Jingle (bar)bells: Tips to maintain your wits and your waistline during the holidays

But maintaining a healthy lifestyle during this period of coordinated camaraderie is attainable, local health experts said.

By Brooks Sutherland / The Blade
Thu, 05 Dec 2019 11:00:00 GMT

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The holidays can be a mixture of excitement and stress.

Excitement to convene with friends and family for food and fellowship mixed with stress centered around convening with friends and family for food and fellowship.

So, for folks who have made health progress throughout the year, or who have met or exceeded weight goals, the incoming stress during the holiday season often comes at the worst time. 

But maintaining a healthy lifestyle during this period of coordinated camaraderie is attainable, local health experts said. 

Those experts shared useful tips with The Blade, such as how to incorporate at-home exercises if you can’t make it to the gym, planning out pre-party eating, and setting aside time for yourself, so at those friendly gatherings you can maintain season’s greetings without triggering season’s eatings. 

• Deck the Halls with moderation 

Halloween and Thanksgiving have come and gone, but food-based gatherings have just begun. No matter which holiday your family celebrates, the period between October and December often brings ample opportunities to overindulge food and drinks, skyrocketing your caloric intake to abnormal levels. 

Dr. Daniel McCullough, a bariatric surgeon at ProMedica’s Health and Wellness Center in Sylvania, said temptation creeps in at these gatherings, but he advises his patients to keep an eye out for health with a simple pre-party plan. 

“If I could give people one piece of advice before going to a party, it’s to eat something before you go and to have something healthier to eat,” he said. 

October and November are slow months and then a big uptick in patients begins in December, when people “really start to think about weight loss.” That number “explodes in January,” because of the New Year’s Resolution phenomenon, Dr. McCullough said. 

“The time period between Halloween and Christmas is the most difficult time of year for our patients to navigate because there’s so many parties that involve food,” he said. “It starts with Halloween and trick-or-treating and bringing food that isn’t really good for weight loss into the house and from there it propels into Thanksgiving and then the holiday season. So, this is really a difficult period of time for our patients.”

Another bariatric surgeon, Mercy Health’s Dr. Matthew Fourman, also advises his patients to think ahead about how much they’ll eat at parties.

“[Holidays] all center around food, and there’s a lot of pressure to eat more than you normally would,” the doctor said. “You don’t want to be that person at the party that doesn’t eat. So my advice is to try to eat something healthy before you go such as Greek yogurt, just to reduce the temptation. If you pre-fill the tank a bit, you can have some moderation.”

“It’s amazing how many calories we can consume just in liquid form.”

• Work out while you’re home for the holidays

It’s understandable if you can’t make it to the gym for a normal amount of sessions, but Cathy Uram, an RN and the bariatric coordinator for ProMedica’s weight loss surgery program, said at-home solutions can keep your fitness levels up even when you’re visiting family. 

“You need to fit some time whether it’s just going for a walk or just watching your favorite movie or TV show, just walking in place,” she said. “And if you don’t have weights at home, you can use canned goods. We share that with our patients. Getting in a chair and doing the exercises with cans. Marching in place. So, there are opportunities for you to do exercises if you can’t get to the gym.”

“Make it fun. If you’re with your grandkids, or your children, or shopping, you’re exercising.”

Working out doesn’t have to interfere with how you celebrate the holidays, Dr. Fourman said. He suggests fitting in “a few” workouts even if you have to scale back a bit. 

“You have to let yourself enjoy the holidays,” he said. “But it’s important to maintain some kind of routine. So if you normally go to the gym five times a week and can only make it there three times around the holidays, that’s fine. There’s a common misconception that if ‘I can’t get to the gym, I can’t workout.’ That’s not true. Take advantage of your smartphone. You can still do a 15-minute body weight workout at home.”

But getting to the gym when you’re in the middle of planning holiday festivities is a disruption, added, Dr. McCullough. He advises folks to power through the temptation to skip out on fitness because it’s time away from family. 

“It’s mind over matter,” he said. “It’s carving out a time in your life where, you’re going to be a little selfish and everybody else in your life is going to have to wait a minute.”

Working out is often the No. 1 New Year’s Resolution set by people who want to lose weight in the new year. Dr. Fourman said that set-in-bold start date can sometimes be harmful. He recommends a jump-start to your fitness goals. 

“One of the mistakes that is made is setting unrealistic expectations,” Dr. Fourman. “When you start on Jan. 1, you sometimes fall into the trap of ‘last supper syndrome.’ So that’s why I advise people to start that resolution early, start with something realistic and look ahead to some of your goals.”

• Carving out some ‘me’ time

Eric Zgodzinski, the health commissioner of the Toledo-Lucas County Health Department, said stress is a big reason why people get sick during the holiday season and believes it’s the biggest health-risk factor. 

Juggling social commitments, keeping kids entertained while they’re on break from school, and getting shopping done all contribute to stress. People need to find ways to reduce that burden, he said.

“You have to de-stress a little bit, because then that affects everything else,” he added. 

Mr. Zgodzinski suggests basic tips such as mapping out plenty of rest and watching what you eat in order to lower those stress levels. 

“You think about the holiday season, many of us have lost loved ones,” Mrs. Uram said. “So, it is a very stressful time period. And you have to just try to concentrate on positive things, your family, good memories from the people that you’ve lost.”

“Being a mother, I know how it is, you put everybody ahead of yourself. And that’s one thing that we share with our patients, you do need to take time for yourself.”

Dr. McCullough said mapping out that ‘Me’ time is hard around the holidays, but essential to maintaining a healthy level of living. 

“It’s having patients prioritize themselves and saying ‘I know all of this other stuff matters, but I can make the time for myself,’” he said. 

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