A lot of people dread their Christmas family gatherings for one reason or another. They can be emotional and draining, whether that’s in a positive or negative way. Combine people who tend to eat emotionally with a lot of wonderful food, and…
It’s like they’re designed to make us overeat.
Tables full of great food, and hours spent together with nothing to do but visit, play games, and eat? Before I learned how to approach these things, I would stuff myself with all the wonderful Christmas treats, and end up feeling gross, tired, and angry with myself.
But I did eventually learn how to manage these tricky holiday meals so that I can enjoy the meal, and feel great afterwards. So can you!
1) Recognize that this will be an emotional time
You can undergo any number of emotions at family gatherings, depending on your family dynamics. Many people respond to these emotions by eating, and a lot of those people don’t actually think they’re emotional eaters at all!
You might personally enjoy your family time 100%, all of the time. This will result in a surplus of joy and goodwill, which you will probably want to celebrate with seventeen Lindt chocolates. This most closely resembles my own experience.
Or, you may thoroughly dislike the dynamics of having your family together, so you stuff yourself with mandarin oranges as a way to numb your brain and get yourself through it.
Either way, coming prepared for the emotions, and the subsequent emotional drive to eat, is a healthy place to start.
2) Set a trigger for reflection on your emotional state
Get some clarity through the emotional hodge-podge. Create a visible trigger for yourself, like a dot on your hand, or an elastic around your wrist, that you will notice on a regular basis.
Every time you see that item, let it be a trigger to remind you to center yourself emotionally, which we’ll do in steps 3 & 4.
3) Once you’ve been “triggered,” check in with your emotions
Are the family pleasantries leaving you feeling happy? Stressed? Sad? Thankful? An unholy mixture of everything?
Name the emotions.
4) Accept the emotions you’re feeling. Evaluate them. Learn from them.
In that instant where you identify an emotion, accept it. Positive and negative emotions are not inherently good or bad the way we tend to think of them. Negative emotions can often teach us something. Positive emotions can encourage us to do stupid things.
The important thing is to accept the emotions and evaluate where they tend to lead us.
That happiness you’re feeling is fleeting. As soon as it starts to dip you might feel the subconscious urge to bump it up again with some food. Prepare yourself for the inevitable dip. You don’t need to be on cloud nine all the time.
On the other hand, maybe you’re feeling depressed and anxious, perhaps because there’s something not right between you and your sister, and you need to communicate better with her.
Even if it’s not the right time to do that relational work, recognize the cause of the emotions, and the logical choices it leaves you with. You can choose to deal with the communication issue now, or not. The only illogical choice is to ignore that the problem exists and muzzle your emotion with food.
5) Create space
This tip comes in two parts. Creating space can firstly mean taking a break, and heading off to a quiet part of the house for a while. If you’ve evaluated yourself and you’re feeling emotionally out of sorts, whether it’s because something upset you, or because being with people just wears you out… take some time for yourself.
Secondly, creating space means literally putting space between you and the food. At gatherings people tend to visit socially or play games… with food in front of them. Who doesn’t love that setup? It makes us feel happy, partly because we’re getting an emotional boost from the food.
Unfortunately it also leads to discomfort, when you realize you’ve eaten way too much.
So put the Christmas baking back in the kitchen. Portion out a certain amount that you want to eat, and take that with you to the living room. Feel free to go back for more when you want it, but leave that space in place so you know exactly how much you’re sitting down to eat.
6) Get Picky – Choose 3-5 foods that you will eat
Many of us have an emotional desire to get in on everything. It’s called fear of missing out.
Holiday gatherings often have many, many types of foods. You have to try all of them, right?
Nope. You’ve probably had your mom’s sugar cookies before. You know what they taste like already.
You don’t need to try them. You need to enjoy them.
There’s a psychological phenomenon where people subconsciously eat more when they have a greater number of foods to select from. Once we’ve started eating a certain food, we end up wanting to enjoy it fully, by eating a certain amount of it. If you enjoy 3 or 4 types of food, you’ll be full. If you enjoy 6 or 7 types of food, you risk being overstuffed.
Instead of trying to eat some of every food, select a few foods to enjoy fully.
If these foods really must ALL be tried, do the trying before you fill up on the main course, and make sure you really are just trying them. Take a tiny, tiny piece, and then SAVOUR that piece. Close your eyes and really taste it.
There. You haven’t just tried that food. You’ve enjoyed it.
7) Give yourself permission to eat what you want
Make your own eating decisions this Christmas, even if they include mistakes. You can learn from those mistakes. Don’t spend the holidays beating yourself up.
Enjoy the Christmas experience. Pay attention to how your body feels as you grow full, and respond to those signals as best you can. Don’t restrict yourself.
If you feel like you’re restricting your food intake, it can lead to higher stress levels and more emotional eating. Whether that emotional eating happens today, tomorrow, or next week, the calories you save today by restricting your eating will come back to bite you in the future.
Realistically, your eating choices over the holiday season are not going to make a huge difference in your health or weight outcomes. Out of the 365 days in the year, the few family gatherings you have are insignificant.
The most important factor in your health and weight will be the healthy habits that you adopt for the other 360 days in the year. That’s why I focus my programs so strongly on developing habits. There is no other way to truly live the life you want to live.
Staying relaxed about your eating choices over the holidays can help your relationship with food stay positive, so that your habits over the year can grow more and more healthy.
What’s your experience with family gatherings? Positive? Negative? Do these tips help you? If not, what do you need help with? I’d love to chat with you in the comments.
p.s. If you want more structured help to end overeating, check out my online program I Quit Overeating! Hundreds of people have discovered freedom from food with this step-by-step plan!
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