December 2022 - #109 - Holiday Season Weight Loss Tips

Hi Everybody and Welcome Back

Halloween parties

Seasonal neighborhood and street get togethers

Thanksgiving

Holiday Office Parties

Christmas/Hanukkah and other year end family celebrations

And to top it all off a big New Years Eve Party to help celebrate the end of one year with hopes and new resolutions for a better new year.

So as usual I have placed the food combining chart with this news letter issue. Food combining does help reduce weight gain during the holiday season.

That’s the best time to either have meats and vegetables as a meal or have a meal entirely made of desserts.

Here is the chart:

For a complete refresher please visit

Food Combining for Healthy Weight Loss

Printable Food Combining Chart

Other tips to help avoid holiday weight gain are:

Avoid Going to a Party When Hungry

If possible, try having a healthy snack before going to an event which is loaded with all kinds of delicious foods and sweets. This way you can maintain smaller portion sizes of the decadent foods much more easily when there.

Also filling up with a zero calorie beverage such as water or herbal tea can be your best friend when it comes to ways of controlling ones appetite.

Limit High Calorie Drinks

We know that alcoholic drinks can have quite the hefty calorie count, but so can nonalcoholic beverages that are popular during the holiday season. Drinks such as eggnog, hot toddies, specialty coffees, hot chocolate topped with whip cream, spiced rum, Bloody Caesars and so on.

If you do enjoy alcohol, moderation is key. Drinking too much can help increase your appetite and over eating becomes easier. Drinking water or zero calorie flavored waters helps keep us healthy, full and hydrated.

Portion Control

This point for me is key and reducing the size of our meals is a great tool to help us avoid holiday weight gain. The amount that we eat is so very important. Visiting France really opened my eyes about portion control. The obesity rate is still reasonably low in France, which is amazing since most of their meals include wine, fresh bread, creamy butter, the main course and believe it or not all of this is followed by dessert.

No supersizing their meals in this country. Maintaining small portions seems to help avoid weight gain. Also the French rarely snack between meals.

Smaller portions means less work for your body, similar to how the food combining process works for digestion times.

Eat Slower and Chew, Chew, Chew Your Food

Chewing your food well helps improve digestion, makes meal times longer and fills you up more.

Be More Active

After a big family meal, it's no secret that for many of us, the couch can be our best friend. If we can just get more active we can burn off some of those delicious calories that we savored at the dinner table.

Make it fun. Get the whole family to partake in an activity that suits your family best.

Perhaps a family walk to check out the holiday lights and decorations in the neighborhood. Or perhaps the whole gang could go skating, sledding, dancing or bowling. Whatever the adventure, it's a great way to get off the couch, burn off some calories and help stay healthy and fit.

Don't Let Food and Drink, Be The Main Focus

This is the time of year to spend some quality time with co-workers, friends and family. And though food and drink shared certainly is important the holidays are really about so much more.

Great conversation, laughter, peace, love, joy, friendship and good will towards man is the real focus.

The food and drink that is shared with family and friends is nice but secondary.

Try not to nibble constantly

If the event has the food in a buffet style there are a few tips that can help limit the calories you eat.

Select a small plate if possible and avoid layering food on the plate.

Go easy with dressings, sauces and dips as they can contain mucho calories too.

As mentioned above chew, chew, chew your food well. It makes you feel fuller and helps facilitate digestion.

It is almost impossible to keep track of calories at these functions, and honestly, who would want to, so again portion control is key.

I’m glad we refresh some of these tips at the start of every holiday season. Holiday seasons can be brutal for weight gain and every little tip, new or old, can help tremendously.

So start the holiday season prepared and we’ll see you next month.

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