Over 50, poor, and thinking about losing weight... How to begin?

It's hard to eat healthy when one is on a limited budget, but it can be done. Concentrate on things like beans and use only small amounts of meat. Some fresh vegetables are cheaper than others, like carrots and cabbage, and you can eat them raw or cooked. Dark chocolate isn't that much of a problem, but the salty snacks are usually high in calories. Anyway, it has helped me to just walk. I was amazed last summer when I was taking radiation therapy. I walked about three blocks to the treatment facility and back again, just because I was determined to not let the radiation get me down. I began feeling better and really missed the walking when the radiation was over. So... I began walking again. I wish I could say that I am consistent with it, but we get some bitterly cold weather here as well as snow and some day I just can't make myself get out there. I think if you start walking just a little farther than you're comfortable doing, then increase it a little each time you feel comfortable, it will make a lot of difference, both in your weight and in how you feel.

i recently lost about a stone in weight, i think thats 14 pounds. because i had put on a bit of weight, for various reasons. in the past i have just lost weight quite easily, but this time i did some serious calorie counting. i worked out my base metabolic rate, i think thats what its called, the amount of calories you burn every day, when doing nothing. i then ate that amount and no more. so that any exercise or physical activity whatsoever was pure gain. my base rate was about 1300 calories, that i could eat every day and burn doing nothing, so it wasn't that hard, and then i just seriously counted the calories. and you need to make sure that the food you do eat is as healthy as you can manage. i found, after the first week or two, when nothing ever seemed to happen, i began to lose a couple of pounds a week. i have to confess i don't like cooking either, so i ate mainly ready meals and fruit, which is high bulk but low calorie, and i don't mind snacking on things like carrots, which is also high bulk low calorie, and high nutritional value, as is fruit, though not unfortunately avodados, which are very nice, but high calorie, but apart from them. one of the advantages of a ready meal is that, here at least, the packaging reveals how many calories, so you just chose the lowest, you can find, that you like, and add vegetables, as they are extremely good for you, and will fill you up. thats the best advice i can give.

start small with exercises. park farther away at the grocery store or other places that you have to go. take the time to do small workouts during commercials. once you lose a few pounds it is a little easier to be motivated. rent an easy cardio workout from the local library, or find 5 minute workouts on the computer.

Well, first of all you need to understand that if you eat healthy and you eat beyond your body's needs you won't loose any weight, on the other hand even if you throw in a couple of cheat meals a day and remain in a caloric deficit you will still loose weight. You must have these cheat meals because you will not be so enthusiastic as you are on your first weeks where you feel like you actually can go through all the dieting. So what I am trying to say is this: Eat healthy, but throw in your favourite foods when you feel like it, but DON'T go over your body's caloric intake for the day. This is the key for loosing weight. Also you should do cardio 3-4 times a week, no more then that. If you never did running, jump rope, and any other cardio that can be hard try walking. And when you feel that walking is not doing it anymore try jogging. Also you would could do some weight training but if your primary goal is loosing weight then you need to worry about that after some months of actually dieting and cardio.