LIHUE — In the past few months, Kauai Weight Watchers has grown from one weekly meeting in Lihue to five meetings at four locations islandwide. Members credit this growth and activity to Director Romae Lenci, who took over in April
LIHUE — In the past few months, Kauai Weight Watchers has grown from one weekly meeting in Lihue to five meetings at four locations islandwide.
Members credit this growth and activity to Director Romae Lenci, who took over in April 2012.
Lenci was introduced to Weight Watchers as a child when her mother became a member. She embraced the program philosophy of support and started working for Weight Watchers in California 24 years ago.
“We want to get as many people involved as possible,” Lenci said. “People hear about Weight Watchers and think it is just another diet plan. It is nothing like that. It is a lifestyle and not a diet.”
Weight Watchers is not a lecture hall to testify about being overweight, Lenci said. It is camaraderie in a supportive atmosphere of success. She said active meetings include sharing what works and what doesn’t with nutrition and exercise goals.
“That is the magic that makes people go,” Lenci said.
Island-wide meetings
Lenci started with about 45 members who attended one weekly meeting in Lihue. A good crowd, she said, but an interactive program works better with small groups attending meetings near their own neighborhoods.
Members were driving from all around the island, and she said it was important to bring Weight Watchers to individual communities.
There are two weekly meetings in Lihue at St. Michael and All Angels Episcopal Church, 4364 Hardy Street, 7 p.m. Thursdays and 7 a.m. Saturdays.
The Kapaa group has 19 regular members. Their meetings are held 6 p.m. Wednesdays at Children of the Land, 4-831 Kuhio Highway.
The Princeville group meets at 5:30 p.m. Mondays at Church of the Pacific, 4520 Kapaka Road.
The newest group is in Eleele, which consists of about 20 people. They meet at 5:30 p.m. Tuesdays at St. Johns Episcopal Church, 322 A Mehana Road.
“Eleele just started and people are telling me they are so excited that meetings are held on the South Shore area for the first time in 10 years,” Lenci said.
Weight Watchers International is a network of company-owned and franchised operations with 45,000 weekly meetings worldwide. Visiting members sometimes come to meetings.
“It’s not a diet but a way of learning to live with a good and healthy relationship to food and self-image,” said Judith Page, an employee and member. “It offers people a way to learn to deal with weight issues that are so detrimental to their health.”
Meetings include topical discussion and presentations on lifestyle choices. In May, they talked about exercise and started a 5K walk for charity. In June, the topic is about healthy breakfasts.
Kilauea physician Dr. Arthur Brownstein is a Weight Watchers member who said he values the system for its nutritional approach over dieting alone.
“It’s a lifestyle and it really works,” Brownstein said, a board certified specialist in preventive medicine.
He said the program teaches members the tools to combat hunger. By choosing the right foods, people will stay ahead of their hunger and be less likely to overindulge in processed or packaged foods.
Hunger is a form of altered consciousness that overrides our ability to make reasonable choices, he said. In combination with a fast-paced lifestyle, this hunger drive influences our choices about what is healthy or not.
“Weight Watchers teaches us to prepare meals and make healthy choices of food not high in fat content,” he said.
Brownstein was moved to try Weight Watchers 15 years ago when a patient dropped 48 pounds and looked healthy. He went to a meeting and was horrified to tip the scale at 248 pounds.
“I was still active,” he said. “I was surfing and doing all of those things.”
Losing just under four pounds a month, Brownstein dropped the weight in 18 months. It was a healthy and conceivable weight loss at just a pound or two a week, he said.
The online tools are great, he said, but the meetings are a source of support that made Weight Watchers indispensable for his goals.
“Joining Weight Watcher’s was to me the AA equivalent for overeaters,” he said.
Brownstein said he was raised to eat everything on his plate and those poor eating habits caught up with him as he became more sedentary as a busy doctor.
“I had always used athletics to keep my weight in check,” he said. “I practiced for the triathlon, I was in the Air Force, I was about hard-core exercise. But I was eating for all the wrong reasons.”
Combating disease
Weight Watchers helps people avoid weight-related health problems from bad knees to high blood pressure, cancer and heart disease.
“Most of the things that are killing us in this culture are self-inflicted and preventable,” Brownstein said.
Lenci said the obesity, diabetes, heart disease and cancer rates for Hawaii are alarming. She said it is preferable to address health and lifestyle as a prevention strategy for treating disease.
“To me, the ultimate gift is for someone to say they have worked so hard to get here and don’t want to go back,” she said.
Local culture has its healthy and unhealthy foods, and Lenci said the concern is more about about quantity and frequency than what foods to eat — and not making it part of every meal.
Balance is key, she said, and including essential oils and natural fats are as important as avoiding processed foods.
Controlling routine and environmental influences are also part of the battle, she said. The other is understanding what the body needs and how to react as it responds to change.
What are points?
Weight Watchers uses a points-based nutritional program as opposed to a caloric-based diet.
Depending on a member’s age, weight, gender and activity level, a person is given a daily set of “points” to eat.
Lenci said it is important to give your body enough to meet this baseline, and eat all of the “points.”
“The body has to be refueled to the baseline,” Lenci said.
The points are established and change with progress. Food items are high or low value items, and people adjust their intake over a seven day period to maintain their baseline.
This system allows for the birthday celebration or the occasional indulgence without having the guilt and anxiety that causes stress and the sense of failure, she said.
“So you gained two pounds, that’s life,” Lenci said. “Stay open to a lifestyle versus doing a diet mentality.”
Weight Watchers offers high-tech solutions to help people manage their food intake in different environments and routines.
Kauai Athletic Club also offers Weight Watchers members a $7 daily member rate. Its Exercise 101 beginner learning class for equipment and cardio-training was designed with Weight Watchers in mind on Saturdays at 8 a.m.
“Anyone is welcome to join,” said KAC owner-operator Josh Nations. “It is closely tied with Weight Watchers, which is a great program and a great way get people eating right.”
Call the Weight Watchers information line at 800-651-6000 or email Romae Lenci at revromae@juno.com for details.
