Fitness Tip - Turkey, Gravy, and Pie, Oh My! - 12/4/2007
By George Hillinger
BS Kinesiology
ACE Certified Clinical Exercise Specialist
ACE Certified Personal Trainer
Every holiday season, I am reminded of an incident a couple of Thanksgivings ago. My wife and I were invited to have Thanksgiving dinner at the home of a friend of her parents. We showed up an hour or so early for cocktails before dinner. We all enjoyed our drinks and made our way to the dinner table.
The dinner host made a magnificent meal including a deep fried turkey, a baked turkey, vegetables, mashed potatoes, three different types of pie, and all the fixings. Each serving dish of food was passed around and everyone loaded up there plate, except one person… The host only had turkey and vegetables on their plate. Before anyone could ask, they explained how they were on a low carbohydrate diet and they couldn’t eat anything but turkey and vegetables. They went on explaining how their blood pressure and cholesterol was too high from lack of exercise and poor eating habits and their doctor recommended that they change their habits.
So we all ate our fill. Soon desert came and everyone ate some pie, except the host, who I could tell was slowly dieing inside wishing he could have a great thanksgiving meal like everyone else. Even Turbo, my dog, got to have a delicious variation to his normal dog food because I added a little thanksgiving turkey to it. All in all, it was a great thanksgiving for everyone except our dieting host, who put a lot of energy into preparing a meal he so called “couldn’t eat”.
The major point of this story is that our thanksgiving host was going about permanently fixing their eating habits all wrong. It is ok to have a great thanksgiving meal, in fact, for practically all of us, treating ourselves is a must to maintain healthy eating habits. If you restrict yourself from having “play foods” (a better name for junk food from Evelyn Tribole’s Intuitive Eating), eventually you’ll burst and binge on those foods leading you to the weight loss and weight gain roller coaster caused by dieting.
It is best to slowly change your eating habits by incorporating what you nutritionally need through healthy foods that you like and having “play foods” in moderation so that you don’t feel like you are restricting yourself from foods that you like to eat. This approach is far more effective as dieting has an over 90% failure rate of maintaining weight loss. A diet is temporary and provides only temporary results of weight loss.
This year, instead of setting yourself up for failure by starting a diet as a new year’s resolution, commit to permanently changing your eating and exercise habits. You can start today, by taking a look at your eating habits. Do you eat throughout the day to encourage a healthy metabolism? Do you eat enough fruits and vegetables? Do you limit your intake of sugar and refined food products? Do you eat out a lot? If so, do you make wise decisions with what you chose on the menu? By making a few settle but comfortable changes in our eating habits we can improve our health without being overly restrictive.
Enjoy your holiday food this year. As long as your eating habits are overall good, a little pie on a special occassion won’t kill anyone.
The dinner host made a magnificent meal including a deep fried turkey, a baked turkey, vegetables, mashed potatoes, three different types of pie, and all the fixings. Each serving dish of food was passed around and everyone loaded up there plate, except one person… The host only had turkey and vegetables on their plate. Before anyone could ask, they explained how they were on a low carbohydrate diet and they couldn’t eat anything but turkey and vegetables. They went on explaining how their blood pressure and cholesterol was too high from lack of exercise and poor eating habits and their doctor recommended that they change their habits.
So we all ate our fill. Soon desert came and everyone ate some pie, except the host, who I could tell was slowly dieing inside wishing he could have a great thanksgiving meal like everyone else. Even Turbo, my dog, got to have a delicious variation to his normal dog food because I added a little thanksgiving turkey to it. All in all, it was a great thanksgiving for everyone except our dieting host, who put a lot of energy into preparing a meal he so called “couldn’t eat”.
The major point of this story is that our thanksgiving host was going about permanently fixing their eating habits all wrong. It is ok to have a great thanksgiving meal, in fact, for practically all of us, treating ourselves is a must to maintain healthy eating habits. If you restrict yourself from having “play foods” (a better name for junk food from Evelyn Tribole’s Intuitive Eating), eventually you’ll burst and binge on those foods leading you to the weight loss and weight gain roller coaster caused by dieting.
It is best to slowly change your eating habits by incorporating what you nutritionally need through healthy foods that you like and having “play foods” in moderation so that you don’t feel like you are restricting yourself from foods that you like to eat. This approach is far more effective as dieting has an over 90% failure rate of maintaining weight loss. A diet is temporary and provides only temporary results of weight loss.
This year, instead of setting yourself up for failure by starting a diet as a new year’s resolution, commit to permanently changing your eating and exercise habits. You can start today, by taking a look at your eating habits. Do you eat throughout the day to encourage a healthy metabolism? Do you eat enough fruits and vegetables? Do you limit your intake of sugar and refined food products? Do you eat out a lot? If so, do you make wise decisions with what you chose on the menu? By making a few settle but comfortable changes in our eating habits we can improve our health without being overly restrictive.
Enjoy your holiday food this year. As long as your eating habits are overall good, a little pie on a special occassion won’t kill anyone.
*Consult your physician before starting any exercise or nutrition program. If you have a question about fitness, email me at george@2fitnessconnection.com and I may write about your question in the next tip of the month!