Don’t let Fat Tuesday live up to its name

You may not believe a personal trainer is saying this, but…(brace yourself)…it’s OKAY to binge every once in awhile. Look, life is worth living! If you’ve been sticking to your meal plan, counting your calories, upping your activity level and staying true to your fitness goal, you can, from time-to-time, take off one day to enjoy yourself. One day of partying and celebrating is not going to ruin everything you’ve been doing. What will ruin your progress is returning to your old habits.

One of the things we’ve done in my home is to remove as much temptation as possible. No cakes, no ice cream and no cookies. All sweets have been removed. Everyone is used to eating dinner and then clearing the table. There is no dessert. So, when a birthday, anniversary or other holiday comes around, it truly becomes a treat to enjoy a small slice of cake and a reasonable scoop of ice cream. Like summer vacations to the beach, what makes it special is you aren’t there every single day. You look forward to that trip all year long and then you savor it the entire time you are there. The same thing applies to special occasions.

You can enjoy Fat Tuesday, just don’t let it live up to its name! Keep track of the extra calories, write everything down and then figure out how many more miles you might have to walk or run (or extra minutes spent in the gym) over the next week to balance it out. Or, figure out where you can eliminate some of your higher calorie meal choices in the next week. Either way, it almost always comes down to calories in v. calories out. With rare medical exceptions, there is no escaping that truth.

So, everyone, enjoy your Mardi Gras. Celebrate! Savor the moment, but then get back to your plan on the path toward a better, healthier you. If you need ideas on lower calorie meals, be sure to check out the recipes section of my blog. I will continue to add to it so check back often for new additions. Better yet, take a moment to sign-up below to follow my blog so you’ll get an email notification anytime I post something new.

Cheers!