Plan your weight loss

Plan what you are going to eat, and stick to your plan. You are in charge of what you consume and how active you are. Do not leave this to chance. It is your body. If you want to lose 52 pounds this year, you can do it by burning 500 calories a day more than you eat. Cooking at home, knowing what you will eat when you go out, and keeping track of this, allows you to plan your weight loss.

Snacking is a great way to gain weight

Meals, not snacks! Snacking is a great way to gain weight. How do those Olympic athletes consume all of those calories? They graze, they snack. Instead of snacking, fill up on good food. Plan for healthy, low-calorie snacks, but if you are not hungry you are less likely to need snacks.

Menu planning is key. In our workbook we have forms to help with that. When you go to the grocery store, do it AFTER you have eaten. Funny thing, when you are hungry the foods you purchase are not as healthy as those you purchase when you are full and have a list.

96 calories a day

If you want to gain ten pounds this year just consume 96 calories a day above your basal metabolic rate. Not too much is it? If you want to lose ten pounds this year it is pretty easy to cut back 96 calories in a day—one beer, one can of soda, fruit instead of French fries.

Many of my weight loss surgery patients gained ten pounds a year, maybe lost it, and regained more. Then they gained another ten pounds—and in ten years they were 100 pounds over their ideal weight and needed to have weight loss surgery. Did they eat a lot more than their friends who stayed skinny? Not at all. Just 96 calories more a day made the difference.

Small dietary changes over time have a huge impact

Small changes—better food choices, some exercise, and weighing yourself—make a huge difference over time. This is not a race to lose as much as you can in a month or two. This is a lifestyle change. Those small changes will make a difference as time goes on. Just like the 96 calories a day.

We change our tastes and our food choices all the time. When I was a kid, Italian food was spaghetti. Now we have pasta. There was no swordfish or Chilean Sea bass—but there are now, and they are great foods. Fruits were not available year around—but we also didn’t have fast food restaurants. Food choices increase, so changing the things that you eat is quite possible. Making healthy changes is the best way to lose weight.

A recent study showed that French women do not have the obesity problem that American women have. They concluded that French women ate very well for meals; in fact they ate delicious food. They did not eat between meals, and they did not eat junk food.

Small changes, over the long run, have a huge impact. If you measure it, you can manage it. Do not be discouraged: skinny people eat dessert; skinny people eat thin mints (thin mints do not make you thin). You will have fits and starts, but keep measuring, keep planning, and know that over the long run you will get to where you want to be.

Success comes from measuring and planning. It is not random. Eat well, plan on it, and enjoy it.