Written By: Nicola Desrochers
And it begins…the food holidays are upon us!
This time of year, can seem daunting when you are on a weight loss journey. We start with Thanksgiving and find ourselves inundated with get togethers, holidays and treats clear into the new year. So how do we survive the next few months? Here are a few tips to guide you through not only now, but years to come, so you can keep weight gain to a minimum and maintain your goal you worked so hard for regardless the time of year.
First, like anything in life you want to achieve, you have to decide that what you want at the end of the day is more important than that want ‘right now’. Before you go into Thanksgiving make sure you look at why you started your diet and remind yourself why it is important to stick to your goal! Once you are motivated and strong… plan! You know the saying, “fail to plan and plan to fail”.
Start your day with a fasted cardio, yoga session or something that gets you into a good mind set, even if you do not manage to be 100% on plan that morning exercise will help minimize the damage! Next look at your day or weekend and decide what days are going to be the trickiest. What members of your family are going to be the ones, even if not purposely, sabotaging you to make the wrong choices? By pre planning the obstacles that you are going to face you can make sure you are prepared to handle these situations. Does grandma insist you are “too thin” and is adamant she needs to “fatten you up”, is your cousin still your “drinking buddy” from days gone by? Remember your goals are not going to be the same as the people around you so you must be ready to handle these situations before they arise. Trust me it is a lot worse to go up 5 pounds on that scale Tuesday than “offend” a family member (who really won’t be offended if you say no to that piece of pie, or the 6 beers with your cousin).
Here are some ideas to handle these tricky situations:
- If you trust the people you are around, be honest with them. Explain that you are really committed to your healthy lifestyle and trying to lose some weight. Let them know you are not trying to offend anyone but its important for you to keep a close eye on what and how much you eat. Even go so far as to let them know you have hired a coach and you spent a lot of money on it and do not want to waste your investment!
- Not in a trusting environment, then ensure your portions are within your program guidelines, chose more meat, veggies and salad and keep the potatoes, stuffing etc. to one spoon. If your plate is full, most hosts will not even notice that you have skimped on the higher carb or fat options for lower calorie dense options. Dessert? Ask to take yours home! You are not offending just too full and will enjoy it later…but do not! Give it to the kids or hubby or just toss it. Are you concerned about wasting food? How about wasting your investment… its just not worth it!
I have clients who are so strong willed when it comes to their goals they will bring their own food to a function. I have one EWYN member who just tells family and friends that she is on a strict plan right now to improve her health and she cannot chance de-railing her efforts. Trust me, when you bring up health, not too many people are going to go against your wishes. In the end, you are working on your health, not just weight loss!
So now we know how to handle the people around us during the holidays, but how do we handle our thanksgiving meal? Ewyn puts out a handy survival guide each holiday with a meal plan, product recommendations to assist you with those tough situations and support from your coaches. Do not go into any holiday with “oh we aren’t doing anything it will be fine”. I have heard this too many times to count and guess what, it never ends up like that…plan with your coach before the holiday hits. Visit Friday and DO NOT miss your Tuesday visit no matter what happens! The best laid plans can have hiccups sometimes and we know that, so if you fall off get in to see your coach as soon as possible. Trust me, when you “can’t make it Tuesday” we know what’s going on, that extra day without a weigh-in is your way of minimizing the damage yourself before getting on the scale. Here’s the thing…you come and see me, I can have you down 2 days sooner than you trying to do it yourself. We are your coaches, we are here to support you no matter what. We know sometimes life happens, so don’t avoid us as we have the solutions in our tool belts no matter the situation.
Eating better got easier when “I can’t have that” turned into “I don’t want that”-unknown
