diet plans?
i'm young, & i don't know which diets would be hard for me to stick to.

also,
what are some good at home exercises?
my main areas that i need to work on are my arms & thighs.

& does anyone know any good tips on how to curb late night snacking?
i tend to get bored & eat, & i want to refrain from doing so.

thanks!

My late-night snacking trick is to brush my teeth and gargle mouthwash once I'm done eating for the day. I hate brushing my teeth, so I will resist the urge to snack because I don't want to do it again!

good one!
i hate eatting after i brush my teeth.
plus, i'm trying to get my teeth in good condition because i'm going to the dentist soon.

i'm going to try that.

thanks!

Hey Emily If you're young, your body should respond quickly to making positive food choices and watching your portion sizes. Try to prepare most of your food at home and eat out less - restaurant food (both sit down and fast food) is typically a much larger portion than a normal person needs and is higher in sodium, calories and fat.

To be a slender, healthy person for your life, concentrate on eating as many "whole" foods as possible (fruits, vegetables, lean protein, low fat dairy, whole grains, healthy carbohydrates - sweet potatoes, quinoa, beans, and healthy fats - avocado, nuts, healthy oils).

Read a lot. Look at labels. Use the internet. Make decisions that work for you and your life. Make a plan that is for YOU and only you.

Some good books to read:

Mindless Eating
Fast Food Nation
Fodo Politics
What to Eat
Omnivore's Dilemma

As someone that started "dieting" when I was 15 and weighed 140 lbs and ended up fatter and fatter and 200 lbs at 35, this is the advice I wish I had gotten and followed. I could have saved myself so many years of feeling like a failure - I always wanted to diet for a short time and then eat "normal." It took me 20 years to realize that "normal" American eating habits (big muffins, large size frappucinos, fast food, pizza) made me heavy and I had to really eat better to live as a thin person. That doesn't mean I never get to eat "good" or "fun" - I try to be about 90% on plan and 10% treat - which works out okay for me.

For late night snacking - declaring the kitchen "closed" at a certain hour might work. Definitely brushing/flossing is a good idea. Stay busy - find a habit that keeps your hands occupied like knitting (seriously - you could make a cool scarf!). Call your grandma, write a letter, heck, post here! Drink herbal teas.

Hey Emily If you're young, your body should respond quickly to making positive food choices and watching your portion sizes. Try to prepare most of your food at home and eat out less - restaurant food (both sit down and fast food) is typically a much larger portion than a normal person needs and is higher in sodium, calories and fat.

To be a slender, healthy person for your life, concentrate on eating as many "whole" foods as possible (fruits, vegetables, lean protein, low fat dairy, whole grains, healthy carbohydrates - sweet potatoes, quinoa, beans, and healthy fats - avocado, nuts, healthy oils).

Read a lot. Look at labels. Use the internet. Make decisions that work for you and your life. Make a plan that is for YOU and only you.

Some good books to read:

Mindless Eating
Fast Food Nation
Fodo Politics
What to Eat
Omnivore's Dilemma

As someone that started "dieting" when I was 15 and weighed 140 lbs and ended up fatter and fatter and 200 lbs at 35, this is the advice I wish I had gotten and followed. I could have saved myself so many years of feeling like a failure - I always wanted to diet for a short time and then eat "normal." It took me 20 years to realize that "normal" American eating habits (big muffins, large size frappucinos, fast food, pizza) made me heavy and I had to really eat better to live as a thin person. That doesn't mean I never get to eat "good" or "fun" - I try to be about 90% on plan and 10% treat - which works out okay for me.

For late night snacking - declaring the kitchen "closed" at a certain hour might work. Definitely brushing/flossing is a good idea. Stay busy - find a habit that keeps your hands occupied like knitting (seriously - you could make a cool scarf!). Call your grandma, write a letter, heck, post here! Drink herbal teas.

thanks for the advice!
what i end up doing is sitting on the couch watching tv, or sitting on the computer snacking on pringles, & doritos.

i'm making myself not eat after 8:00, & if i get hungry i'll try to eat some fruit.
most of the time i eat out of boredom.

i really need to start watching my portion size, too.
but, when i eat small amounts of food, i get hungry (bored)
so, i eat more.

Try filling up on water as well. If you feel like you have the urge to snack, grab a big cold glass of water

If you still hungry, eat some fruit - or make a bag of popcorn (there are HANDY 100 calorie packs that itch that salty craving when I have it).

Hang with some friends - go walking - skating - swimming - shoot some hoops etc... great exercises!

I read your post, and planned to pretty much say what Glory has already said better -
I personally, am not on a diet, my goal is just to eat healthier.
my biggest rule when eating now is that I don't eat anything that doesn't have FOOD in it.
a good example is cake.. if you made a cake from scratch at home, what would go in it - flour, sugar, butter, eggs, chocolate powder, and that's pretty much it, right? think about that next time you're in a grocery store and take a look at the ingredients on a cake mix package or a cake in the bakery. the list of ingredients is a MILE long and most of the items are things only scientists can pronounce! if you don't know what something is, do you really want to put it in your body?

I also watch portion sizes.. if i'm having a treat i make sure to only have what the packaging states is a size (if it's 15 chips, i'm going to only eat 15 chips) calories can really add up otherwise. when eating meals i usually use my hand and my plate to deal with portion sizes - the palm of your hand is about one serving of most protiens/meats or 1/4 of a "normal" size dinner plate (-do you parents have any old dinnerware? plates now are huge and this doesn't work so well. we have hand me down plates from the 70s that i eat off of and they're much smaller than our newer dinnerware-) and then i do the same with starches, if i eat them at all - just a spoonful or two and you're already at serving size. load up on the veggies - i usually have half a plate.. for example - last night for dinner we had bison steak, baked potato, and steamed broccoli. i had about 4oz of steak - which took up about 1/4 of the plate, 1/4 of a baked potato (i will usually have half, but this was a HUGE potato. that still took up almost 1/4 of my plate, if not a little smaller, and i filled up half my plate with broccoli. it was a really filling dinner, plenty of food, i know i ate well because when i don't my scale lets me know right away the next day, i was full, and not hungry at all after dinner.

as far as exercising - there are tons of dvd's out there, or your cable provider might have fitness TV on demand ("free" as it were, no buying dvds) and they often have mini workouts from loads of different workout plans - if you find one you really like you can buy those dvds... OR if you don't mind going outside (and this is something i was really scared of at first.. i mean, what if someone SAW me lol) there is walking, hiking, or if you're feeling adventerous, the couch to 5k program, which is a program for training to run a 5k on a regular basis. you can go to coolrunning.com to get the scoop on the plan, and there are podcasts on a different site that you can download free to your ipod or phone where a REALLY nice guy who i completely hate right now (lol) has set up the whole program with instructions - a lot easier than checking a stopwatch. i'm no fan of the background music, but i'm a huge fan of the program. walking/jogging/running will really tone up one of the areas you're concerned about - and if you carry hand weights, your arms will get a workout right along with the rest of you!

I think you should just spend some time exploring this site! There are tons of people doing tons of different things here. Look under the Diet Central forum and just start reading the posts and asking questions about the types of plans that work for different types of people. See what might best fit in with your lifestyle. There are also threads organized for people in different age groups. I don't know how old you really are, but there's a forum for 20-somethings, that would be a good place to look too.

Best of luck!