How to Avoid Overeating on Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving Day involves a lot of delicious and lovingly cooked food. It also offers a lot of temptation to gorge yourself until you feel sick. Balancing the desire to eat as much of the tasty fare as possible with being sensitive to your limits is a case of mindful eating. Here are some suggestions to help you out.

Method 1

Method 1 of 2:

Avoiding Overeating

1
Accept that this is a day of indulgence. While you may be on a diet or watching your food intake, bringing any sense of deprivation into the day may cause you to overeat out of sheer rebelliousness against "missing out". Cut yourself a little slack and let yourself enjoy more food than usual on this special day. After all, the next day things can go back to normal.
- Weight problems are based on overeating over a period of time, not just one meal. Thinking that feasting on Thanksgiving will lead to a dramatic weight change is not realistic.
- Indulgence does not have to be about stuffing yourself silly. It can also be about trying a little bit of everything and really enjoying the experience.
2
Be sure to not come to the meal famished. Avoid skipping any of the meals during the day – eat breakfast and lunch.^{[1]XExpert SourceMarjan Mahallati, RHN, AADP
Registered Holistic NutritionistExpert Interview. 21 July 2020.} The only difference is that you may want to eat more lightly than usual. However, skipping eating normally will just tempt you to overeat at the Thanksgiving meal.
- Be thoughtful about snacks. On one hand, snacks can help avoid being overly hungry. However, snacking can lead to overeating before the meal, especially if hosts provide tempting appetizers.
3
Take small amounts when serving yourself - smaller than you would at a regular meal. Take a 3-4 bite portion rather than a full sized portion.
- Thanksgiving meals tend to have more sides than a normal dinner, so this approach allows you to eat a bit of everything without over-eating.
- You can always take seconds!
- This approach also avoids waste.
- Use a smaller plate if possible - it makes your eyes estimate that you have more on the plate than a larger plate that has lots of empty space.
Thanksgiving is a time of giving thanks for the food that is on the table. Think about the contents of your plate and how it was once alive and is now about to provide you with energy and nutrition. Think about all the people whose efforts brought the food to the table, from the farmer to the cook.
Before you begin to eat, notice everything about the food on your plate. What are its colors, textures, aromas and anything else of note? Enjoy the anticipation. Compliment the people who made the meal on its appearance and aroma.
6
Take small bites and chew everything well. This relates back to the previous step––as you bite, savor the things that you noticed about the food when you took time to assess, such as texture and taste. Also, small bites and slow chewing aids digestion, as enzymes in the mouth begin to break down the food for you.
- Rest your eating implements on the plate between each bite. The physical act will slow down your eating.
7
Engage in conversation. During the meal, make an effort to engage others in conversation in between bites. Try to focus on the people around you more than on what the pie selection is.
- For those who find chit-chat difficult, try to have some safe and comfortable topics to talk about. For instance: the excellent quality of the food, and what is in it, favorite hobbies of other people, pets, children, weather, what travel was like to the venue, and complimenting people on things they are wearing.
- Avoid talking and eating at the same time; it's bad manners as well as an unhealthy habit.
This is not a situation where gobbling down food as fast as possible, ignoring people around you makes sense. Thanksgiving is about taking some time to enjoy things.
9
Take seconds only if you're really still hungry. Repeat the eat-wait-take more cycle until you feel satisfied, but not stuffed. Aim for feeling good, not feeling so stuffed that you can't eat another thing or feel ill.
- Leave room for the dessert. One piece of pie or one scoop of dessert is sufficient to end the meal. If you feel too full, leave dessert until much later.
10
Get away from the table. Go for a walk, play football, entertain a child, play with a pet or help clean up! Head out to volunteer for those less fortunate on Thanksgiving. This will keep you from munching just because there's food in sight.
- Try to make your eating selection a one-stop destination. If you take time to really think about what you want, instead of constantly grazing, you are more likely to stick to a healthy eating habit.
Hopefully, you have had a delicious Thanksgiving dinner, without stuffing yourself silly.
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Method 2

Method 2 of 2:

Coping with Having Overeaten

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Avoid beating yourself up. Once "postprandial somnolence" (food coma) has happened, it has happened and it's a case of coping with the result. Follow the remaining steps here to ease yourself through being so stuffed that you feel ill or exhausted.
- Thanksgiving dinners are set out in a way that it is extremely hard to avoid over-eating. Do not be too hard on yourself if your best intentions fail on this day.
- The main part of the holiday is focused on food. A lot of energy is focused on providing a large meal of indulgent food. This is not a holiday that encourages moderation or healthy eating.
- Family members can be "food pushers" that insist on giving you more food than requested. It can be very difficult to decline, and in some cultures, impolite to not take a second helping from Grandma.
- Stress can easily lead to over-eating. Holidays are often filled with all sorts of stress, and this is one that often combines angst, anxiety, and difficult people with lots of food.
- You may have to deal with multiple "Thanksgivings". This time period often requires more than one sitting. Your best friend from high school insists on getting together with you on Wednesday when you get to town. Your mother is hosting Thanksgiving at her house on Thursday, and you are stopping by for pie at your grandfather's house for dessert in the evening. It's hard to avoid over-eating when having to confront multiple feasts.
You might even need to change into something less constricting. Just allow your stomach and breathing muscles the freedom to move and gurgle. Your stomach digestion will improve with loosened garments around this region.
Instead, try to go for an easy walk or stroll. Lying down can bring on reflux (heartburn) and make things even worse. However, if you do feel you really need to lie down, do so by heaping up pillows, to prevent you from lying flat.
4
Drink water-based after dinner drinks. Plain water is best, however, drinks with a high water content, such as tea, coffee, seltzer, or hot cider will aid digestion.
- Some people enjoy an alcoholic drink after indulgence. This may help physically relax your stomach. However, these drinks lower inhibitions and therefore make it harder to avoid a second helping of dessert.
Go for a stroll, walk or some other form of physical movement to help your digestive system work better. A good dance with everyone else at the dinner won't go amiss!
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Tips

These tips could be used at any meal, Thanksgiving just seems to be a major overeating offender!
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Sometimes, putting the fork down between bites while you chew can help remind you to eat slowly.
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Thanksgiving is about your family, friends, and other things you should be thankful for. Not just the food.
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Warnings

Don't starve yourself or be super calorie conscious. And definitely don't whine about how people are starving elsewhere and draw attention to the table excesses. Everything is relative and that's just rude.
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