Remember, as with any new diet or exercise plan, consult your physician if you have pre-existing health conditions that may limit your ability to safely reduce calories and participate in extended amounts of physical activity.

This challenge is for those of us who may need to need to lose a little to a moderate amount of weight. Cutting out all the sugary, fatty foods all at once can be difficult. If you have tried to diet and have not been successful, I challenge you to try this approach.

In the first two weeks of your "diet", eliminate pop. Drink mostly water, and limit the amount of caffeine drinks, like tea and coffee. Do not sweeten tea or coffee, if drinking. That is all for these two weeks.

After two weeks, continue to cut out pop, and begin to cut out sweets. If you have a real sweet tooth, you CAN choose three of your favorite treats to eliminate rather than eliminating them all together. Remove this and the pop for the next two weeks. That is it.

A month now has passed; it's time to eliminate fried food from your diet. Continue removing the pop, and the sweets. If you previously did not cut out all the sweets from your diet, forget worrying about eliminating the fried foods and focus on fully eliminating sweets. Once you have gone two weeks without sweets, move on to eliminating the fried foods.

As you can see, this approach focuses on taking baby steps rather than diving into a world of 'sacrifice'. And of course an indulgence every now and then can be forgiven, however, try not to over-indulge; limit all categories of elimination to one serving no more than once every two weeks.

Try this approach, and remember, lean on those you feel most comfortable for support!