The Junk Food Season

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Sunday is Halloween and the beginning of what I like to refer to as "The Junk Food Season." You know what I'm talking about, right? The Junk Food Season begins with the bags of Halloween candy that we buy for the trick-or-treaters who will show up at our front doors on October 31and doesn't end until the last of the leftovers from the New Year's day brunches are consumed. In between there will be copious amounts of pumpkin pie, candy canes, egg nog, Christmas cookies, spiked punch, and gingerbread waved under our noses to tempt us. It's not always easy to resist these offerings when they are available at every turn.

So how do you handle the temptation of the leftover fun size candy bars from Halloween sitting in the pantry or the plate of holiday cookies in the break room at work? How do react when Aunt Elsie insists that you try her sweet potato pie on Thanksgiving or when the sweet old lady down the street shows up at your door with a homemade fruitcake? For me, the best answer is to anticipate what you might encounter and have a strategy formed in advance. A few suggestions that work for me:

-If you celebrate Halloween, don't buy candy for trick-or-treaters until the 31st of October. You won't have to worry about those bags of chocolate and licorice calling your name.

-Our church accepts individually wrapped candy on November 1 to put into treat bags for a Thanksgiving day dinner that they host. Again, if it's not in my house, I won't talk myself into eating just a couple candy bars. Even the fun size bars rack up the fat and empty calorie count if you eat several. (You can contact Meals on Wheels, nursing homes, or veteran's homes as well.)

-I host Thanksgiving for my immediate family every year which allows me to control the menu. I do my best to provide healthier versions of the traditional holiday foods. Check out my post from last year on strategies for a healthy Thanksgiving.

Green beans with almonds are a delicious alternative to green bean casserole.

via Shrinking the Planet

-I don't work outside of the home currently, but when I did, I avoided the break room as much as possible during the month of December when clients and co-workers would send in trays of sweets for the staff.


-Christmas is filled with traditions, one of them being the baking of cookies. When my children were small I started the tradition of baking one batch of cookies on Christmas Eve so we could leave them for Santa and save a few for us. My kids usually had plenty of opportunities throughout the holiday season to decorate and eat cookies, this prevented them from having too many sweets at home as well.

Save the cookies for Santa!

-If I don't want to feel deprived when everyone around me is enjoying sweets, hot chocolate or egg nog I will make myself a cup of herbal peppermint tea or one of the holiday blend coffees that Hickory Farms offers during the holiday season. It's even more festive if I drink it from a Christmas mug.

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-There are always a lot of parties and celebrations during the holiday season and that can pose a problem if you aren't prepared. I like to bring a dish to share, that way I know there will be something healthy to choose. For some ideas, take a look at my post What to Bring to the Party.

A beautiful presentation like this one from Eddie Ross will make veggies and dip the hit of any party.

-I like to keep a glass or bottle of water handy so that if I'm offered something laden with fat and calories at a party, I'll have a built in excuse not to take it-my hands are full! A simple no thank you without explanation usually works too. If someone says, "but it's the holidays!" I'll remind them that I don't want to spend the new year working off what I ate in the old year. Then I high tail it out of there.



What strategies do you use to get through the junk food season?

Mistakes, Grief and the End of the Day

For the past week our family's routine was upset by the death of my brother on Monday, October 4. My sister flew in from Georgia to stay with us through the weekend. There were arrangements to be made for the funeral and preparations to be made for out of town visitors. All of these things were a welcome distraction and took our minds off of our grief. The last of our visiting relatives left on Sunday. On Monday morning I was alone in our home for the first time in a week. That is when the reality of the situation set in. How would I handle the mourning process? How would I avoid letting grief take over my life, setting me up to developing unhealthy patterns of behavior?

When my father passed away in 1997 I made my share of mistakes during the months, even years, that followed. I stopped exercising regularly. I developed unhealthy patterns of eating, skipping meals some days and choosing unhealthy foods on other occasions. I spent a lot of time alone watching mindless television while my son was at school and my daughter played alone in the basement. Essentially, I let grief take control of my life. I refuse to let that happen again, I have learned from the mistakes I made in the past.

As I sat sipping my morning coffee on Monday I felt exhausted. I didn't want to take care of the piles of laundry that had accumulated over the past few days. The idea of cleaning the house or running errands was less than appealing. If I had my choice, I'd rather sit in my sweats all morning and well into the afternoon sipping coffee and watching the news. Then I asked myself a couple of questions that put things into perspective:

How do you want to feel at the end of the day? How will you feel if you get nothing accomplished today?

I pictured myself, clad in my sweatpants and t-shirt, a used coffee mug perched on the table beside me. I imagined how pathetic I'd feel if I used my grief as an excuse to let life pass me by. I imagined beating myself up and making lame promises to myself that tomorrow would be different. I didn't like the visions floating around in my head. I got off that chair, put down my cup and went to the basement to work out. Later I ran some errands that I'd been putting off and went out to lunch with my husband (who I know has been sorely neglected in the past months since my attention was focused on my brother.) I ordered an enormous grilled chicken salad and saved half to eat as my dinner.

Lying in bed Monday evening I thought back to those questions I'd asked myself in the morning. While I didn't move mountains that day, I did find ways to spend my day productively. More importantly, I didn't allow grief to cause me to wast precious hours. I know that I'll have to take things one day at a time. I'm confident that some days will be more difficult than others. I have no doubt that I will be asking myself those questions again.

Yesterday afternoon I received the phone call I've been dreading. My older brother, David, passed away after battling stage 4 lung cancer for the past year.

I will be taking some time away from blogging to spend time with my family. Thank you so much to all of those who have asked about my brother over the past months and offered their support and prayers. I truly believe that he is in a better place and at peace.

Stressing In

Whenever I'm forced to wait in line at the grocery store or pharmacy, I like to play a little game of "What's Going on Here?" You have probably played this game yourself. As the person ahead of you in line places each of their selections on the belt, you examine the items and draw conclusions about the life you imagine that he or she leads. The elderly woman with a small bunch of bananas, a loaf of white bread and a package of boiled ham might be a widow who eats the same meal for lunch and dinner 5 nights a week just to make life easier. The creepy guy with the lavender shirt, tossing a rubber snake, a bottle of Mr. Bubble and a pack of Tick Tacks on the belt has plans that you'd prefer not to know. It's fun, it's harmless, it kills time.

A few months ago, I hit the grocery store on a Friday night to beat the crowd and geared up to play a round of my harmless past time while in line behind a young woman. Her cart was full of the types of foods that small children beg for, Captain Crunch, generic Oreos, Doritos and root beer. I imagined the woman's children waiting impatiently at home for Mom to return home with snacks to gobble up while watching a Disney movie, asking their father how much longer it would be every 3.5 seconds. Then I took a better look. The woman's hair was disheveled. She was wearing a baggy gray sweat shirt and a pair of wrinkled jeans that looked like they may have been plucked from a pile of dirty laundry. Her hair was falling out of the elastic band that held her loose pony tail. There was no wedding band on her left hand. While she appeared to be in her late 20's or early 30's there was already a deep wrinkle running vertically between her brows, maybe from years of holding her stress inside. The story just changed.

She continued to place the last of her purchases on the belt as the smiling cashier asked if she found everything she'd been looking for. Distracted, it took her a few seconds to register that she'd been asked a question. I imagined that she was thinking about everything that she needed to get accomplished while her children were staying with their father for the weekend. When she arrived home there would be a week's worth of laundry to wash and sort, a house to clean, bills to pay. Perhaps she was feeling a twinge of guilt that she was thankful that the kids wouldn't be in her way, making a new mess in place of the one she'd just cleaned. Maybe, if she finished everything by Saturday evening she could reward herself with the bag of Doritos and a can of that root beer that was in her cart and watch some mindless reality show. It would be the highlight of her week.

As the woman left the store with her cart of groceries, I made a silent prayer for her. I hoped that my analysis of her situation was wrong and that she had a pleasant weekend to look forward to with family and friends and a little time for herself. Driving home from the store that evening I thought about how lucky I was to have a husband and children waiting at home. I'd be cleaning my house, paying bills and doing laundry over the weekend too, but my kids and husband could help me with those things if I couldn't get them done on my own. I'd have time to exercise. We had dinner plans with friends the next night. My backseat was filled with bags of healthy ingredients that would be the makings of our meals in the days to come.

I truly am blessed that I have options when I am feeling stress. My mother is just a phone call away, my husband is a great listener. There is a sand bag hanging in my workout room just waiting for me if I need to work out some frustration-and I'm not afraid to use it! I don't need to hold my stress in or use bags of snack foods or cookies to temporarily push it out of the way.

How do you manage your stress?

Giveaway Winner

Congratulations to.....Jessica from See How She Runs. She is the winner of the copy of Heather Wardell's new novel, Planning to Live.

Thank you to all of you who entered the giveaway and to Heather for providing a complimentary copy. If you are still interested in reading Heather's book you can order it on Amazon or Smashwords.

Giveaway Reminder

Don't forget to enter the giveaway to win a copy of Heather Wardell's latest novel, Planning to live. For a chance to win, go here.

The book tells the story of Rhiannon, a women struggling to lose 40 lbs before her best friend's wedding. When the temptations of her mother's holiday cooking is too much to bear, she flees her parent's home on Christmas evening in a blizzard only to be involved in a horrible accident. The book details Heather's thoughts in the hours that follow the crash. It's a real page turner.