Dieting for your wedding

I have mixed feelings about this, as I spent four years as a leader for Weight Watchers and witnessed a bride or two working through the extra pounds to look glorious for her special once- in- a- lifetime day.

What argues in favor? If you know you're carrying around recent extra pounds, like weight gained in the past two years (or fewer), and you know it's due to stress eating, bad habits, or careless indulgences that can be avoided by ignoring specific people, places and things, then it might be not such a big deal to go for the weight loss.

What argues against? If you have a chronic weight problem, are carrying more than thirty pounds over your BMI limit, and you're in a hurry to lose it fast, forget it. The stress of wedding "work" and the stress of dieting can cancel each other out.

I remember a bride in my group a few years ago who was dropping weight at the rate of four to five pounds per week. She had several months to go before the wedding, but wanted to get thirty five to forty pounds shed in total and maintain it for eight weeks before the big day. She impressed other members with her amazing losses every week. WW, however, has a policy of advising members to take off weight at the average rate of one to two pounds maximum per week. This is a healthy weight loss regimen, but argues against the quickie programs out there. My young bride was gaming the system, starving herself while using the basics of Weight Watchers. Long before she finished her regime to lose, she disappeared from the meeting. I never found out if she met her personal weight loss goal.

Bottom line is this: the stress of weddings demands you take good care of yourself every step along the way. This means getting enough food in your body to keep your moods in check, a spring in your step and energy to burn. A five to ten pound loss over eight weeks can't hurt you. Any other program should be under the strict guidance of a doctor; but in any event, you want to look like yourself at your wedding. What's the point of going through your wedding album a year later and wonder who's in those pictures?