The holidays are ALWAYS a challenge!! It would be so easy to say “forget it, I’ll deal with this in January”. 

I made a conscious decision at the beginning of November that I was not going to gain weight over the holidays!

Early November started with my mother’s 75th birthday and a week of family and celebrations. By the end of that week I had gained 2 pounds. I knew that I had friends coming to visit for Thanksgiving and my birthday, so once everyone left after my mom’s birthday, I did three super strict phase 1 days and those 2 pounds were gone.

Then came Thanksgiving week filled with friends and also my own birthday celebration the day after the holiday. Once again I was up a couple of pounds. I did the same thing and spent four days in phase 1.

I followed this plan through the end of the year and overall I actually lost 2 pounds from the beginning of November to the end of December.

I still had fun! I enjoyed food, alcohol and desserts in a balanced way that helped me to stay on track. IT CAN BE DONE!!

PS logging my food diary daily and getting on the scale every single day and entering the number in the My Fitness Pal app was super important to my overall success!!