How do you start a plan to lose 40 pounds in 3 months?

Answer 1

• Weight loss is all about creating healthy habits. To be successful at losing weight, you need to change your lifestyle and your eating habits. Adopting healthy eating habits together with regular cardio exercise is the best way to lose weight effectively and keep the weight off.
• Cut out anything containing sugar, or high fructose corn syrup, including breads, and cereals, all pre packaged junk that contains monosodium glutamate/hydrolyzed protein, including boxed "dinners", drink no milk, and buy bottled drinking water (store brand is just fine). You will lose 40 pounds by the end of three months. Eat all the fresh low carbohydrate vegetables you want and a few (but not too many) fruits.
• Eat well balanced diet, count you calories and carbohydrates, take vitamin and mineral supplements, cut right down on saturated fat but use beneficial fats, do of aerobic or cardio exercise, lift weights three times a week.
• Before changing your physical habits, or starting any fitness program, you may wish to obtain the blessing of your physician.
• I lost 40 pounds in about 6 months. Like other answers here, it consisted of eating right along with a weight training/aerobic program. Aerobics (bike, treadmill, elliptical) three times a week anywhere from 20-40 minutes per day (depending on my energy level). Weight training three times a week as well. There are many good books out there on weight training programs. The key here is to mix it up every 3-4 weeks and ease into the program. Many first time weight lifters injure themselves by doing too much, too quick.
• 40 pounds in 3 months is about 13 pounds per month. Most diet doctors recommend a weight loss averaging 1 pound per week, or 4 pounds per month. Losing weight slower means that you are more likely to keep it off, to lose fat instead of muscle, and to gain new healthy habits. Most of the people who lose large amounts of weight quickly are very obese, or regain it just as quickly. If you are dieting for a special event, even a loss of 10-15 pounds will significantly improve your appearance.
• Forty pounds in three months is too much. Aim for a loss of one or two pounds per week on a low carbohydrate diet. That way, you are not depriving yourself of calories and compromising your metabolism.
• In addition to eating correctly, you can do more to boost your metabolism for fat loss and increased energy. For example, proper strength training will increase lean muscle. Lean muscle is your metabolic furnace that will burn extra energy (calories) 24 hours a day. Moreover, adding muscle through strength training will enable you to eat more food and avoid gaining body fat in the future.

• Cardio exercise will also increase the amount of calories your body uses during and immediately after exercise. Choose some kind of mild cardio exercise that you dislike the least and do it six days a week. Brisk walking is a good way to start. Walking for weight loss is very effective when done properly and it is sustainable long term. 'Brisk' means walking at a 4 mph pace. Slowly work up to that pace and then slowly increase your distance. If you want to use that form of mild cardio to lose body fat, you will need to average walking from 3 to 6 miles daily at that pace. Ideally (for maximum effect), walk before your first meal of the day. Don't worry if you are not able to do that, you can still achieve good results. You do not have to do your entire daily walking at once and you can split it up into more than one walk.
• There are some things that you can add to training to increase metabolism and get the maximum effect out of weight training and weight loss. Try to eat six smaller meals a day to aid blood sugar. This can give you more energy to work out. Also, your body has to digest the food more often and to do so it burns more calories. In addition, drink ice water at every meal because your body has to warm its core and that too burns calories. Train with the four main weight exercises for 6 months bench squat curls and military press. After the 6 months, you can add dumbbells. This increases your body's frame strength to handle more weight efficiently. In addition, eat protein before bedtime. It feeds your muscles during the night and more muscle means more fat loss. Also, be wary of having too much fruit. Fruit is fructose to the human body. It turns it into sugar and sugar is turned to fat. It is best to eat small amounts of fruit but you can eat all the non-starchy vegetables you want. The more muscle you build the more you can eat per day and still lose weight because muscle burns calories (even while you sleep). If you add some form of cardio every other day and weight training every other day, with one day a week off, and eat more on your day off to feed your body, you can turn the tide and get into great shape fast.