but pure fats like butter are penalized. A single tablespoon of butter counts for 3 points. It's not really a big issue right now when I'm having a little difficulty figuring out how to eat enough to use all my daily points like I'm supposed to, although it feels a little odd to be carefully measuring something I used to use with abandon, but I can see it becoming a problem down the road as I lose weight and reduce the number of points I have available. I'll deal with it if and when I come to it, I suppose! Anyway, yesterday's meals...

Breakfast: Scrambled egg, 4 pieces bacon - 13 points
Lunch: Salad - 16 points
Snack: Apple - 0 points
Dinner: Chicken & mushrooms, sauteed zucchini, milk - 19 points
Dessert: Sugar-free Jello pudding, Cool Whip - 4 points
Total: 52 points

One thing that I think did work really well with my previous program was the schedule I made for myself of eating something every 3 hours so I was never really hungry, so I'm going to continue to do that with WW. If I'm starving, I'm more likely to have cravings, and less likely to want to spend the time and energy to cook when I want to eat right now! It's best to prevent that as much as possible, I think, since my energy levels are never exactly high to begin with. Avoiding the situations where I'm tempted to fall off the program is a large part of the battle!