With the Easter weekend upon us and chocolate consumption high on people’s radars, Twitter is its usual ragey self about how un/surprising the amount of sugar in a cream egg is.
Like many of the major holidays, Easter typically involves time off work, family get togethers (thank god for outdoor spaces at the moment) and food – whether that be roast dinners, Easter Eggs or something else.
Only you can decide what’s right for you and your family. Here are a few thoughts from me on the subject.
- The first rule of food is that if it’s in the house, it’s being eaten, by someone, at some point. So if you’re trying to achieve balance with your eating habits and sugar intake, don’t put yourself into the situation of having too much chocolate around in the first place. I’m sure you can find connections locally that will happily take some off your hands.
- when you do decide to eat some chocolate, do it deliberately and mindfully. So ideally make it your favourite chocolate, plan when to have it, eat it mindfully to savour it, eat it slowly so you don’t overeat and be sensible on portion size
- Easter egg hunts are exciting and fun…and that doesn’t change if you mix in non-chocolate items to hunt too, or make them instead of chocolate. The girls love a treasure hunt and will be finding Marvel and Disney rubbers this year with a book waiting for each of them at the end. Easter crafts also work brilliantly too. They’ll still have Easter eggs, but we’re not adding to the pile from grandparents and we’ll ration how much they eat and when. (Oh and we also “help them out” by not buying each other eggs and sharing what gets bought.)
- Rather than denying yourself, consider adding one extra thing to make each meal more balanced / healthier. Roast dinners are a great way to get extra veg in! And use your smaller plates. You can always get more food if you’re still genuinely hungry afterwards. We’ll be BBQ’ing with friends and family and you can bet I’ll be sneaking in a colourful salad and some vegetables.
- don’t skip breakfast to “save” calories for later as you’re much more likely to overeat when hungry. Start your day instead with something that balances your blood sugar (think protein, healthy fats and fibre) and potentially a workout.
- Remember that guilt serves no useful purpose and not only will it leave you feeling bad, it will also trigger your body to produce more stress hormones which will have a negative impact on your digestion and fat storage.
- Make time to be active over the bank holiday and to move your body in whatever way feels great to you.
Above all, spend the time focusing on what matters…the people you’re with, the activities that you’re doing and the meaning of Easter if you’re religious. Happy Easter folks!