Pray It Off Meeting 5/20/10 Dr. Oz's 16 Tips for Summer Weight Loss WITH VIDEO

Dr. Oz's 16 Tips for Summer Weight Loss* by Norine Dworkin-McDaniel

The warm weather's here, beach season is just around the corner, and that means it's time to shed the last of your winter clothes -- along with the extra pounds you've been hiding underneath all those layers. If you're dreading the thought of bathing suit shopping and fear the idea of actually wearing that suit on the beach or around the pool, relax. America's favorite physician, Dr. Mehmet Oz, best known as the host of "The Dr. Oz Show," can help. Over the next four weeks, Dr. Oz will share his strategies for slimming down and toning up so that when summer arrives, you can storm the beach with confidence. Here's are his 16 tips on how to get started:

See yourself looking fabulous. Successful athletes do this all the time -- before they even start a race, they picture that they've already crossed the finish line. So take a page from the pro-athlete playbook and before you count a single calorie, picture how successful your bathing suit reveal will be. "Visualize the first time you'll be out at the beach, walking around with confidence," said Dr. Oz. "You'll have lost some of the extra pounds that make a huge difference in how you look in a bathing suit and you're going to go out there and you're going to look hot. Focus on how you think that will feel and shoot for that."

Take a "before" picture in your swimsuit. Don't worry, no one else needs to see this, said Dr. Oz. All this picture does is give you a baseline reference point so you can see how far you've come when you reach your goal. Each week, take another picture in your swimsuit and compare it to the earlier ones. "As you shed the pounds, you'll be able to see that you are steadily progressing," said Dr. Oz. And it's a reminder that while you won't see results overnight, you will see progress.

Hang your favorite summer outfit where you'll see it every day. Buy something sexy, or dig out an old favorite that you've longed to fit into again, then put it in a prominent place so that your goal of wearing it stays top of mind. "It's an empowering visual cue," he said. "As your weight comes off, try it on periodically to see how much better it's looking on you."

Let your family in on what you're up to. Tell your co-workers. Tell everyone about your weight-loss mission. Use Facebook to update your status and tweet about the fat you're losing. "Telling people is an insurance policy," explained Dr. Oz. Not only will friends and family lend support and cheer you on, either with encouraging "You can do its!" and "Looking goods!" or at least keep the donuts and pizza out of your face. "Accountability is a spectacular motivator," said Dr. Oz. "If everyone knows what you're up to, you'll stay on track simply to avoid the embarrassment of not reaching your goal."

Kick off your efforts with a token gift to yourself. It doesn't have to be fancy or expensive -- a pair of quality walking shoes, a pedometer, a nice workout outfit, even an iTunes gift card so you can download your favorite workout tracks. The idea is that now, you're invested in yourself. "This kick-starts the psychology of change," he said. "At this point, you're no longer planning to lose weight, you're actively doing it!"

Take advantage of longer days. More daylight hours means more time for physical activity. And that can take all kinds of forms. Of course you can get out and work out, or simply spend more time walking -- aim for 10,000 steps a day. But according to Dr. Oz, yard work counts -- as long as you're not sitting on a ride-on mower -- and so does racing around with your kids! (Tag is a fun game that can get the whole family on their feet.) Keep in mind, you can divvy up your exercise into chunks of time that fit in with your schedule. You don't have to do a full hour all at once. And even if it doesn't feel like you're pushing yourself to the max, burning just a few extra calories a day can add up. "If you lose two pounds a month, over the course of the summer, that's six to eight pounds," Dr. Oz said. "And every two pounds is about an inch around your waistline."

Skip the elevator. With this simple strategy you don't have to think about when you'll fit in a workout -- you're already doing it. "Taking the stairs at work or any building you're in helps you shed pounds and maintain your cardiovascular health," said Dr. Oz. "All the years I worked in the hospital, I took the stairs -- seven flights -- between the operating room and my office. It built exercise into my day without even realizing it."

Have sex. Slimming down and rekindling some red-hot passion with your hubby? That's called win-win. And in theory, said Dr. Oz, makin' more whoopie should lessen your desire to make a beeline for the snack machine. That's because the brain has four satiety centers -- sleep, hunger, thirst and sex. "Food is one way the brain seeks to satisfy itself," Dr. Oz explained. So, from a neuroscience perspective, having more healthy sex should divert your food cravings. "Satisfying one appetite center you seem to satisfy the other," he wrote in "YOU: On A Diet."

Eat breakfast. Eating a healthy, fiber-filled breakfast can curb hunger for up to 18 hours a day, so you don't crave simple carbs and sugar, said Dr. Oz. Bonus: You'll also eat less at lunch and dinner.

Cut 100 calories a day. Be diligent about finding ways to trim a mere 100 calories from what you eat every day, and this subtle change can add up to about 10 pounds lost in a year. "This just takes a little bit of willpower," said Dr. Oz. "It's doing things like not finishing the donut or taking one donut less." Other easy ways to trim 100 calories daily:

1. Swap regular soda (97 calories in an 8-ounce can of Classic Coke) for water.
2. Trade your morning latte (a 16 ounce with whole milk can have 220 calories and 11 grams of fat) for coffee with reduced-fat milk (15 calories, 0.6 grams fat) or black (4 calories, 0 fat).
3. Have a cup of watermelon chunks (46 calories) in place of a bag of Sun Chips (140 calories, 6 grams fat).

Have a drink. The hormones in our guts that tell us we're hungry are very similar to the hormones that let us know when we're thirsty, so sometimes our bodies get confused, thinking we're hungry when we're actually thirsty and having a drink will often quell the craving. But instead of soda, beer or juice, which can be packed with empty calories, reach for no-calorie water. If you find plain water too bland, no-calorie flavored waters are a good choice. So is seltzer with a dash of juice. Aim for a 3:1 ratio of seltzer to fruit juice. Two of Dr. Oz's favorites: pomegranate or grapefruit juice. "It tickles my palate and has a little bit of flavor," he said. "A lot of people find water boring, which is okay."

You can also go for this diet classic: the pitcher filled with filtered water and sliced fruit, which is what they do in the Oz family. The all-natural alternative to soda avoids the artificial sweeteners found in other diet drinks that can trick your brain into mistaking the sweetness for sugar and storing the calories as fat. If you're craving a little sweetness, have a little sugar. "People don't realize that a teaspoon of sugar is only 12 to 16 calories and that's no big deal," Dr. Oz explained. " You'll taste the sugar and enjoy it and it's better than drinking 140 to 160 calories of soda pop which contains roughly one teaspoon of sugar per fluid ounce."

Snack before you eat your meals. Mom was right -- snacking before dinner will ruin your appetite. But Dr. Oz wants you to ruin it just a little. Here's why: When we feel hungry, it's because our empty bellies are madly secreting the hormone ghrelin, sending out a message that basically says "Hey! Feed Me!" Ghrelin levels continue rising until we've eaten. And then they drop back down to normal and you no longer feel like eating. Having a snack about 20 to 30 minutes before you sit down to eat starts to lower your ghrelin levels, so that by the time you sit down to eat, you don't feel like eating as much. Of course, this isn't license to tear through a bag of cheese puffs. Instead, grab a small handful of walnuts or a piece of fruit. That's not only because of their filling fiber, but also because nuts and fruit both contain antioxidants, which play a special, if somewhat indirect role, in weight loss too. "Antioxidants reduce inflammation, which contributes to chronic stress in the body," said Dr. Oz, "and which in turn activates certain receptors in the brain that lead us to overeat."

Fill your plate with summer fruits and vegetables. Brightly-colored fruits and vegetables are chock full of the antioxidants we just mentioned. And, let's not forget, they're rich in fiber and low in calories (provided you don't drench them in high-calorie dressings or toppings) so you can eat heartily without worrying that you're "overeating."

Eat dessert in the afternoon. "The one thing I'm adamant about is not having dessert after dinner," said Dr. Oz. "You can have sweets, like chocolate, but I don't want people having dessert after dinner." Why the hard line? Because following a big meal with a sugary-dessert, he explains, produces a surge of insulin which in turn socks away all the calories you ate at dinner as fat. "Dessert is metabolic suicide," he said. That said, Dr. Oz recommends -- indeed urges you -- to eat chocolate every day! "Of all the sweet snacks, chocolate is the healthiest because it's not loaded with trans fats," he said. In fact, a recent study just reported that chocolate-eaters have nearly half the risk of heart disease as non-chocolate eaters. Here's how to make chocolate work for you: Choose dark, rather than milk chocolate or white chocolate. The dark chocolate has many of those indirectly-helpful-for-slimming antioxidants we mentioned earlier. Eat a small amount (say, a quarter of a regular-size candy bar) as your afternoon snack. "Since you're not eating other food with it," said Dr. Oz, "you won't deposit those calories as fat."

Have wine with dinner. Timing is everything when it comes to alcohol. Drink a glass of wine or have a cocktail before you start eating, and the pleasantly relaxing intoxication may relax you enough into making less-desirable diet decisions: What's a little sour cream? A bite of your macaroni and cheese? Sure! How 'bout some cheesecake for dessert? Instead, Dr. Oz recommends pouring your wine and having it as you start to eat. "That way you're not going to overeat and -- " he points out, "the rest of your wine can be used as your after-dinner dessert."

Dine outside. Warm weather and more sunshine don't just make for more opportunities to be active; you can also take advantage of summer days to eat less by eating outdoors. For starters, we eat less when the light's bright, said Dr. Oz. (This works in the kitchen, too, by the way, so turn up that dimmer switch!) We also eat more slowly when we eat outside. "You look around, things happen, birds fly by, you have to stop the napkin from blowing away," he said. "Simple, little things in the environment slow you down. When you're in an environment where nothing's happening around you, all you can do is eat."

*http://www.thatsfit.com/2010/05/03/dr-ozs-16-tips-for-summer-weight-loss