The Holidays and Weight Loss Dieting – Still Oxymoronic to you?

By Marjet Heitzer, Ph.D.

The Plateau-proof Diet Foundation

Although the holidays are a time of celebration as well as
reflection, they also represent a veritable dieting nightmare.
Almost as a rule, each holiday party contains a wealth of food
items deemed untouchable to most dieters. It is no mistake that
following the revelries of holiday binges come the all-forgiving
New Year’s resolutions, which most likely include some of the
characteristics such as overeating displayed during the previous
weeks. This article will discuss some facts concerning weight
loss maintenance during the holidays as well as some helpful
hints to get you through them.

The average person gains approximately 1.1 pounds (0.5 kg)
during the holiday season (1). Furthermore, people of all sizes
gain weight in December and January. Specifically, obese and
normal-sized individuals gain 1.32 pounds (0.6 kg) and 0.88
pounds (0.4 kg), respectively (2). Although gaining 1.1 pounds
may seem like no big deal, for a person trying to lose weight,
gaining instead of losing weight is devastating and may threaten
their desire to continue dieting.

So, why do we gain weight during the holidays? As you can
probably imagine, the reasons behind holiday weight gain are
subjective, varying from person to person, as well as complex,
possibly involving multiple factors such as financial and family
stress along with increased social interactions surrounding
foods (i.e. holiday parties). Although occasional binge episodes
during the holiday seasons may seem harmless, there is evidence
that people suffering from periodic overeating are less likely
to continue a dieting regimen (3). Furthermore, people, who
occasionally overeat, are more likely to have harder time
controlling their weight.

There is some evidence that self-monitoring, the systematic
observation or recording of target behaviors, may assist people
during the holiday, helping individuals to stay focused on their
diet (4). In a study conducted by Baker et al., participants
that self-monitored, writing down their total food intake daily
as well as time the food was consumed and their weight each
week, continued to lose weight during the holiday season (4).
However, the control group, participants that didn’t
self-monitor, gained 500% more weight over the holiday. Perhaps,
self-monitoring serves as a checkpoint between putting a food
item on your plate and into your mouth. Even outside of the
holiday season, individuals that self-monitor, lost 64% more
weight and continued with their diet as compared to participants
that didn’t self-monitor (5).

Perhaps self-monitoring provides some dieting consistency
throughout the year. A recent study of the National Weight
Control Registry, composed of people who lost significant
amounts of weight and maintained their weight for 1 year, asked
the question: Does consistency in dieting matter in weight loss
maintenance? The answer was yes, people who maintained the same
diet over weekdays, weekends, and holidays were 1½ times more
likely to maintain their weight as compared to people dieted
strictly on the weekdays and non-holidays (6). So, staying
consistent throughout the holiday season as well as
self-monitoring can help you get through the upcoming season,
losing weight instead of gaining it. The Plateau-Proof Diet
Foundation offers a free on-line weight loss log
(Http://www.plateauproofdiet.com/log/register.php ) where you
will be able to record your weight loss, thus, self-monitor.

1. Garrow J 2000 Christmas factor and snacking. Lancet 355:8

2. Andersson I, Rossner S 1992 The Christmas factor in obesity
therapy. Int J Obes Relat Metab Disord 16:1013-5

3. Wadden TA, Bartlett S, Letizia KA, Foster GD, Stunkard AJ,
Conill A 1992 Relationship of dieting history to resting
metabolic rate, body composition, eating behavior, and
subsequent weight loss. Am J Clin Nutr 56:203S-208S

4. Baker RC, Kirschenbaum DS 1998 Weight control during the
holidays: highly consistent self-monitoring as a potentially
useful coping mechanism. Health Psychol 17:367-70

5. Sperduto WA, Thompson HS, O’Brien RM 1986 The effect of
target behavior monitoring on weight loss and completion rate in
a behavior modification program for weight reduction. Addict
Behav 11:337-40

6. Gorin AA, Phelan S, Wing RR, Hill JO 2004 Promoting long-term
weight control: does dieting consistency matter? Int J Obes
Relat Metab Disord 28:278-81

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