We’re one day out from Christmas Eve and eight days out from New Year’s Eve. This is a time of great anxiety and, unfortunately, shame for those stuck in the endless trap of trying to lose weight. Managing holiday nutrition can be so overwhelming it causes people to just give up.
Things like family gatherings, late nights, dinners out, and Wawa gift cards in our stockings make it harder to “eat healthy” over this time period. This tends to result in a spiral that lasts way longer than just the next week or two.
How do we enjoy ourselves over the holidays without setting ourselves back too much?
Holiday nutrition does not need to be complicated or induce guilt trips.
The first step to managing your holiday nutrition is not a source of stress in your life is to have a solid plan before the holidays. I don’t mean to make a plan for what you’re going to eat over the holidays. You need to have a plan in place that you are following pretty closely already. Winging it might work while you’re in a routine, but that method falls apart pretty quickly when you’re three bourbons deep staring at a plate of I Knead Coffee’s cookies.
The next step is to look at your calendar and identify the events where overindulging is most likely to occur. Don’t forget the little ones! This can be things like family dinner on Christmas Eve, happy hour with friends or coworkers, or shopping trips near your favorite restaurant.
While most “plans” would recommend using your willpower and being disciplined to avoid these events or only eat the healthy stuff, that is also a recipe for failure. The holidays are about rest, recovery, and relaxation. Go ahead and enjoy dinner, have a few drinks, and maybe an extra dessert.
What you should do on days where you have holiday obligations is an amazing trick I heard on Instagram! (From a wonderful creator who I cannot find anymore!)
Front load the days where you are going to holiday events or will be around a lot of food with protein. Try to hit 75-80% of your daily protein goal before your event. If you don’t have a set daily protein goal (you should, btw) aim for like .5-.6g per pound of bodyweight.
This will make you feel fuller throughout the rest of the day and help you avoid overindulging.
Look at the big picture!
The days you go out with friends and family are not the biggest problem, however. Over the next two weeks, holidays account for only 28% of the days.
Sustainable fitness and nutrition should be focused on doing well 80% of the time and living a little 20% of the time. If you only go off the rails those four days, your ratio shifts to 72:28. Over a short period like two weeks this will have almost no impact on your results.
Problems arise when people just chalk up the “holiday season” as a loss. Then they go off the rail for all fourteen days (or longer if you go back to Thanksgiving). Even more problems arise when that becomes your new norm and you spiral into the new year.
Do not let perfect be the enemy of good. If you let go of the reins a little, managing holiday nutrition will be a breeze!
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