Medifast Weight Control Center

I was debating whether to buy Medifast online and do it myself or go to their local Medifast clinic on Ray Rd/​Kyrene. I decided that I wanted the support of weekly weigh-​ins and counsel so I made an appt after I was told it’s just $ 8/​week for the weekly weigh-​in and appts. After meeting with them, I’m told it will take 47 weeks to lose my weight plus another year for maintenance visits for a total of 99 weeks and then they asked me to pay UPFRONT for all the weeks (at $ 8 each) for a total of $ 792. Then added on almost $ 400 more for intial blood work and review. It came to almost $ 1200. So, I decided to order food online and do my weigh-​ins with a friend. I’ve done Medifast in the past and I like the program but I don’t believe it’s worth the extra money of meeting with their counselors. Their counselors are very nice, many are recent college grads from the Nutrition program at ASU but I don’t think any have ever experienced a weight problem and certainly they don’t have many years of professional experience which I would have personally wanted in a counselor if I were to spend the money on visits.

I’ve lost 100 lbs since January 4^th of last year — I actually hit that milestone on November 27^th, 2011 (2 days after my birthday… what an amazing gift!). I have another 50 lbs to go until I reach my goal.
There are a number of staff at the MF Location in Chandler — there aren’t Medifast Centers in Tucson, so I drive up every other week for my ‘counseling’ session… where I weigh in, get measured, and talk to the girls about how my week or two has been.
Have to admit the holidays were rough — MF is a low-​carb (not insanely low– a la Atkins), low-​fat (healthy fats are allowed), low-​sodium (seriously, the first 2 weeks I lost 22 lbs, and I know a lot of that was from retaining so much liquid with the high sodium diet that is standard in the USA), and high-​protein meal-​replacement plan. 5 MF meals and one «lean and green» meal that is real food. The meals are all carb/​protein balanced, and the food charts for the Lean & Green are based on carb counts of the foods — which can help make decisions about what to eat if the weight loss has slowed down for some reason.
Medifast has been around for 25 years, and used to be liquid shakes only… they’ve improved the food offerings 1,000%! There’s oatmeal, really good bars, brownies, soups, chili, sloppy joe, puddings, soft serve ice cream type stuff, crackers, puffed rice snacky things, and snacky «meals» that take the place of potato chips and snack foods along those lines.
I love the program. I love the girls at the office… but I call them girls because I don’t believe any of them have had the life experience to truly be ‘counseling’ me, an over-​40, overweight-​the-​last-​twenty-​years-​of-​my-​life, eat-​because-​of-​every-​reason-​but-​hunger woman. They have degrees in Nutrition or Dietetics (sp?) from 4-​year universities — which is awesome… I just wish they had a few more employees who know what it is like to live life at over 200 lbs. This is the only thing that stops me from giving it a 5-​star rating.
Between the food and the accountability — I have lost 100 lbs. Which is still amazing for me to say out loud, let alone believe :-)