We’re now in the full swing of the holiday season and there’s a lot to look forward to. It’s one of the best times of the year, with lots of family, friends, festivities, and of course, FOOD! For those of you trying to get in shape or stay in shape, however, that means it can also be a rather challenging time. I can personally relate to that very much, so in this post I want to offer a few tips on how to avoid weight gain during the holidays. This way, you can have fun and enjoy yourself without guilt.
Now, I can’t guarantee that your weight won’t increase at all if you follow these tips, but to be fair, that isn’t necessarily the goal for most people anyways. The truth is that fitness doesn’t have to be at the top of your priorities during the holidays, so for many, given that some amount of weight gain is inevitable, you can also just use this as a guide for how to minimize the amount of weight you gain.
Work Out When Possible
Like I mentioned in the beginning, the holidays are for spending time with friends and loved ones. Especially if you’re traveling and going to visit people you haven’t seen in a while, that’s what you should prioritize. During times like this, you can be a bit lenient with your workout routine if you don’t have a place or time to go to the gym.
If you do manage to get some exercise in whenever you can, though, that’s a great way to put those extra calories you’re consuming over the holidays to use and reduce the toll that all this food would otherwise take on your physique. Normally, you’d work out just to maintain your routine; during the holidays, any working out you can fit into your schedule is an added bonus.
Find Ways to Stay Active
Even if you aren’t able to go to the gym much, this doesn’t mean you can’t still find ways to stay active and expend additional calories.
The problem is that many people tend to be very sedentary during the holidays, spending a lot of time sleeping in and sitting on the couch. Instead, if you want to avoid gaining significant weight during the holidays, make a conscious effort to be more active.
Make it a goal to go for at least a half-hour walk every day. Do something active with your friends and family, whether that’s playing a game of pickup basketball in the driveway or throwing a football in the backyard. It can even be something as simple as deciding to help out in the kitchen instead of watching TV until dinner is ready. These actions won’t burn too many calories on their own, but making several of these small changes in your day can actually add up to quite a large difference in your total daily calorie expenditure.
Avoid Eating Excessively
We’ve talked about a few ways you can manage your calories burned, but what should you do about your calories ingested? While I certainly don’t want to stop you from eating your favorite holiday foods, what I would suggest is to avoid eating excessive amounts of food.
Food is an important part of celebrating the holidays, and you shouldn’t feel bad about breaking your usual diet and fully enjoying yourself. However, once you’re satisfied, there’s no need to keep gorging yourself until you can’t even get up from the table.
How much you eat is the most direct determinant of how much you weigh, more so than how much you exercise. Therefore, although you’re probably not going to restrict your portions so much that you lose weight during the holidays, the more you can control yourself when it comes to the amount of food you eat, the more you can minimize it showing up on the scale the next day.
Weight Gain Isn’t Necessarily Fat Gain
Speaking of weighing yourself on the scale, you may notice pretty large spikes in your weight during the holidays. Before you see that and start panicking, it’s crucial to know that not all weight gain is a result of fat gain. Fat doesn’t accumulate overnight, so what you’re actually seeing can be explained by a few other things.
Firstly, some of this increase can be water weight. Your body tends to retain more water especially if you eat lots of sodium and sugar. Additionally, if you weigh yourself the morning after eating a large meal, you might be a few pounds heavier simply because of the volume of food still in your body.
Obviously, if you eat like this for an extended period of time, your body will begin to accumulate fat, but if you’re only eating like this once or a few times throughout the holidays, you shouldn’t be too concerned about any drastic fluctuations in your weight.
Deal with It Later
Lastly, while you now have some tips for reducing the impact of all the festive feasting you may be partaking in at this time of the year, if you still end up getting a bit carried away and aren’t where you’d like to be by the end of it all, there’s no need to stress out.
Frankly, if you’re away for a bit during the holidays, aren’t able to work out at all, and don’t really watch what you eat, you’d still be fine if you could get back on track with your usual routine right afterwards. If you’re typically good about eating and exercise, a few bad days or even a bad week isn’t going to derail you in the long-run.
Once the celebrations are over, you might consider further decreasing your calorie intake or increasing your physical activity from their usual levels for a bit, but generally speaking, as long as you have the discipline to immediately revert to your normal, healthy habits, you should be able to get back to where you were before the holidays pretty quickly.
So with that in mind, focus on what matters during the holidays: being with family and friends, making lasting memories, and having a wonderful time.
