"Those holiday lapses do not have to turn into collapses"

Let's be real, we all over-indulge during the holidays.

I personally had about a dozen cookies late last night and you know what they tasted good and I enjoyed them. It seems like many "experts" offer tips such as keeping a food diary during the holidays and calorie counting, but to me that seems to just over-emphasize the "lapse" and create unnecessary guilt.

Therefore, I suggest after a lapse in your healthy eating plan that you "Fu-ged-a-bout-it" and move-on. Wake-up the next morning and start over with a healthy eating day. I still felt a little full this AM from the over-indulgence lapse last night, but the worst thing I could of done this morning would be to starve myself and not eat.

Everyday we have the opportunity nutritionally, physically, and emotionally to have a positive start-over day. My positive start-over day nutritionally included a healthy meal of oatmeal and apples and walnuts in the AM and will continue to "keep the wood-stove burning" and intake another small healthy meal each 2.5-3.5 hours.

It is most important that we "not let that wood-stove burn-out" and create a fight-or-flight stress response in our sympathetic nervous system, which often leads to "lapses" and a lot of calorie intake. To keep that wood-stove burning in our bodies and prevent "holiday nutrition lapses" we must learn to feed our bodies with a healthy "small meal" every 2.5 to 3.5 hours.

My next post will include sample "small-meal" plans that will keep your wood-stove burning and keep you from over-indulging too much this holiday season.

In closing, when you do over-eat this holiday season (and most of us will) enjoy it and move-on. Most importantly, do not create unnecessary guilt for yourself about the lapse. Instead focus on a positive start-over day in all health dimensions and stay positive.

This is the opinion of Jonathan T Felsen and is not intended to replace the advice of your health-care provider.