Has anyone tried the South Beach Diet? How does it work and did you like doing it? What are the pros and cons? I am thinking about starting it but I want to make sure I don't have to buy a lot of strange foods and that it really works. I want to lose about 40 lbs and Would like to do this over about 4 months. I would appreciate any info you can give me:) Thanks!

40 lbs in only 4 months sounds like a lot. I am not an expert in any way. It takes burning 3500 calories to lose one pound. Again I am not an expert. GOOD LUCK!!!

Thanks:) I would be happy with about 30 but I really want to lose 40. The bad thing is I don't drink a lot of soda, I eat pretty good and I am still overweight:( I also exercise on a pretty regular basis. I just want to lose this weight.

I always thought juice was so good for me. Its great on vitamins and high in calories. Reducing the amount of juice I drink has helped.

Charity...you might want to amp up your workouts with freeweights...Or take up a new Zumba class or find a new exercise video to workout to. Our bodies need change constantly or the plateau....Good Luck! Happy Workouts!

My husband and his sisters did it before our wedding, and it really worked.   Basically, with any diet, the total elimination of any substance, whether it be carbs, protein, etc. is going to initially "shock" your body. That's usually how you end up losing weight fast in the beginning.  My SIL did this diet for awhile, and she did lose weight, but her face had the look that she was "malnourished", just my opinion.  Not saying it was the diet per se, she could have very well been lacking in other nutrients unrelated to the actual diet, but just make sure with ANY diet to take your vitamins regularly. 

My husband has been on every fad diet known to man, and they all work to some degree. The key is sticking to a healthy diet regimen, because everyone plateaus as was mentioned in an earlier post.  I always try to talk him into just eating more fruits and vegetables, and try to "juice" with lots of green leafy vegetables, but you have to be careful with the fruits because of the sugars, but they tend to tone down the not so tasty green leafy veggies. Anyway, I'm going off topic from your question.  Good luck.

The greatness of the South Beach Diet is simply a means of eating more the way we truly should. It is full of lean meats, fruits and vegetables.  Eating the right combination of protein, carbohydrates and fats will always help bring our bodies back to the way God intended.

We tend to eat too much, too fatty, to starchy than we should.  But God designed the body to heal itself - so if you feed it properly (South Beach Diet aids us in that) and add a little exercise 3-5 days a week you WILL lose weight. 

I'm NOT here to sell you anything, but I'm on a nutritional supplement that eases my mind because I DON'T HAVE TO EAT 9-12 SERVINGS OF FRUITS AND VEGETABLES PER DAY!  I found that impossilble - so someone told me about this Glyconutrient that gives me more of that then I could ever eat in a day.  By all means, email me if you want more info.

Thanks everyone! I think right now I am going to just practice cutting back on my portions and drinking a lot of water with plenty of exercise:) I normally don't eat real bad and most of what I drink is water and an occasional cup of tea. But I think my portions are probably a big part of my problem. All I know is I am 180 and need to get back to 140 or around that. :( Sigh. All the fun of losing weight.

Yeah, it worked for me but not for my wife.

We really stuck to the first phase which cuts out all carbs and all sugars including fruit.

I found that it was fruit that I was missing more than any other sugar product.

But I deffinately saw a result even after just two weeks.

Unfortunately my wife and I still had cupboards full of pasta and rice so we decided to take a rest from the South Beach diet for a couple fo weeks until we cleaned out the food in our cupboards. I put 10lbs back on in two weeks. HOWEVER, when we had finished all the pasta and rice and stopped replacing it in the cupboard, it was easier to go back to the low / no carbs and low / no sugar first phase and the 10lbs dropped off in about a week.

So all in all I would say that if you can get over the initial phase and cut out virtually all bread products, potatoes, pasta and rice and really pay attention to hidden carbs then, yeah, it's a reasonable lifestyle maintenance choice.