Something called The Step Diet has been all over the news in the past few days because a woman lost over 100 pounds with it. Looking back in time, here’s some information on just what the Step Diet is and how it works. Sadly there’s nothing wacky or crazy involving eating on steps or food that looks like steps. What the Step Diet does provide, however, is a simple plan that can help you lose weight.
The basics of The Step Diet are pretty simple. The plan is designed to last 12 weeks, and combines decreasing your calorie intake with increasing your activity level. Sounds good, right? Well, the best part is you don’t have to be a nutiritionist or join a health club. The first “step” is to take a week-long inventory of your eating and activity habits. This helps to develop guidelines for the amount of food and number of steps you usually take in a day.
Once you’ve got that information you are ready to start stepping it up, so to speak. You can eat anything you want, just decrease the portion size by 25%. That can accomplished by literally taking 25% off your plate, or by replacing a food item with something that has 25% less calories and fat. On the activity side you add 500 steps to your routine – with a total minimum of 2000 steps per day. The steps don’t only have to be walking, you can convert any activity to a number of steps. There are charts in the Step Diet book, but you can use something like this to start.
Each week you continue to add 500 steps until you’ve reached the plan’s goal of 10,000 steps per day. These steps don’t have to be completed in one session, so don’t worry about having to carve out a huge chunk of your day. Adding 500 steps a week only increases your activity time by 3-5 minutes, which makes it easy to incorporate into your lifestyle. If you have a day where your food intake increases a lot, just add more steps proportionally.
If the Step Diet sounds too easy to work, it really isn’t. The plan is really just the basic advise most weight loss experts give. You have to eat a bit less and exercise a bit more. The Step Diet just presents it in a way that is simple and possible for almost anyone. The gradual increase in steps will ease you into the program, and is great for folks who are very sedentary. Plus steps are easy. You can walk around your house if it’s cold, and bring your kids or dog along in nice weather.
the thing we like best about the Step Diet is that you don’t really need to buy the book. All you really need is your will to succeed, and ideally a pedometer to help count your steps. There won’t be any dramatic weight loss in 3 days like some plans promise, but you will be stronger and healthier after 12 weeks if you stick to it. That’s a great way to turn your life around.
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Weight loss diva 02.19.09 at 5:55 pm
the step diet is a good one, i like the way it removes the stress of counting calories and starving from the person trying to lose weight.