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" As you rummage through your closet, you spy a box of old photos: you as a baby, you as a tomboy and then you at age 18, back when minis and high heels were your friends.  By now, so many years have gone by that maybe you feel you&amp;#039;ve always been 40 pounds overweight. Trust me, you haven&amp;#039;t. That smiling girl in those wedding photos really is you. We all know why she looks different now. Life leads us away from that happy time when our bodies were at their best. The good news is, you can get that body back \u2014 or come darn close. All you need is a smart plan and the will to stick to it. Step 1: &amp;quot;See the pretty girl in the mirror there...&amp;quot; While holding a photo of the younger you, visualize your former size. Close your eyes and imagine your present face on top of that slimmer figure. You can be that size again. Whenever you need extra motivation, whip out that photo and say to yourself, &amp;quot;I&amp;#039;m coming back.&amp;quot; Step 2: Chew, swallow, record Don&amp;#039;t get angry with me for mentioning food diaries. Most weight-loss professionals recommend them, and for a good reason: Journals make it virtually impossible for you to ignore how much you&amp;#039;re eating. The more you write things down, the less you will eat. Keep a small spiral notebook in your purse, pocket, or briefcase, so you can quickly note your most recent meal or snack. Recording your food intake does two things. First, it helps you self-police. Sure, you could snatch that free sample of cheese in the grocery store or those last few fries on your child&amp;#039;s plate...but then you&amp;#039;d have to add it to your log. Suddenly, you question whether you&amp;#039;re really even hungry. Second, the diary spells out how many calories you&amp;#039;re consuming. (To assign caloric values, buy an inexpensive calorie-count book or find the information on the Web.)  Step 3: Go food shopping Like Mom said, you need to eat your fruits and vegetables. You can buy fresh or frozen \u2014 research demonstrates that the nutritional content is usually not compromised by freezing. Since most frozen vegetables are prechopped, they&amp;#039;ll also save you some time, so load up. Why all the emphasis on produce? Fruits and veggies are loaded with water and fiber, which help fill you up on fewer calories. Aim for four servings of vegetables and two servings of fruit each day. It&amp;#039;s easy: Just add a piece of fruit to your breakfast; for lunch, include a big salad or top your favorite sandwich with extra lettuce, tomato and cucumber, and have some carrots on the side. Steamed vegetables at dinner (choose two you like) and some frozen grapes for dessert will get you to your daily total. See \u2014 not so hard after all.  Step 4: Move it! When you were 18, I bet you walked a lot more and drove less...and you probably walked much faster, too. Nowadays, maybe you hardly ever break a sweat \u2014 and that&amp;#039;s got to change. Let me be clear: To lose weight, you must exercise as well as diet. You have no choice. Why? Because if you eat much less than you normally would but don&amp;#039;t exert yourself more, your metabolism will slow down and your weight won&amp;#039;t change. Focus on strength and resistance training \u2014 moves like push-ups, sit-ups and leg lifts. Strength and resistance training is key, because after age 20, the average American woman loses half a pound of muscle a year. With the onset of menopause, that number doubles to one pound a year. Muscle is the body&amp;#039;s most active tissue \u2014 it consumes major calories, even when your body is at rest. So less muscle means fewer calories burned, and that means the pounds pile up more quickly.  Step 5: Hit the snooze button Sleep is critical to your weight-loss program. Without enough zzz&amp;#039;s we tend to make poor decisions in many areas of our lives, and food and fitness decisions are no exception. When we&amp;#039;re tired, we find all sorts of excuses to avoid exercise. So be sure to get plenty of rest. For starters, try getting into bed a few minutes earlier tonight. (Research suggests that the optimal amount of sleep most women need is eight hours.) Turn off the TV, pick up a book and let yourself drift off. Also, try not to drink caffeine or alcohol too close to bedtime. They can significantly disrupt your snoozetime.  Step 6: Send up a flare Don&amp;#039;t be afraid to ask for support. Call your sister and best friend and tell them you&amp;#039;re on a mission to get back in shape. Let&amp;#039;s face it: More than 64 percent of Americans are overweight. So the effort to slim down is something other women understand all too well. You may even find them saying, &amp;quot;Wow! I&amp;#039;ve wanted to do that for years. Can I join you?&amp;quot; Include your kids in the project, too. Take the family for a hike, switch to low-calorie frozen yogurt, talk about healthful foods. In my home, we don&amp;#039;t focus on words like fat, calories or weight loss, but we do discuss eating healthful foods, exercising and drinking lots of water as habits that make us feel good. Step 7: &amp;quot;Can it be that it was all so simple then?&amp;quot; When you were young and single, life was probably simpler \u2014 no kids, no mortgage, no career, no health worries. But don&amp;#039;t use life&amp;#039;s added responsibilities as an excuse. If you give in to thoughts like, Why even try? I&amp;#039;ll never be able to find time in my overloaded schedule, they&amp;#039;ll lead you straight to the kitchen for a pint of H\u00E4agen-Dazs. Don&amp;#039;t do it. Return to your action plan. If you plan intelligently and believe in yourself, you can lose the weight permanently. You can reclaim the body you once loved. It&amp;#039;s not just a &amp;quot;watercolor memory&amp;quot; \u2014 it&amp;#039;s right inside you, waiting to get out. You&amp;#039;ve just got to give the way you were a chance. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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