You may have already seen my previous post where I talk about if Slimming World does work for weight loss. As a follow-up, and as someone who spent several weeks or months seeing my weight plateau (or a few gains), here is a quick guide on what to do if you’re not losing weight on Slimming World.

Why You’re Not Losing Weight On Slimming World

First of all, you need to understand that weight is only one (often unreliable) measure of health and only one measure of progress.

There are plenty of other things to consider including your mental health, stress management, mood, energy levels, and more.

What’s more is that weighing yourself weekly is one of the worst ways to track your week to week progress.

A sensible weekly rate of fat loss is around 0.5 to 1 pound per week. Your body’s water weight can fluctuate up and down by A LOT more than that.

In a week, you could potentially lose a pound of fat but because of water weight increases, you could be a few pounds heavier on the scales. And think you have made no progress, or gone backwards.

Other things that affect weight changes are stress levels (causing inflammation), time of day you weigh yourself, the food in your gut, the salt in your diet…

You get the idea.

My point is, week to week weight changes are a roller coaster and is one weakness of Slimming World‘s whole system which I allowed to affect me for a long time.

I needed to get that out of the way first.

Now then, if over a consistent and lengthy period of time (at least 4-6 weeks) find that you’re not losing weight on Slimming World and weight loss is one of your goals, here are some possible causes.

Inflammation and Water Weight

I lumped these as one because inflammation in the body can cause an increase in your body’s water retention.

Inflammation can come from food intolerances, generally “refined” foods (I’m looking at you, refined sugar!), stress, lack of sleep, hormone levels, poor gut health and more.

It is commonly from stress placed on the body in some form.

Inflammation is one possible cause of water retention. Other common causes include extra salt in your diet, poor hydration otherwise, and hormone fluctuations.

I have seen cases of weight fluctuating by 5-6 pounds in a day because of water levels.

So take some time to hydrate, chill, sleep, and maybe go a little bit boring with your diet for a few days just to help give your gut a bit of a rest.

Too Many Syns

One of the best things about Slimming World is that it is easy to follow because, with free foods, portion counting isn’t a big thing.

And with the healthy extras, the portions can be a bit vague.

That makes it easy to get into the habit of estimating food portion sizes by eye. And our eyes will often tell us we’re having less than we actually are.

I still remember one of my experiences with what I thought was 15 grams of peanut butter turning out to be 40 grams.

Time Of Day

Believe it or not, when you eat or drink something, it stays in your body until it is digested and your body has “dealt with” the waste from it.

I have seen other Slimming World members either switch from a morning weigh-in to an evening weigh-in or have a meal before getting weighed.

That food is still in your gut.

You do still need to eat of course – your body needs and deserves nourishment.

Just bear in mind that if you don’t eat before weighing in one week, it will show an “artificial” dip on the scales compared to other weeks.

Treat Night

I know Slimming World doesn’t do calorie counting.

I also know the day of a weigh-in, right after getting weighed can lead to a cheat/treat snack, meal, day…

Because of course you then have the whole week to then shift any gain from that treat.

There are a few issues with this.

This can lead to feast and famine or binge and ban cycle – this is the kind of behaviour that can lead down the road to eating disorders.

There is also a good chance you are underestimating your overall syns (or calories) for the week. I know people who would use 3-4 days worth of their syn allowance on their treat and then carry on the rest of the week as normal.

You DO deserve to treat yourself and shouldn’t ban any foods.

But whether you count syns or calories, it does mean eating more than you are allowing yourself to count.

Key Things To Remember When You’re Not Losing Weight On Slimming World

I try to make my blog more about overall health and wellness, and I encourage body confidence and not stressing about weight too much.

So posts like this, specifically about weight loss are out of sync with my mission here.

Except that I think the people who I’d like to see my message the most are exactly the people this kind of post is written for, so I do need to compromise a bit on my aims.

Having said that, here are the key things to remember if you’re not losing weight on Slimming World:

• Weight is only one measure of progress and it is a very unreliable one at that.
• There are a lot of factors in determining your weight and weight fluctuations.
• Weighing yourself weekly is an unreliable way of tracking your progress.
• Weight loss and any fitness goal take consistency over a long period of time. Not just clinging onto a weekly landmark.
• Food in your system can impact what the scales show but that is no reason for you to starve yourself on your weekly weigh-in day.
• Don’t ban or demonise foods, and don’t give them a halo either. Enjoy things in moderation and fit them into your plan.

If you are someone who is not losing weight on Slimming World but believe you’re following your plan exactly, feel free to get in touch and I’ll happily look through your circumstances with you.