What are your game plans for the holiday temptations?!

eringrace95_

I only just started my journey in April so no major holidays have had a chance to try to mess me up yet. I feel like as long as I keep with moderation I'll be okay but do you guys have any tips or tricks for making it through the holiday season?!

eringrace95_

Oh and I'm in Canada so my thanksgiving is in October, so coming up!

yesimpson

Thanksgiving/Christmas are only a few days. Don't make them a few weeks.
Enjoy the festive foods but be sensible; is this is the last opportunity you'll ever have to eat that particular item, do you need two helpings? Is it necessary to take advantage of every single chance to eat, say, a mince pie, or would it be better to save calories for what you really fancy? Stay active.

eringrace95_

yesimpson wrote: »

Thanksgiving/Christmas are only a few days. Don't make them a few weeks.
Enjoy the festive foods but be sensible; is this is the last opportunity you'll ever have to eat that particular item, do you need two helpings? Is it necessary to take advantage of every single chance to eat, say, a mince pie, or would it be better to save calories for what you really fancy? Stay active.

Thanks!! Awesome advice

queenliz99

One day out of 365 is only a bleep in the scheme of things. I thoroughly enjoy the holidays and when they are over I get back to logging. No big deal to me. You need to put this into perspective.

greynotesfall

This year will be extremely easy for me. My husband is military, so we're far from family. He will be gone over the holidays this time around, so I won't even make any holiday food. And I'm a homebody so, other than work and grocery shopping, I really won't even leave the house.

Usually though I recommend not denying yourself all of the yummy food. Definitely eat the things you want, but watch your portion sizes. If you are tracking your calories over the holidays I feel it is better to slightly overestimate them to allow for variations of different recipes. Holidays should be happy occasions and you don't want to dampen your mood by thinking of all of the things you have to miss out on!

Exercise wise, if you like sledding or skiing or anything, those are fun exercises to slip in to help with extra calories you may be consuming. Once it starts snowing regularly, of course. Good luck!

eringrace95_

Thanks for the replies!!

JeffBrown3

I'm going to eat whatever I want and however much I want. If I eat a big meal on Thanksgiving, Christmas and my birthday I won't gain hardly anything. I'm gonna enjoy it and go back to logging the day after.

moribunny

You could also switch to maintenance calories over the holiday season. This way you won't gain or lose, but you can fit in more things you'd like to eat. ^__^

eringrace95_

Good ideas!

robspot

yesimpson wrote: »

Thanksgiving/Christmas are only a few days. Don't make them a few weeks.

This!

The number of times in the past years that my "Christmas" eating and drinking has started on December 1st is depressing!

As someone said on another thread, it's not what you eat between Christmas and New Year that makes you fat, it's what you eat between New Year and Christmas. Wise words

DeguelloTex

Eat what I want and move on.

vivelajackie

I plan to drink the nog. I plan to eat the ham. I plan to fit a piece of pie in there and drown it with wine.

Seriously though. Enjoy the holidays. Don't feel guilty for letting yourself have a little fun. Log and move on and don't let it become the entirety of winter. You should be okay.

neldabg

bunnyxhime wrote: »

You could also switch to maintenance calories over the holiday season. This way you won't gain or lose, but you can fit in more things you'd like to eat. ^__^

^This. Also, I plan only to do this on my Birthday (I'm a December baby!), Christmas and New Years so it doesn't make a dent in my progress. However, if some of the food is fast food, I won't eat it. After eating clean for so long, I don't really like/crave fast food. Maybe it's all mental, but I can just *taste* the artificiality. It's like the lowest quality of food available and so not worth it health-wise and taste-wise. I'll just eat all the home cooked food provided.

goldthistime

Thanksgiving doesn't worry me. The "feast" includes so much healthy stuff that I rarely gain. Looking forward to it.

Halloween has me shaking in my boots. Last year was my first year ever that I didn't overeat mini chocolate bars purchased for the kiddies. I was oh so proud to have consumed exactly none. But within a few days of Halloween I went on a sweets mini-binge. Plan to eat a decadent but not overly sugary treat like ice cream or cheesecake that evening.

goldthistime

Oops. Part of my post didn't post. A short version: get my Christmas shopping and decorating done before Dec 1 to avoid stress eating.

Francl27

I eat all the foods... more specifically, the foods I don't get to eat the rest of the time (so desserts, typically, lol). Go light on the rest. But just those 2/3 days (we do Christmas Eve too but don't care about New Year Eve). And keep a deficit the rest of the week.

We have a wedding this year in December too though. That's gonna suck.

mlcollins89

I think in the case of special occasions you have to give yourself a break; enjoy the food, have pice of cake (or two!), have the mashed potatoes, the gravy, the stuffing. The next day, get back to business and don't punish yourself.

I found this summer I constantly had various celebrations, back to back. It was very challenging to "splurge" and then get back on track. Once I start eating unhealthy choices, I have quite a bit of trouble stopping.

masterloafer

I love that everyone is being so supportive of having some soul food. I've had a few "cheat days" here and there this summer and I'm so riddled with guilt about it that I usually way undereat the next day and feel gross about for a week or so. This is all fantastic advice! I'm looking forward to my mom's buttery smashed potatoes and sugar pie!!

macgurlnet

I go for the foods I don't get much of outside the holidays - like my aunt's spinach dip & my mom's cheesy potatoes. I start with one small portion of everything I want & evaluate my dessert options, too, so I can decide which one I want (or if I want both).

If you're currently trying to lose, consider taking a few days at maintenance so you have more calories to play with.

I do absolutely recommend you continue to log, even though it'll be a lot of "guesstimates." Better to have an idea of what & how much you ate, rather than nothing.

If you weigh yourself within a few days of the holiday meal, you'll probably see a gain - don't panic and wait a week or so and see what happens with your weight.

And, most of all....

Enjoy!!!



~Lyssa

Sabine_Stroehm

Same thing I always do, plus a few more wine calories. I cook the way I want to eat, and I eat the way I want to eat most days. I don't use holidays as an excuse to overindulge in foods I don't really want to eat.

shadow2soul

Well last year, I ate what I wanted without restrictions on Thanksgiving, my son's Birthday (2 days before christmas) and christmas. I stuck to a deficit the rest of the time (adding small treats here and there, but not going all out) and I continued to lose weight through the holidays.

This year will be a little trickier, because I should be transitioning to maintenance before the holidays. To prevent a gain (fat gain, not the water weight gain...I expect and accept temp water gains), I might set my goal to 0.5 lb per week loss for the weeks that the holidays land in. By doing that I should end up with an extra 1500 calories I can eat over maintenance on Thanksgiving. It should also give me 1250 extra calories to divide between my son's birthday and Christmas.

Machka9

ESotrops wrote: »

Oh and I'm in Canada so my thanksgiving is in October, so coming up!

Thanksgiving weekend in Canada is usually fairly nice ... or it was when I was living on the Canadian prairies. A little chilly, but not usually much snow, and often some great autumn colours.

So I took advantage of the long weekend to get outside for long bicycle rides each day.

Then dinner in our house was usually turkey and lots of veg ... which is fine. That's relatively low-cal. And of course we'd have a small slice of pumpkin pie with whipped cream. But after the long bicycle ride, that's OK too.

Loveslupins

goldthistime wrote: »

Thanksgiving doesn't worry me. The "feast" includes so much healthy stuff that I rarely gain. Looking forward to it.

Halloween has me shaking in my boots. Last year was my first year ever that I didn't overeat mini chocolate bars purchased for the kiddies. I was oh so proud to have consumed exactly none. But within a few days of Halloween I went on a sweets mini-binge. Plan to eat a decadent but not overly sugary treat like ice cream or cheesecake that evening.

Halloween is a big problem for me too! I always eat too many of the chocolate bars that we are giving out and I usually dig into my kids bags while they're at school too! So much so, that they've learned they have to find a really good hiding spot before they leave or they will come home to a lot less candy!

masterloafer

Oh Halloween. I didnt even think about that. Oh no! Last year i planned on doing the "teal pumpkin " thing - foodless treats, like little toys or games instead of food. There are ao many kids with allergies or sensitivity now that i heard about the idea but got too lazy and just handed out chocolate last year... and of course ate the left overs.. this year I think I'll make a real effort to keep the goodies out of the house in the first place.

Machka9

masterloafer wrote: »

Oh Halloween. I didnt even think about that. Oh no! Last year i planned on doing the "teal pumpkin " thing - foodless treats, like little toys or games instead of food. There are ao many kids with allergies or sensitivity now that i heard about the idea but got too lazy and just handed out chocolate last year... and of course ate the left overs.. this year I think I'll make a real effort to keep the goodies out of the house in the first place.

My mother does that ... she hands out little school supplies like fancy pencils and erasers and little notepads and stuff like that.

queenliz99

Machka9 wrote: »

masterloafer wrote: »

Oh Halloween. I didnt even think about that. Oh no! Last year i planned on doing the "teal pumpkin " thing - foodless treats, like little toys or games instead of food. There are ao many kids with allergies or sensitivity now that i heard about the idea but got too lazy and just handed out chocolate last year... and of course ate the left overs.. this year I think I'll make a real effort to keep the goodies out of the house in the first place.

My mother does that ... she hands out little school supplies like fancy pencils and erasers and little notepads and stuff like that.

When I was a kid I would have avoided your mom's house the following year for sure. LOL

jennifer_417

I think there are times when it's totally appropriate to feast. I don't log on Thanksgiving or Christmas.

Machka9

queenliz99 wrote: »

Machka9 wrote: »

masterloafer wrote: »

Oh Halloween. I didnt even think about that. Oh no! Last year i planned on doing the "teal pumpkin " thing - foodless treats, like little toys or games instead of food. There are ao many kids with allergies or sensitivity now that i heard about the idea but got too lazy and just handed out chocolate last year... and of course ate the left overs.. this year I think I'll make a real effort to keep the goodies out of the house in the first place.

My mother does that ... she hands out little school supplies like fancy pencils and erasers and little notepads and stuff like that.

When I was a kid I would have avoided your mom's house the following year for sure. LOL

She's only started doing that in the last 10 years or so. She may have become tired of the whole handing out candy thing after all these years.

If we handed out Halloween candy here, I think I'd do the same thing now. Fortunately that's not a thing here, so we don't have to worry about it.

kellyjellybellyjelly

I plan on limiting my calories a bit maybe to around 1,500-1,700, & then saving my adjusted calories from my Fitbit so I can use it as a buffer.

I am sure I'll go to my sister's Church Thanksgiving meal, but not sure I am going to go anywhere Thanksgiving day yet. It mostly depends on when I'll work.

I'll probably do the same around Christmas.

Liftng4Lis

I plan on eating, logging and moving on. Being conscientious and using moderation, just like any other day.