In my last blog I promised to share some practical things that you can do to keep the holiday weight gain at bay. Here are my favorites:
- First, decide your goal regarding your weight over the holidays. Will you gain, lose or maintain? It may come as a surprise to some of you that you really do get to pick this goal. Make the decision. Take ownership. What happens is not your relative’s fault, it’s not the host of the party’s fault, it’s not the holiday’s fault. Everything that you choose to eat or drink is a decision that you will make.
- Make a plan, establish some decisions for yourself ahead of time. Decide now what things are going to be worth a splurge. What are you realistically willing to do or not do? Be specific. Pick the things that you really want, have and enjoy them, and the rest of the time just eat like you normally would. If just the thought of making a plan feels bad to you and you don’t want to do it, you probably ARE making a plan. You’re probably making a plan subconsciously – to overeat or overdrink.
- Make sure you have practiced the thoughts that go with the plan before you have to enforce it. You might have to argue with yourself a little. For example, do you have any version of these thoughts?
- I will hurt the host’s feelings if I don’t eat her food. (Is that really true?)
- I just love ____ (your holiday food of choice) so much. (Is that true, do you love that food more than you would love to not gain weight?)
- I can’t lose weight during the holidays because ____. (Is this true? Why?) It’s not that you can’t it’s that you won’t. (read that again, there’s a big difference)
- Go ahead and argue with your thoughts ahead of time. (I probably lost some of you here, but I am charging ahead)
- Last week I talked about ‘expecting stress’. I also think we should expect to want to eat and drink all of the things and not be surprised. Be like, “Of course I want all the casseroles and the dressing and the pie. Why wouldn’t I? I have always eaten it in the past and it tastes good.” Expect to want it and be prepared to live with the desire without acting on it, unless it was part of your plan.
- Don’t forget to pay attention to your hunger. You made your plan and decided what was really worth splurging on, eat it, but don’t overeat it. Enjoy each bite but continue to pay attention to your hunger before and while you are eating, as we should be doing all of the time.
- Lastly, keep weighing yourself, don’t ignore the situation. You don’t really want to be surprised in January, do you?
