How To Lose Weight

The two questions I get asked most often are (1) why I wanted to create a diet and (2) how I picked the 20 Diet Items chosen for the weight loss. My husband, Stan Kallis, was the inspiration for writing "Don't Diet Yet: Diet; or, How to Lose 10 Pounds in 14 Days."

A few years ago, while driving to a local ski resort for four or five days of skiing, Stan started complaining about a sharp, boring pain deep in the center of his chest. Without a blink of an eye, I reversed gears, hazard lights flashing and headed for a local hospital emergency ward. While in the hospital the doctor on call just happened to be a heart specialist. After being given many tests, he kept us overnight. The results turned up negative for a heart attack; however, the doctor said Stan was obese - seriously OBESE - and needed to start losing weight and exercising. Back in Los Angeles, I instantly started to create a diet.

Knowing that vegetables are clearly the way to lose weight, the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) provided the calorie count and nutritional values of hundreds of vegetables from which I picked 16 with the lowest calories. Fruit, carbs, eggs and chicken or fish broth were also added. My most important issue at this time was to get the excess weight off Stan to the point where a doctor wouldn't ever call him OBESE again.

As everyone knows, there's only ONE way to lose weight naturally: consume fewer calories, exercise daily, and consume an enormous amount of water.

Planking for 45 seconds each day.