Description
Dr. Ann Kulze debunks the myth of the five-pound holiday weight gain,
Transcript
Let’s face it, most people use the traditional thanksgiving feast as a kickoff to a holiday eating frenzy that lasts through new year’s tipping the scales more towards overweight and obesity. The good news is the holiday 10 is really a myth. Thank goodness right. In reality, most Americans gain on average 1 pound over the holiday season. The problem is the studies show that it tends to stick. We do not lose it and unfortunately, this yearly pound creep can over time really have a dramatic impact on your health because even gaining as little as five pounds can increase your risk of some of our biggest killers like high blood pressure, type II diabetes, even some cancers and I want you to enjoy your holidays without wrecking your health and your waistline and you need to know that it’s easier to prevent weight gain than it is to deal with it after the fact than it is to deal with it after the fact so here are my best sort of holiday eating strategies again to help you not wreck your waistline during the holiday season. So the first thing is fill your tummy up first meaning before you arrive to a holiday gathering with foods that have lots of bulk but minimal calories. What are some specifics here? Let’s say you get to a holiday party, cocktail party, you want to make a beeline the second you walk into the door to the fruit and vegetable platter, this is what do and you sort of make a pig of yourself and the good news is, even if you stuffed yourself with fruits and vegetables, you would not get enough calories to have caused weight gain but the bulk they provide has a very powerful appetite suppressive effect. The other thing you can do is when you are serving your plate, let’s say at a holiday meal, go ahead and first put 2/3—cover 2/3s of it with plant foods, fruits and vegetables, beans, and again so if you do that, it doesn’t leave that much room for the sort of high risk foods and the other great strategy is prior to the holiday meal, make a point of having an appetizer salad or a couple servings of a vegetable side again before you eat that meal to kind of use the bulk that you get from fruits and vegetables to kind of stave off ravenous hunger. The second thing you want to do is you know what, don’t even go to a holiday gathering hungry. Especially not ravenously hungry because the reality is it takes less calories to prevent hunger than it does to deal with it if you let it occur and holiday gatherings are already high risk for dietary indiscretion. And the hungrier you are, the less control you have, it’s common sense. So about an hour before you arrive at the holiday meal, the holiday cocktail party, have a good appetite suppressive snack and my top picks would be a handful of nuts maybe with a piece of fruit like an apple. You can do a couple of pieces of string cheese. Another one of my favorites would be some vegetables with a little bit of hamas and again, it will take the edge off your hunger. You’ll be in a lot more control. It’s simple to do. Another real important strategy is watch the alcohol. This one can be very very difficult. Because we love good cheer but excess alcohol we know lowers our inhibitions and we’re much more apt to overeat in that situation. To add insult to injury, we also know that alcohol especially heavy consumption of alcohol really makes you very very hungry in the morning. You know what I’m talking about right and you want things like cheeseburgers and donuts and all that starchy stuff and the other thing of course, alcohol does have calories and the calories can really mount so be careful. Now, what are some of the things you can do to sort of moderate your alcohol intake. This is something I do, I think it works great. Have a big glass of water between each drink at any gathering. The other thing you can do is choose your holiday parties wisely because you don’t have to go to every one. Another great strategy for you is in general to avoid holiday weight gain is please be careful and avoid mindless eating, meaning be constantly aware of the food that is crossing your lips. A couple of examples, don’t hover over the hors d’oeuvres or mingle over the buffet line just nibbling while you chat with someone. Be constantly aware of what you’re eating. Put every single solitary thing on a plate. You’re appetizer and the hors d’oeuvres. Of course, your meals and desserts. Plate everything. Studies show that if we can view our food before we start, we tend to eat less so that’s an important simple strategy. Another general strategy is get your beauty rest. There’s some very very interesting provocative new science telling us that sleep depravation really does rev up your appetite hormones and if you don’t get your sleep, we are seeing in studies that you tend to wake up with a lot more robust appetite. The other thing we see is you tend to crave salty junk foods and sweet foods right so these are like diet sabotaging foods and of course if you don’t get your rest, are you going to feel like moving and exercising? Probably not and that gets us to the last thing I think is really really important. And that is make exercise a priority during holiday season. So many people use the holiday season as an excuse. I’m so busy. I don’t have time to do it. That’s ridiculous. Stupid, stupid, stupid, why? Because it is a perfect safeguard against the caloric excess that we tend to indulge in because of like all these parties and it’s a great safeguard against the weight gain that you may experience and what I think is most important about holiday exercise is that it’s the perfect tonic for the stress and anxiety that we all experience because we just have so much to do. Exercise is like Prozac and Ambien and all those things rolled into one. So take advantage of that. What are some of the kind of things you can do? How about after your thanksgiving or Christmas meal, why don’t you take a family walk? You’ll feel so much better when you get back than before you left. You leave, you’re so stuff, you get back, you feel better. Sign up for holiday roadways and pay for it because that’ll entice you to stick to it. How about schedule in advance regular workouts with your personal trainer. It’s a good way to do it. How about recruit a holiday walking buddy. Get with a friend and say let’s try to make a point of walking everyday during the holidays and let’s do it together and of course this is something I do, you can incorporate walking into your holiday shopping. Put on some comfortable shoes and do as much shopping as you can on foot. Don’t use any elevators or escalators. Use stairs when you’re shopping and don’t forget that cleaning house and shoveling snow which we have to do a lot during the holiday season can count as exercise too. So I hope these tips will help you avoid the holiday weight gain and remember, you are the only one that can make you healthy so take charge of your health. ICU, this is Dr. Anne.
