Ensuring You Don’t Undo All Your Good Work Over The Holiday Period

Many people go through the year battling to lose weight. For these people, every reduction in weight is a big win. So why would you let all the good work be undone over the Christmas period? Yes, there are temptations with food and events that make exercising and going to the gym easy to miss, but with all the time and effort spent during the year to get where you are at, why would you want to reverse it all in a matter of weeks.

“I’ll go tomorrow”, a phrase heard all too often as an excuse not to exercise. But “I’ll go tomorrow” soon becomes “I’ll go next week” and eventually the motivation to go and routine you worked so hard to develop is completely gone. Increasing weight during this period and losing your routine can be highly demotivating for people and makes the transition back into regular exercise very hard.

Once out of the routine, it can take some people many weeks or even months to get back into the same exercise routine. For many of my clients that go away on holidays or have a very social festive season, I always say that this period is a maintenance period. This means that as long as they maintain their routine, exercise capacity and don’t have an increase in weight that that is a good outcome.

Below are some strategies that will help you to keep up with your exercise over the Christmas period

  • MAINTAIN ROUTINE!
    • This one can’t be stressed enough. Ensure you stick to your routine and maintain current exercise habits throughout the holiday period, it will not only keep you feeling good during this time, but it allows you to get straight back into it when your return.
  • Be conscious of, and increase your incidental exercises
    • Park your car further away from where you’re going, take the stairs or walk too the shops. If you are away on holidays go for a walk on the beach or explore the local area.
  • Prioritise your workout
    • Make your workout number 1 on the list, ensure this gets done before going out and doing other social things. Wake up before everyone else and get your workout in early before the daily events, this way there is no excuse to miss it.
  • Set realistic goals
    • Re-evaluate your goals before the holiday period, set new goals related to adherence, diet and maintenance.
  • Don’t skip your workout
    • Never skip a workout that you had scheduled, whether that be with your Exercise Physiologist or a planned session you had with yourself.

During this period ensure that you maintain your exercise habits, continue to work hard and be ready to move into the New Year having solid exercise habits and ready to smash your new year’s goals. The Optimum Health Solutions clinics are only closed public holidays, we don’t take a break from helping you achieve your goals so neither should you.

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