Whether you’re hosting Thanksgiving dinner, going to a family member or friend’s house or going to a restaurant, there will be plenty of good food around and with that, the temptation to overeat. We need to think ahead and not set ourselves up for overeating. Here are some tips that will help.
Start the day with your normal breakfast. DO NOT skip breakfast or lunch with the intent of saving room for the Thanksgiving dinner. The most detrimental thing you can do is skip breakfast and lunch with the intent of saving plenty of room for that one big Thanksgiving meal. When we do this, we’re more likely to overeat and let’s face it, Thanksgiving meals are not low cal.
If you’re cooking and hosting the dinner, make sure you know the head count for guests. Don’t cook for an army if you know you’re only having five guests. This will cut down on the cost of the meal and it will also diminish the amount of leftovers. As we all know, leftovers – especially Thanksgiving leftovers – can be hard to resist. Even more so when we think that we don’t want those leftovers to “go to waste.”
If your dinner is a potluck style, where everyone brings something, then at the end of the evening make sure your guests take back the leftovers of the dishes they shared. In the spirit of thanks for their contributions to the dinner, offer for them to take home some of your leftovers if you feel like the temptation to overindulge will be too great.
If you’re going to a family member or a friend’s house, please don’t go on an empty stomach. Have the willpower to resist a second plate and the conviction to stand up to your auntie (politely) when she is telling you to eat more. If you’re full, don’t feel like you have to eat more to please someone – even if she’s your favorite auntie.
If you’re going out to eat, please try to stay away from the “All You Can Eat” places. The probability of you overeating is very high and most of those places lack healthy food options.
Make sure you move around during the day. Some families go for walks together, play touch football ???? , play basketball ???? , or even walk their dogs ????.
Thanksgiving is only one day. It’s the days before Thanksgiving and the days after, that really make a difference while you’re on your health journey.
I would like to wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving!
Here is this week’s O’Nealism:
“It is easy to be thankful for the good things that happen in our lives. Real appreciation and thankfulness for the not-so-good things is important too, because those are the things that make us stronger.”
