by Michelle Wilkinson

Created on: May 05, 2010

When you’re desperate to lose weight it can be tempting to aim for rapid weight loss, but the trouble with that is you sometimes end up taking rather dangerous measures to achieve the results you’re after. Rather than going about weight loss sensibly you might go on a crash diet or start taking pills to kick-start your weight loss, although this won’t help you with your weight in the long run. You therefore have to find a way to lose weight which you can do without jeopardising your health.

Ultimately, this means you have to reduce your calorie intake so it is lower than your calorie expenditure, while making sure that you don’t cut calories too much. Realistically, you should be aiming to lose a pound or two each week, which requires you to build up a calorie deficit of 3,500. Thus, if you reduce your calorie intake by 500 calories each day you should find you have lost a pound at the end of the week and if you combine a lower calorie diet with regular exercise you may even be able to increase this amount.

To reduce your calorie intake you have to focus on changing what you eat and how much you eat, but you have to think about the future – not just the present – so that you adopt habits which you can follow after you have reached your goal weight. There isn’t much point following the cabbage soup for a couple of weeks just so you can shed 20 pounds or so, when as soon as you come of the diet you return to your usual eating habits and regain all the weight you lost.

Thus, you have to get used to calorie counting and making healthier choices at meal times. You need to increase the amount of fruit and vegetables you eat and to get more complex carbohydrates and protein into your diet, while reducing the amount of junk food you eat. As well as making healthier food choices you also have to think about how much you eat, as reducing the quantity of food you put on to your plate can reduce your calorie intake significantly, as can eating fewer snacks.

Not only should you focus on your diet, though, since regular exercise is also worth making time for if you want to lose weight in a sensible way and keep it off when you have reached your goal.

Obviously, you won’t reach your weight-loss goal overnight, but at least if you take a sensible approach you should be able to maintain a healthy weight because of the better eating and exercise habits you have learned to embrace.

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