Winter is a period that most people associate with holiday tables and high-calorie foods. This is not just popular opinion fueled by television commercials, but a state of fact based on both physiological and social factors.
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Namely, the winter season is (or at least it was so until now) marked by distinct seasonal changes and cooling, which significantly changes our pace of life and internal biorhythm. Tens of thousands of years of evolution have made our body possess energy conservation mechanisms that enable survival in extreme external conditions. It is precisely these mechanisms that are "to blame" for the increased appetite during winter and the irresistible desire to fill the stomach with fatty and caloric food.
Frequent slavish and other holiday meals in the winter make this easier for us, which represents the social factors we mentioned earlier. Traditional home cooking is perhaps best known during these cold months, and the average person can hardly resist these "holiday" pressures to please their stomachs. Good food and strong drink seem to be essential ingredients of traditional social gatherings.
What should we do?
Although it might be easiest to give in to the "holiday spirit" of overeating and justify yourself with winter excuses, and leave the decision to lose extra pounds again for "after the new year" (read late spring) when we usually look for the latest diet for weight loss - this time of the year is the best moment to turn things in our favor, perhaps for the first time! It's time to make good preconditions so that we welcome spring not with the usual extra - but with 5 kilograms less!
To that end, we've formulated three main strategies that will help you get through the winter without gaining extra weight, and introduce building new habits in terms of nutrition, training and health into your life.
1 - Eat more often and with better quality
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Although this seems paradoxical at first glance, eating properly designed meals more often will have a positive effect on appetite. This is especially important during winter, as we have already seen that the appetite is naturally increased at this time of the year. In this way, we will have a positive effect on the metabolism and reduce the risk of sudden attacks of hunger that we cannot resist.
"More often" means that we should not wait for hunger to manifest itself in full force, but to eat every two to three hours. The easiest concept of this way of eating is three main meals and two to three smaller snacks.
"Higher quality" refers to the content of the meal. It is best to consider each count as a combination three groups of macronutrients: proteins, carbohydrates and fats.
The order in which we listed them also represents the gradation of their importance for our plate. First, put a good source of low-fat protein in it: chicken, beef, fish, beans, tofu cheese (or dairy young/small cheese), eggs, dried meat (avoid complex processed meats like salami and sausages because they are full of additives and fats). If you follow the recommended choice of protein, you don't need to limit it in quantity.
After that, add as many vegetables as you want (even though they belong to carbohydrates, vegetables have very few calories and you can eat them unlimitedly, except for tubers - a common example is potatoes). After the vegetables, put some of the classic sources of carbohydrates on the plate, but with a better composition and in a limited amount (measure the amount with the fist of your hand - as much as can fit in a half-open fist): wholemeal bread, rice (wholemeal), dough (from wholemeal/buckwheat flour ), potatoes (sweet potato is a better alternative), peas, green beans, etc. Although there is already a certain amount of fat in a meal designed in this way, you can additionally add flavor to your vegetables or side dishes by adding a little oil (preferably olive oil).
A snack is best conceived as one piece of fruit (small banana, apple, orange, handful of blackberries, etc.) and a third of a handful of stone fruits or seeds (there are excellent mixes of various seeds and nuts on sale).
2 - Plan your eating
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In the context of winter and traditional celebrations, this advice primarily applies to eating in a social environment - various celebrations or outdoor food stands. What will be unexpected for many who read this text - the diet that we list here is not a diet, but a common-sense approach for the long term! So, you don't have to completely give up festive meals and street fast food, but just plan a little better and in practice more self-consciously apply the basic principles of a healthy diet.
Look at it as a kind of financial balance sheet: if you have 1000 dinars at your disposal and you know that you have no other source of money besides that, we are sure that you will not spend it all at once on unnecessary things, or even borrow from someone close to satisfy your current needs. whims. Look at food in the same way: if you really care about losing weight, look at the food you will eat every day as a kind of capital that is limited by quantity, but not by choices and preferences in composition. It is logical that if you only "debt" 100 calories every day (which is, for example, only half a bag of sticks), at the end of the year the total amounts to 36500 - which is about 5 kg of pure fat!
On a practical example, it looks like this: You're going to celebrate with your friends and you won't be someone who "waddles" or jumps away from the rest of society. Before leaving, eat a healthy snack so that you are not too hungry when the sarma, roast and Russian salad are brought to the table. At lunch/dinner, put on the plate what you intend to eat, following the principles we mentioned above, and after eating, simply stick to the rule of no more additions! Limit alcohol consumption to a reasonable extent and avoid high-calorie drinks that can be drunk in large quantities (eg beer). For dessert, choose a small cake or a piece of cake, and don't forget to drink plenty of water between meals and alcoholic drinks.
3 – Get Fitness NOW!
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In addition to being necessary for long-term health and vitality, regular training will help you create a negative calorie balance. We all know that the weight loss formula is essentially simple: you have to be in a caloric deficit for a long period of time so that the body begins to replace energy needs with calories from fat deposits. Calorie intake can be tracked in more detail through apps such as MyFitnessPal. Another way is by limiting the quantity of individual meals and choosing foods that are low in calories, which is our advice in this text.
What will significantly help to stay in a caloric deficit, and is also fun, is regular training. To perform physical activity, the body uses energy from the food we ate and the fat reserves we want so badly to get rid of. To begin with, those who have completely neglected physical activity will be enough to start with regular hiking. Those who are more serious can go to one of the group fitness activities at least three times a week. However, on other days it is also necessary to be more physically active, preferably by replacing motorized transport with walking or cycling, when the destination and weather conditions allow it.
Don't leave the decision to start a fitness regimen until after the holidays. Choose the one that is closest to you in terms of content and is close enough to your place of residence. Today, at least the choices in terms of fitness are numerous. For those who are not used to training, we advise them to try exercising at home, because with the first extraordinary circumstances, they will give up and return to their old inertia.
Conclusion
Our strategy for losing weight during the winter period is based on simple and proven principles of healthy eating and the formation of new, more constructive lifestyle habits in the long term.
Three principles are important: Meal planning (which includes eating at certain intervals), Choosing better quality and lower calorie foods (less traditional sources of carbohydrates such as bread and sweets, and more protein, vegetables and fruits), as well as regular exercise.
Don't wait for a "more convenient time" to make the necessary changes. Right now is the best moment!
Dragan Vuković
Dragan Vuković is a blogger from Novi Sad, with over 5 years of experience in writing about health and fitness. In his free time, he is engaged in mountain biking, he never misses a day of training or taking care of his cat, Gruča.
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