How To Survive The Holiday Eating Frenzy
By CocoaDiva on Nov 30, 2008 with Comments
The holiday season is upon us and between Thanksgiving and New Years Day Dinner there will be more holiday parties, random baked goods, peer pressure to try someone’s dish, and general overeating than a day at the Klumps dinner table. The holidays can cause emotional eating and a relaxed attitude toward fitness as you think “I will start a new diet as my New Year’s resolution,” while you gain 10 pounds in 6 weeks. Don’t fall into the holiday eating trap!! Here are a few tips to eat smart and still enjoy the holiday season.
1. Be Active Every Day - The average Thanksgiving and Christmas meal adds up to a whopping 3,000 calories. 3,000 calories is a pound of fat!! Work off some of those calories by being physically active. Go take a walk with a relative and catch up on old times, give your Aunt a guest pass to your gym and work out together, and park in the last row at the mall. Also add a few minutes to your work out. Some research shows that adding just 10 more minutes of exercise to your usual workout can stave off holiday weight gain. Aerobic activity is a sure fire way to combat those extra pounds from these two meals alone.
- Don’t Fall Asleep After You Eat – This is the perfect time to hit up that walk or do some quick trips up and down the stairs. If you sleep, your body is more likely to store excess calories as fat, not muscle. It will also slow your metabolism down and you’ll digest your food a lot slower. Relax, but if you can help it, don’t sleep right away.
2. Never arrive on an empty stomach and Don’t Starve Yourself- Keep a small snack with you at all times. Go stock up on an energy bars ( I love Luna Bars), protein shakes, fruit, cheese, yogurt, or 100 calorie packs and keep them in your car, purse, briefcase or desk. Make sure you never shop on an empty stomach as well!!! Starving yourself is the worse thing you can do because you will overeat instead of eating smartly.
3. Stop Thinking about your New Years Diet - This is the biggest excuse ever!! While you keep telling yourself about your New Years plan as you cozy up to the snack table, you are slowly gaining a good 5-7 pounds. So, you are starting off in the hole. Make your goal a healthy holiday season instead and don’t think about dieting until the New Year hits, if at all. When New Years rolls around, don’t get on the scale for two weeks. Allow some time to return to normal and then attack your new weight loss goal.
4. Make A Plan - Think about where you will be, who you will be with, what foods will be available, what foods are really special to you (that you really want to eat) vs. those that you could probably do without, what are your personal triggers to overeat and how can you minimize them. Once you’ve thought about all of these things, make a plan of action. It’s much easier to deal with a difficult social eating situation if you’ve already planned for it.
- If you bring home desserts, save them for post-workout meals- Most desserts are filled with sugar. After a workout, your body will suck up this sugar just like any other carb and not store it as fat. In fact, it will increase your insulin levels and help you store protein in your muscles!
- Take Leftovers- Try to keep them Veggies and Protein
- Plan A BIg Workout Right Before And The Day After a Big Meal – Immediately after a hard workout, your body is desperate for raw materials to rebuild with. This effect lasts for about 3 to 4 hours. During this time, your body is primed for muscle growth. So working out before a big helps your body rebuild.
5. Use the Taste Test Method And Don’t Eat Recreationally - Instead of heaping your plate with loads of deserts, snacks, and entrees, taste test the foods you want in small portions. Make a plate of just the foods you want and eat them slowly. At parties and holiday dinners we keep eating beyond our body’s physical hunger because food is there and eating is a “social thing.” When you are finished get a glass of water or pop some gum until your hunger clock turns off. Then go strike up a conversation.
8. Make Smart Drink Choices - Alcohol is high in calories. Liquors, sweet wines and sweet mixed drinks contain 150-450 calories per glass. By contrast, water and diet sodas are calorie-free. If you choose to drink, select light wines and beers, and use non-alcoholic mixers such as water and diet soda. Limit your intake to 1 or 2 alcoholic drinks per occasion. And, watch out for calories in soda, fruit punch, and egg nog as well. (Vodka and Rum have no carbs, my holiday stable is a rum and diet coke).
9. Reduce the fat in holiday recipes.There are plenty of low fat and low calorie substitutes that are amazingly tasty. Magazines are full of reduced calorie and reduced fat holiday recipes and P.O.S.H. will give you a few good recipes as well. Give them a try, and share your cooking creations with friends and family, most of the time they will never know you skimmed on the calories.
10. Enjoy the Holiday But Remember Moderation Is the Key – Food can be a huge part of the holiday season, but it doesn’t have to be your focus. Holidays are a time to reunite with good friends and family, to share laughter and cheer, to celebrate and to give thanks, make that your focus. It’s OK to eat too much once in a while. Just relax, enjoy the holidays, and remember what the season is all about.
10. Maintain perspective and Don’t Strive For Perfection – Overeating one day won’t make or break your eating plan so stay FLEXIBLE. And it certainly won’t make you gain weight! It takes days and days of overeating to gain weight. If you over-indulge at a holiday meal, put it behind you. Return to your usual eating plan the next day without guilt or despair. Give yourself permission to have fun and enjoy these annual indulgences, without beating yourself up in the process.
Here is to a happy and healthy holiday season!
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Filed Under: Eating Right • Exercise • Fitness and Health
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Toya Anitri
