I am trying to lose 5-10 lbs before my wedding in October.

I've been doing a lot of research on healthy dieting. I've never really done it the right way before. Here is some of the information that I found to be helpful.

Remember to have a good ratio of calories, 40-50% Carbs, 25-35% protein, 20-30% fat. Under 2500 mg of sodium and over 25 grams of fiber.

Never go below 1200 calories if you are a female, because your body can go into starvation mode and it is possible that you might gain weight, besides doing serious damage to your body. (1500 calories if you are male).

It is recommended to reduce your calories by 500 per day, but never more than 1000 calorie deficit per day. When your down to the last 5-10 lbs, you should just focus on toning. Tone. Tone. Tone. Start lifting weights, keep up the cardio. As for the number of calories, don't reduce by more than 500 less than what you burn. It's only, if you have 20 or more lbs to loss, that you don't reduce by more than 1000 calories less than what you burn. 3500 Calories = 1 lb. Divide that by 7 days, and you have a reduction of 500 calories per day for a week. You can safely lose 1-2 lbs per week.

With the increasing summer heat, water is important to staying hydrated and aiding in meeting weight loss goals.

A good estimate is to take your body weight in pounds and divide that number in half. That gives you the number of ounces of water per day that you need to drink. For example, if you weigh 160 pounds, you should drink at least 80 ounces of water per day. If you exercise you should drink another 8 ounce glass of water for every 20 minutes you are active. If you drink coffee or alcohol, you should drink at least an equal amount of water. If you live in an arid climate, you should add another 2 servings per day. As you can see, your daily need for water can add up to quite a lot.

A calculator to help you figure out how much water you should drink:

http://www.muscletech.com/CALCULATOR...ter_Calculator .shtml

Do you walk or run and want to know how much water to carry with you: Check out this calculator: http://walking.about.com/library/cal/ucwatercalc.htm

Can you drink too much water? http://www.drmirkin.com/fitness/hyponatremia.html

Here is some math to help you figure how many calories you should consume. Remember to never go under 1200 for a female and 1500 for a male.

Here is how you can figure your BMR and your caloric needs so that you can stay within 500-1000 calories of your needs. This is the most effective method of losing body fat and not losing water and muscle.

Imperial(US) BMR Formula

Women: BMR = 655 + ( 4.35 x weight in pounds ) + ( 4.7 x height in inches ) - ( 4.7 x age in years )

Men: BMR = 66 + ( 6.23 x weight in pounds ) + ( 12.7 x height in inches ) - ( 6.8 x age in year )

Metric (Canada) BMR Formula

Women: BMR = 655 + ( 9.6 x weight in kilos ) + ( 1.8 x height in cm ) - ( 4.7 x age in years )

Men: BMR = 66 + ( 13.7 x weight in kilos ) + ( 5 x height in cm ) - ( 6.8 x age in years )

This will calculate what you require even if you were to sit on your butt all day or sleeping most of the day. Because this is roughly how many calories your body will burn as a living, breathing, eating, heart-beating, digesting etc.. being. This does not include your daily activities. It is really easy to not eat enough, so you need to factor in your activity levels.

Harris Benedict Formula To determine your total daily calorie needs, multiply your BMR by the appropriate activity factor, as follows:

If you are sedentary (little or no exercise) : Calorie-Calculation = BMR x 1.2
If you are lightly active (light exercise/sports 1-3 days/week) : Calorie-Calculation = BMR x 1.375
If you are moderatetely active (moderate exercise/sports 3-5 days/week) : Calorie-Calculation = BMR x 1.55
If you are very active (hard exercise/sports 6-7 days a week) : Calorie-Calculation = BMR x 1.725
If you are extra active (very hard exercise/sports & physical job or 2x training) : Calorie-Calculation = BMR x 1.9
This is the total number of calories you need in order to maintain your current weight. Now to address the caloric deficit needed to help lose body fat.

The calorie deficit should be achieved by a combination of fewer calories in (diet) and more calories out (exercise). This combination of diet and exercise is simply the best for lasting fat loss.

If you want to lose fat, a useful guideline for lowering your calorie intake is to reduce your calories by at least 500, but not more than 1000 below your maintenance level. One pound of fat = 3500 calories. That is why 1-2lbs per week is the best rate of fat loss. Anything faster would mean you are probably losing muscle mass and losing water. You want to lose FAT without doing damage to your body.

For people with only a small amount of weight to lose, 1000 calories is clearly ridiculous and would be too much of a deficit. As a guide to minimum calorie intake, the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) recommends that calorie levels never drop below 1200 calories per day for women or 1500 calories per day for men. Even these calorie levels are considered by most fitness, nutritional and exercise professionals to be quite low.

An alternative way of calculating a safe minimum calorie-intake level is by reference to your body weight or current body weight. Reducing calories by 15-20% below your daily calorie maintenance needs is a useful start.

To figure out the math to determine the number of grams of Carbs, Protein and Fat you should consume, take the total number of calories you are suppose to consume.

Divide it by the precentages you are using. So for Carbs you will have a number of calories that represent a fraction of the total, same for protein and fat.

Then you take each of those number of calories, and you divide Carbs by 4 to get the total grams, Protein by 4 to get the total grams and Fat by 9 to get the total grams. For example:

The Math for a 1200 Daily Calorie Goal:

40-50% Carbs = 480-600 calories (120-150 grams)
25-35% Protein = 300-420 calories (75-105 grams)
20-30% Fat = 240-360 calories (26-40 grams)

Aim for 25 gram or more of Fiber
Aim for 2500 mg or less of Sodium

This is my list of information that I have on my computer. I don't remember where I got individual pieces of information. The information is widely available all over the internet however.

I hope this is helpful to someone. The information has been helpful for me.