Healthy Living in Connecticut Blog
Enjoy the Holiday Season!
The Christmas holiday is a tough time to keep in shape. I applaud Ryan's recent post about how to maintain your waist size over Christmas. It is something so many of us go through… Christmas parties at work, family get togethers, cookies everywhere. Everyone expects you to partake in all the eating and drinking, so if you're not prepared ahead of time, you can really overdo it.
There's pressure for those that have already lost weight too. Certain people may watch closely to see what food you will take. Maybe they'll make comments like "go ahead, eat some dessert", or "you're skinny enough, you can eat this"! It can get very uncomfortable when all the people there know that you lost weight.
And then there's all the unhealthy food that's given over the holidays as gifts. I'm sure you've received your fair share of candy boxes, cookies, gift cards for fast food, the list can go on and on!
Well, I decided to start a different tradition this year in place of bringing unhealthy food as gifts. Some of my friends received healthy gift bags filled with healthier food options. I figured it would be artificial of me to give cookies if I'm trying not to eat them myself.
Surprisingly, everyone seemed to welcome the healthy food! At work, I purchased a crate of clementines and they went quick! I feel better that I didn't encourage unhealthy eating, although I know many people will still eat too much sugar afterwards!
I wanted to thank all the supporters of the Healthy Living CT website and wish you all a Merry Christmas and a healthy, Happy New Year! Also, I don't want to forget my fellow bloggers on this site. You are all doing a terrific job and I always look forward to reading your posts!
Comments 1
Excellent article Rich! There surely is a lot of pressure over the holidays on people that have lost significant amounts of weight. Some times you can feel other people using their special powers almost trying to mind will you into taking a cookie to see if you'll crack and fall apart. Why? Because it somehow makes them feel better about their lack of commitment.
I too have chosen to not bring cookies and unhealthy foods to the houses I visit this year and you're right the openness from others is pretty amazing. Deep down everyone wants to be healthy and sometimes the fear of failing is enough to prevent the person from even trying.
I can speak from my experience with all my clients and people I have encountered that one thing remains 100% true, 100% of the time, with no exceptions and that is this... Someone will never take the second step if they don't take the first step. What you did by bringing healthy foods this holiday was allow people to freely and willingly take their first step. Congrats!