It is easy to pick up 1kg to 3 kg on a holiday. We typically drink more sugary or alcoholic drinks than usual and we consume a lot more sugary, starchy and/or fatty foods than normal while exercising very little. Surveys have shown that most people will never lose all the weight they gained over a holiday, and these kilos add up yearly.
So here are my tips and suggestions to keep weight gain to a minimum this festive season:
1 – Add healthy side dishes to all unhealthy meals. Offer to bring a salad or vegetable side dish to all events you are invited to this holiday. Dish up a big helping of healthy foods on offer and keep the portions of unhealthy foods to a minimum.
2- Plan your number of alcoholic beverages before each event. Spread these out through the whole evening and drink water and sparkling water in between. Alcoholic beverages have a staggering amount of calories in them, even more so when they have sugary mixers. Try to stick to wine and spirits e.g. whiskey and water.
3 – Have fruit on hand to snack on instead of crisps.
4 – Never go to events hungry and without healthy snacks. If you get too hungry you are much more likely to eat too much and eat the wrong things. An apple of a few almonds stashed away could save the day.
5- Download a pedometer App onto your smartphone to count your daily steps helps and to keep track of your daily activity level. I suggest FitBit for Apple and Moves for android. Make exercise part of every day of your holiday. Go for long walks on the beach, walk to the shops instead of driving and keep up your usual exercise activities.
6- Detox one day a week. Have plenty of fresh fruit, raw veggies and easily digestible protein e.g. fish. Snack on almonds in between meals and drink at least 2 litres of water per day while staying off caffeine, alcohol, sugar and starch.
Keep Well,
Dr Jana
