THE END OF THE YEAR - BUT NOT THE END

I read a quote by someone about the fact that we worry about what we are going to eat during the holidays when what we should really worry about is what we are eating the other 50 weeks of the year. So true. We do get very concerned about the opportunities to overindulge over the holidays and there is talk about being unwilling to give up the pleasures of the traditional meals, cookies and cocktails versus all the many ways we can avoid adding calories and pounds and still enjoy ourselves.


In truth, if we have been paying attention the rest of the year - is it really such a big deal to indulge during these special occasions? Beyond the question of forbidden foods and falling off the wagon and all the other ways we label our behavior around food, I think the fear is that we just plain will not stop eating once we start!

In a way this is true of me. There are so many foods I can ignore all around me much of the time. I can eat out in a restaurant and not reach for the bread basket or the chips and salsa. I can say no to dessert without a qualm, I can cheerfully choose the scrambled eggs over the french toast and navigate a buffet spread selecting the healthy items. However...if I have made monkey bread for my family for Christmas morning, I will pick at it all day until the tiny portion I served myself at breakfast has ballooned into hundreds of calories. I will not even consider eating a single cookie from the huge tin delivered to us a week before Christmas, but put a little box of See's peanut brittle in my stocking and I am fixated on it until I can eat it all in one sitting.

So, yes, I indulged. I did the dreaded holiday eating. I only ate 1 roll with dinner and skipped dessert, but came home and ate some of my own homemade cookies while I stuffed the stockings. But guess what? I didn't instantly return to my old ways. I got back on track and within a couple of days I was counting my calories and back to the gym (I admit I did not go to the gym on the Monday after Christmas - I have done that before and it is sooo crowded with guilty people working off their own splurges that it is not worth fighting over the equipment!)

And the bottom line on the No Gain Holiday Challenge so far - I am still in minus territory,  having lost weight since Thanksgiving.  I'll do my weigh in for my January post on the new site.

My new calendar is up in the kitchen, my new blog site is up and I am ready for a successful 2011.  Looking forward to spending it with my bloggy friends.  Happy New Year to us all.