Smart Ways to Avoid Christmas Weight Gain

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Give your body a holiday

Did you ever think about treating your body to a blissful holiday break? Not on a beach somewhere (though that’s good too), but from the excess sugar, fat, alcohol, caffeine, stress, and exhaustion that can come with the season.

Valuing your body means treating it well with foods and exercise that are good for it. Treating your body means you’re less likely to gain weight. This season try giving your body a gift of good health. You might even let it outside in the fresh air for a walk!

Avoid portion distortion

Watching portion size is always a must for weight control. But at Christmas time it's especially easy to eat bigger portions and more of everything. This is a major contributor to seasonal weight gain.

Think about how big a ham is, for starters, or the massive spread of food on Christmas day, or the mountains of hors d'oeuvres piled up on party tables, or the heaps of homemade shortbread, mince pies and cakes. Be aware that the large amount of food around you may prompt you to want to eat bigger portions than you normally would eat. Make a conscious decision to eat certain portion sizes and stick to it. Don’t be fooled by the overabundance of food around you.

To keep on track, keep track

Although the festive season may not be most conducive to keeping track of your eating and exercise habits, journalling this activity is critical to keeping off Christmas weight gain. Make a point to remember that!

Make a commitment to yourself to continue tracking food and exercise habits throughout the holidays – it should only take a few minutes each day. Even if you feel there is not enough time, do it anyway. No excuses. It takes less than five minutes to log your food and exercise. You will be much happier with yourself when January 1st comes along.

Remember that tomorrow never comes

Christmas time is prime time for putting important things off until the next day, and the next, and the next. Important things such as controlling what you eat and how much  you exercise.

CalorieKing.com.au member Amanda suggests a way for dealing with this problem. “If you feel like you've strayed from your weight-control plan over Christmas,” she says, “don't think ‘I'll start again tomorrow.’ Start again immediately. If you say you'll start again tomorrow, why not say the same the next day? If you keep waiting until ‘tomorrow,’ you'll never make the changes you need to make.”

Take Amanda’s advice this year and remember that tomorrow never comes – don’t put weight control plans off until the next day, or they may never happen.

On the other hand, the fact that tomorrow never comes makes it all the more important to enjoy the festivities and the company of family and friends while the season is here. That can be hard to do if you spend 100 percent of your time and energy worrying and fussing about food. Keep things in perspective, make healthy choices, and have a slice of plum pudding while you’re at it. After all, it’s Christmas time. Enjoy.

Related articles :

• 7 ‘Little Black Dress’ Tips for Partying on a Diet
• Christmas: Day-after damage control
• Tis the Season to Be Jolly?

Last updated: November 30th, 2006