Food, food — everywhere you turn there’s food! “To avoid over-indulging, you’ll need some proven tips to reduce the potential for the average holiday-season weight gain of five pounds,”. “For years, people have been told to drink lots of water before going to a holiday event, but honestly, that just doesn’t work for most of us,”. These updated tips have brought success to many people during the holiday feasts in the weeks to come!

Be realistic – don’t focus on losing weight during the holidays. Focus on maintaining your current weight. You can get back on track with weight loss when the diet danger zones of November and December have passed. Also, don’t let yourself justify binge consumeing over the holidays because you expect to restrict fodder after Jan.Plan in advance to consume a little more when you face holiday temptations. This way, you can enjoy treats more often, and you’ll be less likely to binge.

One thing that will help you is to eat before you go that way you don’t show up starving. When you are famished you will devour more food just because you are feeling so starving. consume healthy throughout the day to keep glucose levels stable and to boost metabolism; this will work to reduce hunger for an evening event. Choose a high-protein snack before an event; examples are: an apple with peanut butter, yogurt, unsalted almonds or walnuts, hard boiled egg, or nonfat mozzarella cheese.

Watch your portion. Treat yourself to a nice drink, sweets or creamy dips without culpability, but keep portion sizes under control. This is a great way to sample different provisionss. To avoid plate piling use smaller plates this season.

Survey party buffets before filling plate. Decide what you’re going to consume in advance, and make only one trip to the buffet. Fill small plate with ½ vegetables, ¼ lean meat and ¼ starches.

Avoid frivolous eating. It takes about 30 minutes for the message to get from the stomach to the brain that it’s full. “Social eating” – during the holidays is very common, and especially when everyone else eating too. Enjoy your choices, and then wait at least 30 minutes before deciding if you would like a bit more.

Make sure whatever you’re offered is splurge-worthy. We all have some favorites that we look forward to during this time of year. Don’t waste calories on provisionss you can have anytime (chips, salted mixed nuts, dip, etc)? During the holiday season make sure to have all of the unique holiday food, try to eat everything if you can do it in moderation.

Make sure that you are prepared to know which foods are high fat items and try to avoid them. If it’s creamy, fried, or cheese-filled, it’s going to be loaded with calories. Commit to tasting portions. Low fat, high fiber fodders allow you to consume a larger amount for fewer calories and not feel deprived.

Use strongly intense mints, gums and strips. These dull the taste buds and also trigger satiety messages to the brain. Be sure to throw one in as you are arriving to the party and remember to have one when you are feeling like you have to nibble.

Choose alcoholic beverages wisely. Most alcoholic beverages can contain up to 450 calories per 6 ounces! So alcohol will lower your inhibitions and in most cases cause you to overeat; not to mention most calories from alcohol are stored in the abdomen. If you choose to drink, select light wines and beers and use non-alcoholic mixers such as water and diet soda. Also ask for your drink in a tall, slender glass; you actually receive less while giving the illusion of more.

Go easy on eggnog and punch. Most holiday beverages have very high calorie content. Choosing water or fruit juice will fill your stomach and keep you hydrated as well.

Maintain perspective. Overeating one day won’t make or break your devouring plan. And it certainly won’t make you gain weight. It takes many days of overconsumeing to gain weight. If you do overindulge, don’t give up. Plan to stay on your diet, think about tomorrow and you will eat better today. The holidays are going to bring a few bumps on the road to healthier eating and we have to accept the fact that sometimes eating on the holidays is just part of dieting, no need to feel guiltiness about it though.

Clearly, fasting is an effective way to lose unnecessary body fat, but once the fat has melted away restoring a youthful physique, how do we keep it off?  Should a fasting regime be practiced to maintain weight loss? The answer is a simple one.You should never go fasting considering it as your primary source to get rid of excess weight.  The secret is to learn how to fast healthy and eat healthy.If you wish to lose weight fast, then you should eat in a way that helps keep the weight off.  That’s balance.  Lets learn how.

First you must understand when I say weight management I do not mean the endless seesaw action of gaining and losing weight.  We are all sick of that ride where eating is ether a mathematical equation of calorie counting or a mindless overindulgence.  No, I am speaking about managing body weight as a consistent dietary lifestyle.
I have a friend who is an avid faster.  In fact he finds it easy to fast and has done it  often throughout the years.  On the surface it would seem he has steel discipline, effortlessly doing what others find to be a great challenge.  His self-imposed purpose is to become a fruitarian and for twenty years has read and studied the health benefits of eating an all-fruit diet.  Yet never has he been able to put together more than 14 days of fruit eating, experiencing countless failed attempts.  My friend eats better than most people I know, but in his words, always “blows it”, gorging with franticness and absurd extreme.  I found it difficult to witness these compulsive exhibitions because I knew the aftermath would be guilt and depression, leading to yet another joyless fast.  This abusive cycle has continued for years and probably is still continuing.  He is thin and in good shape but there is no joy and little freedom in eating.
  
Not long after opening our Internet Bulletin Board, I became increasingly alarmed about some of the posts popping up here and there.  Over time we learned that a website which promoted anorexia had linked to our website.  I immediately went and looked in no way prepared for what I was about to see.  A mixture of shock and profound grief griped my heart as I read the melancholy testimonies of young women emasculated with self-hate, repulsed by their own bodies, never thin enough.  Most of the testimonies came with photos of themselves, a macabre gallery of gradual suicide, skin stretched over skeletons, large, hopeless eyes set in bony faces, wearing their gauntness like a cry for help.  Weeping, I was appalled that a ministry created to bring freedom was being used to enable obsession.  It was a mockery directly from Satan, soiling the purity of our work into desecration.We acted fast by offering a forum on our Board for those who are suffering with major disorders of eating, enlisting the help of an Bulimia and Anorexia Counselor and providing links to other Eating Disorder Recovery portals.
 
Satan is a god of extremes.  He will gladly offer the two extremes of obesity and anorexia as long as it is he who is in control and not you.
 
Anorexia/Nervosa and other related eating disorders:   
Tragically it is not until we see an unbalance taken to the extreme that we can begin to recognize its peril within ourselves.  The images of those young woman has forever changed how I look at my own body-focus.
No matter what type of personality God has planted in you, practicing fasting or dietprograms as a means of balancing the scales is unhealthy.  Bingeing and purging is harmful and emotionally dangerous.  You have replaced one damaging cycle for another.  There is no freedom and joy in such a cycle, only slavery and guilt.  
Fasting is an exhilarating way to begin a healthy diet, excess body fat quickly drops, bathroom mirror nodding approval, maybe for the first time in years.  Fasting can produce a temporary altered state¾hunger and craving shut down.  Often, while fasting, feelings of euphoria and emotional balance can be enjoyed.  Those with an obsessive personality are attracted to fasting almost like the escape of drugs.Problem is, later or sooner you must face the voracious world including all its trappings.  The junk-food shrines on every street corner have waited patiently.  What was pushed into the peripheral through fasting, is now back into the fore.  Voracious hunger awakens from sleep; the fragrance of KFC is all the more intoxicating.  In fact, some find themselves worse off and within day’s rush to their old food-lovers, fulfilling the axiom, “distance makes the heart grow fonder.
 
I have fasted to gain lost ground on a slipping diet or to break a tenacious addiction or even detoxify after Christmas feasting¾this has been very effective for me.  The fast re-establishes focus on Christ.  This can be healthy and balanced.Once the fast ends, my diet shows the spiritual freedom earned during the fast.  In other words, the fast is more about warfare than weight.      
Where do we cross the line from healthy concern to obsession?  The simplest way for me to answer this important question is by creating what I believe is a balanced and healthy lifelong weight management program, avoiding the endless seesaw action of gaining and losing weight through fad dieting or quick-fix fasting.