Winning the Holiday Weight Loss Battle

I began battling my weight problem two months ago. Yes, my weight problem actually started years ago. But, I hadn't started battling it yet until I finally made up my mind.

I was mentally charged to lose the weight and take it off for good. What I didn't think through were the days ahead. Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas are that lethal combination of days that make a weight loss program very difficult.

Halloween Trick or Treating brings home a plethora of candies and assorted goods that are so hard to deny yourself. But, I have a daughter. Trick or Treating is mandatory. One month later almost to the day comes a great eating day that has no mercy.

Thanksgiving is the day of gorging yourself to death and sitting miserably on the couch. The day was actually designed for overeating. Not only are you miserable because you just ate more food than you normally eat in a week, but you know you just ruined your diet. You gained more weight in that one day than you lost in the last couple of months working on your diet.

Now, comes Christmas up ahead. That's not just a day of eating. That's an entire month. Everywhere you go, there's a feast all month long because people are trying to have you visit for Christmas and get you out of the way before the day of Christmas finally comes. People want to spend Christmas with their families, so they get their friends to the house earlier in the month and fatten everyone up just to be able to say they thought of you over the holidays.

If you're not prepared to meet with the holiday season, you can feel the urge to quit your diet and waste still more time battling your weight until you reach that picture you have of yourself in your mind. So, get ready. You have to be mentally prepared and you have to make sure your body doesn't get confused.

First of all, don't let your mind beat you up over it. If you can't lose weight over the holiday months, at least you can make a goal to maintain your present weight. That's actually good enough to keep yourself motivated until the holidays are over. Make sure when you step on the scale it never reads more than it did the day before. It's not a step back. It's standing still until the dust settles. You'll have more time in the future to get back on the diet hardcore just as long as you don't make it harder for yourself when you do.

Keep on your diet between holiday festivities. Just because you ruined your diet one night doesn't mean you can't return to it the very next day. Get back on it as soon as possible. In fact, make sure the next meal you eat after enjoying a night of bliss is highly focused on only those foods that are supposed to be in your diet.

When you are visiting your friend's house and you find a huge buffet in the dining room, don't worry. Cut your portions in half. Take a taste. Don't eat the same amount of foods you normally do when samples are all that you need. You still get to enjoy the food. Just not as much.

Commit yourself to a little extra exercise. Walk more. Bicycle more. Even dance more! If the holidays are going to be a festive occasion, make yourself more active and get out on the dance floor. Any activity that arises is your chance to burn some calories. Go caroling. When it snows, find a nice hill for sledding. You'll walk up the hill every time you go down it. Shovel snow...help the neighbors. Play a game of football. You get the idea.

The most important thing is that you remember that you are trying to lose weight and that you are not going to let the holidays ruin it. You can do physical activities that help you burn calories. You can watch how much you eat and make sure that your weight doesn't start increasing again. But, the main thing is that you keep it in your mind.

The weight loss battle is waged and won in the mind. The battle can be over before it gets started. But, you can keep that from happening by staying focused. Accept the calculated losses of the holidays. Do what you can to make sure you at least maintain your weight. Fight every day for every calorie.

Remember the Al Pacino speech from Any Given Sunday that is so famously called "Inch By Inch."

"I don't know what to say really.
Three minutes
to the biggest battle of our professional lives
all comes down to today...

Inch by inch,
play by play
till we're finished."

In your mind, in your own battle, it's for calories. Every calorie counts. And when the holidays are over, you can look at yourself in the mirror and wonder what happened to you. Wouldn't you rather be able to say that the holidays were fun, but you are still very much in the battle? You're not going anywhere. See you at the goal line.