Lose Your Thanksgiving Pounds in 8 Easy Steps

Thanksgiving is upon us once more and that means going home for the holidays and stuffing yourself with all the turkey you can muster. That also means you’re going to be accumulating unwanted excess pounds you don’t want to keep.

But since thanksgiving is all about letting your inhibitions go (at least when it comes to food) avoiding all those delicious home-cooked meals is nearly impossible not to mention rude.

C’mon, your mom worked all day to give your whole family a wonderful meal so you owe it to her to taste her candied yams and pumpkin pie! But don’t worry because here are eight easy ways to get rid of those unwanted pounds right after thanksgiving.

Expect to gain weight

A lot of people fear the holidays because they’re sure to gain weight when the stuffed turkey comes out of the oven and into their stomachs. But the wrong thing to do here is to convince yourself that you’ll only eat a little because you don’t want to get fat.

It’s thanksgiving so you have the liberty to eat as much as you can and besides you don’t want to be a killjoy for your family, right?

The right way to approach thanksgiving is to expect that you will gain weight and that you’ll enjoy eating all those delicious food because if you try to deprive yourself of all those home-cooked meals it’s highly likely that you’ll stuff yourself whenever no one’s looking anymore and that could be worse. So take a breather from staying slim and eat as much food as you can because the next ten steps will be your road to recovering your slimmer physique.

Eat right afterward but eat plenty

You may think that after thanksgiving the best course of action to lose weight is to stay away from food—wrong! You should keep eating because skipping meals will only make you hungrier and therefore you’ll be more tempted to eat foods that aren’t good for you.

One way to curb those hunger pangs is to eat more protein after you’ve had your calorie quota from the holidays. According to dieticians, you should eat more protein for your breakfast, which means more eggs, yogurt and cottage cheese. This way you’ll feel full and it will keep you from relapsing and eating leftover stuff from thanksgiving.

Eat lots of vegetables

Vegetables are not only good for your body but they’re also effective suppressants for appetite. If you eat more vegetables you’ll lose more of those cravings for delicious but unhealthy foods.

Do not eat leftovers

It’s possible that you’re going to have leftovers after thanksgiving but get rid of them as soon as you can because you won’t help yourself get slimmer if you have leftover turkey in your fridge waiting to be devoured.

Get right to exercising

After the holidays are over DO NOT reschedule your plans to hit the gym or wake up early in the morning for that much needed morning jog.

Eating so much during thanksgiving will make you feel so full and sluggish that it’s very tempting to cancel your plans to exercise after the holidays are over.

But fight this urge and hit the treadmill right away because once you’ve started exercising you’ll feel more energized and willing to work out and get rid of all those excess fat.

One useful trick here is to do one set of push-ups/sit-ups/jumping jacks every time you feel like slinking back under the covers. This way you’ll release more endorphins into your system, which will make you want to move even more.

Stay away from white stuff

Another useful tip to get rid of your thanksgiving fat is to stay away from eating white bread, crackers and bagels.

Those foods are filled with salt and sugar and it could lead to your body retaining lots of water when you eat too much of them.

So when you stop eating those foods you will feel less sluggish and more energized helping you shed off more weight by exercising.

Stick to your goals by writing them down

Oftentimes we come up with our plans to shed off unwanted pounds by thinking what we intend to do after thanksgiving, but this often leads to failure because we forget our plans when our minds are preoccupied with other matters.

So in order to stick to your goals you should write down what you want to happen and how you’ll go about accomplishing your tasks.

Write down the number of pounds you want to lose and you must attach a date to it, like say, “I want to lose five pounds in five days.”

Also, write down what you plan to do to lose all those pounds, like say, “I’ll go to the gym tomorrow morning and work out from 8 to 9AM, after that I’ll have eggs and yogurt for breakfast and some fish and vegetables for lunch.”

Take it one step at a time

Losing weight after thanksgiving can be daunting and it is important that you start shedding off those excess pounds slowly but surely because when you get overwhelmed by how difficult it is to lose weight you might give it up altogether.

So start slowly and stick to your plan.

You should also come up with a plan that’s feasible for you because if your goal is to shed off 30 pounds in one week and you’re neck deep in office tasks or family duties you won’t be able to achieve your goal and you’ll probably give up on losing weight.

Take it one step at a time and be patient with yourself, you’ll eventually lose all the excess pounds you’ve gained as long as you stick to your plan.