Need help losing weight? Top 20 weight loss tips

Q. I need to lose a lot of weight. I'm making progress but I need weight loss help. We're going to Disneyland on December 3 and my goal is to be less than 300 pounds by then. I've followed many YOU Docs weight loss tips -- especially walking 10,000 steps a day (11,472 yesterday!). At first, the pounds flew off. But now it's slowed down. I currently weigh 315. How do I lose more and keep it off? 
-- Barry S., Whitehall, PA

A. Great progress (congratulations!) and great, important questions. We YOU Docs get asked these more often than the NBA gets asked about the lockout. So, we're devoting some extra space to the top 20 weight loss tips from one of our best-sellers (thanks, all!), "YOU: On a Diet."

• Eat five or six times a day so you're never hungry (three meals and two or three snacks).
• Close the kitchen 3 hours before bedtime.
• Choose a few healthful meals each for breakfast, lunch and dinner, and stick with them. Fewer choices lessen temptation.
• Ditto for snacks.
• Always keep your meal/snack foods around so you're never without healthful options.
• Stash these for hunger emergencies: apples, almonds, walnuts, edamame.
• Read the ingredient lists on everything in your kitchen, fridge, desk drawer, wherever you keep food. Throw out anything that lists the following in the first five ingredients:
• Added sugars and/or syrups (high-fructose corn syrup, for example)
• Trans fats (anything that has the word "hydrogenated")
• Saturated fats
• Non-whole-grain flours (including enriched or bleached flours)
• Use heart-healthy olive oil or canola oil instead of butter.
• Use a 9-inch luncheon plate for meals. Smaller plates promote smaller portions.
• Don't go back for seconds.
• Don't keep platters of food on the table.
• At restaurants, request half portions. Share the other half with a friend or ask your server to box the other half in advance to take home.
• Or, order a healthful appetizer and soup or salad instead of an entrée.
• Eat far more plants and fish than poultry.
• Rarely eat red meat, and never eat cold cuts.
• Keep portion sizes reasonable (not like the gigundo ones restaurants serve). Here are some size-comparison samples:
• Chicken or fish = a deck of cards
• Baked potato = a computer mouse
• Brown rice or whole wheat pasta = a baseball
• Non-whole-grain flours (including enriched or bleached flours)
• Fruits and vegetables = a fist
• Cheese (low/no-fat) = 4 cubes the size of dice
• Peanut butter = a golf ball
• Oil = a poker chip
• Walk every day. NO EXCUSES! Build up to 10,000 steps daily.
• Stretch quietly for a few minutes after walking. Stretching keeps you limber, and its meditative element helps you resist cravings.
• Do strength training for 10 minutes three times a week (alternate days).
• When you hit a plateau, increase strength training for several weeks and use 7-inch plates for 2 weeks.