Most of the people want to lose weight fast. Maybe there’s a wedding in a few weeks or a party or holiday and they want to lose 20 pounds or more quickly. There are diets available that promise just that. You could be successful. It will be bad for your health and your skin will shrink slower than your body, so you will look like a prune, but you might achieve your goal. Then you will stop the diet and the weight will go back up again. Which could be bad news for the person you just married, as well as for yourself.

So let’s be real about it. A two year old weighs 20 pounds. So you’ve asked your body to burn the weight of a two-year-old in just a few weeks. Put like that, it might sound more like a challenge. It can help to know what your crash diet is doing to your body. At first there will be some weight loss that will continue for a few days and you will be celebrating. You are depleting your body’s limited supply of glycogen. As you lose glycogen, you lose water, and that explains the rapid weight loss. You are also at risk of becoming dehydrated, potential gallstone problems will come later. Then the body goes into starvation mode and you start to lose muscle and fat. Now, the more muscle you have, the higher your metabolism will be. So by losing muscle, your body slows down its metabolism so it can survive on less food. Which means your weight loss slows down. You may also find that you suffer from headaches, irritability, fatigue, insomnia, and diarrhea. Not necessarily all at once, but even one or two aren’t very nice. At this point, you might as well give up and then you’ll regain the weight you lost. ‘Only one in six Americans who have been overweight or obese lose weight and maintain that loss’ (Penn State College of Medicine). Now we know why.

What should you be doing? You have to set goals, but here we are back to realism again. It may be a good idea to lose weight for a summer vacation. But if you book your vacation in February and eat junk food until June, you won’t look like Victoria Beckham in August. If you start a healthy diet and exercise regularly in February, you just might. That should be your long-term goal to keep in mind as you achieve your short-term goal of losing 1-2 pounds per week.

To lose 1 pound a week, you must consume 500 fewer calories each day than you need to maintain your current weight. That’s the equivalent of two chocolate bars or an almond croissant at your favorite coffee shop. But you have to do more than give up chocolate and almond croissants. Drop the junk food, you know what it is, everyone else eats it. Reduce the consumption of sugars, animal fats, chips and soft drinks. Clear your fridge of junk food, you’ll eat it if it’s there. You are going to need a lifestyle change, so you should start eating healthy foods. Eat plenty of fresh fruit, vegetables, whole grains, lean meats, and fish like mackerel. If that sounds terrible, Google ‘Mediterranean recipes’ and you’ll find numerous French and Italian meals that use these ingredients and taste great. Drink plenty of water, avoid skipping breakfast, and eat smaller portions. But don’t become a martyr for what you eat. An occasional glass of wine or a celebratory meal is fine. Just stick to your new diet most of the time.

You will also need exercise to burn off the calories you eat. Don’t bother going to a gym if you don’t like that kind of thing. Half an hour of brisk walking, swimming, or cycling every day is fine. An hour is better if you have time.

That’s all you have to do. Just eat right, exercise every day, and you will lose weight slowly and safely. No rapid weight loss and sagging skin, no yo-yo dieting and health problems, no giving up. Then it won’t be long before you become the only person in six who has lost weight and kept it off.