When you get right down to the essence of losing weight, you're left with diet and exercise. Your body cannot store fat if it's burning off energy. To lose weight fast, begin limiting your calorie intake immediately and exercise every day. The amount of calories you should eat depends on a variety of factors including your sex (women need to eat fewer calories than men), height, age and activity level. At the website ShapeFit (see Resources), you can calculate how many calories you should consume daily. Dropping a few pounds over the next few weeks will be successful only if you do all of these things.
Step 1
Count calories. You can choose any diet you want, but unless you know how many calories you're taking in, a diet won't help you lose weight. The USDA National Nutrient Database (see Resources) lists nutrition information for thousands upon thousands of different foods, including fresh and packaged foods. Write down everything you eat and add up your calories each day. Once you hit your total for the day, stop eating. You obviously want to avoid hitting your limit early. Planning out your daily menu won't just ensure that you don't become uncomfortably hungry, but you can also trade out single, high-calorie foods for multiple, low-calorie substitutes.
Step 2
Exercise no less than 30 minutes a day, five days a week. That's the minimum amount recommended just to stay healthy. ShapeFit.com maps out a daily exercise routine for people who want to lose weight. It takes about one hour a day and includes both cardio, weights and exercises like push-ups or jumping rope. You don't have to do the entire routine in one session. Get in 20 minutes before work, walk a half hour at lunch and do the remaining exercises at night after dinner.
Step 3
Skip one snack a day. Most people sneak a cookie or add cream to their afternoon coffee. There are 20 calories in 1 tsp. of half and half. If you like your coffee light, that can amount to at least 100 extra calories daily. A prepackaged chocolate chip cookie may carry about 55 calories. If you eat two, again, that's more than 100 calories a day. After one week of skipping these treats, you've cut about 700 calories from your diet.
Step 4
Substitute fattening foods for healthier foods. Limiting your diet, for some, may sound impossible. The good news is that there are a variety of foods that can satisfy your hunger, have fewer calories, and make you feel fuller. John Berardi, nutrition expert, suggests eating no less than 20 g of fiber a day. Fiber helps the body rid itself of excess food rather than absorbing it and storing it as fat. Fiber also satiates hunger longer. Foods high in fiber include whole wheat pasta, pears (keep the skin on) and lentils.
Step 5
Sneak in as much extra exercise as you can. According to Trinity Mother Frances medical clinics, counting your steps could help you lose weight. In a 2009 study, sedentary people who started a new walking program and tracked their progress with a pedometer lost weight without making any diet changes at all. A study analysis by the University of Michigan Health Systems found that when study participants started using a pedometer, they increased their steps from just under 1,000 to more than 4,000 steps daily. Ways to tweak your walking routine include parking further from work, the grocery store or mall and taking the dog for walks instead of letting him out in the backyard.
Tips and Warnings
- One good rule of thumb for quickly losing weight is to eat 500 fewer calories than your daily caloric needs. Alcohol is packed with calories. Eliminating three beers a week will cut about 450 calories; eliminating three glasses of red wine a week amounts to striking about 360 calories from your diet.
- No one should ever eat fewer than 1,200 calories a day.
Things You'll Need
- Pedometer
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