How to Navigate Holiday Eating When You Have a Difficult Relationship With Food

As the holidays are approaching, this season can feel overwhelming. For those of you with a complicated relationship with food and your body, the family gatherings, heavier meals and more indoor time due to the cold weather can undoubtedly trigger more emotional eating, intrusive thoughts about body image and food anxiety.

If this resonates with you, please know that all those feelings are completely normal and valid. You are not alone!

The holidays can be beautiful, chaotic, nostalgic, stressful, and daunting all at once. And when you’re trying to heal your relationship with food, that mix can feel even more intense.

This guide will provide you with tips and tricks to help you navigate holiday eating, emotional eating and holiday food guilt while giving yourself self-compassion to help you feel better physically, mentally and emotionally.

1. Remember: Holiday Eating Is Meant to Be Different

With all the work holiday parties, family meals, Christmas and New year’s gatherings can certainly throw off your regular eating schedule. In addition, short daylight and cold winter gatherings in Montreal can make emotional eating more common. The meals can also be denser in terms of calories, fat and sugar. Undoubtedly, if you have food rules or fear of over-eating, this can quite triggering.

To help you with food guilt, anxiety and be more connected with your body’s cues, try reminding yourself of a few things:

• Food has many functions It’s not just meant to bring you nutrients. Food brings comfort, connects people with each other and helps us celebrate traditions.
• A few festive meals won’t impact your health or your weight. Try to look at the bigger picture: it might be 4-5 festive meals during the holidays out of at least 90 meals throughout the month (considering you eat at least 3 meals per day). That represents 5% of the times your usual food intake. Instead, try to look at the other 95% of the times you eat regular nutritious meals.
• When we are connected with our body, our body will adjust itself naturally after eating heavier meals. Your body is very smart. For instance, you might feel less hungry in the next coming days and the cravings might also be different. For example: you could be gravitating towards lighter meals naturally.

2. Let Go of the “Good vs. Bad” mentality

Categorizing food as good and bad will make the “good” foods mandatory and thus they become more of a chore or punishment for you to eat. On the other hand, the “bad” foods will be put on a pedestal and you’ll want to gravitate towards them just because they are forbidden. This could fuel restrict-binge cycles and food guilt.

Yes, undoubtedly, there are some foods which are more nutritious than others. But again, your body is smart. If you allow yourself all foods and are connected to your body, you will see that most of the times you will actually gravitate towards the healthier foods because they make you feel better physically.

So, before your holiday gatherings, try to eat your meals and snacks before your festive meals. This will help prevent you from getting to the meals starving and decrease the risk of losing control with food. Let go of the diet mentality and try to also enjoy your meal without guilt and savour the moment with your loved ones.

3. Build a Plate That Feels Nourishing and Satisfying

In front of a festive table with all kinds of different dishes, we might often plate food mindlessly. Sometimes, some dishes might not be foods we actually enjoy but foods that we portion on auto-pilot mode on our plate.

Try to practice some mindful eating techniques during this holiday season. Here are some questions you can ask yourself to check in with your body as you are plating your food:

• Which dishes look appealing and would I like to try?
• What foods do I want to try for comfort and connection?
• What is my level of hunger right now?
• How do I want to feel after eating? Is it worth it to continue eating knowing that I will feel too full?
• Do I want to save some for later when I’ll have more room in my stomach?

Remember, there’s no right or wrong answer. A balanced holiday plate is based on your body’s cues and needs and try not to compare your plate with others in terms of quantity and quality. Your body, your needs! And everyone has different needs and preferences.

Also, if more emphasis is placed on satisfying meals, you might be surprised to see that the urge to over-eat can be less present.

 4. Protect Yourself From Body & Diet Talk

During holiday gatherings, there are often a host of comments about food and body image. Often, those comments can be well intentioned but are in fact quite damaging for your relationship with food and your body. For instance, you could hear:

• “That’s a lot of food on your plate! Are you going to be able to finish it all?”
• “I’ll have to go on a diet after this meal.”
• “I’ll need to go to the gym tomorrow to burn off the excess calories.”

Those types of comments can actually just reinforce the restrict-binge-food guilt cycle.

To set some boundaries and shield yourself, you can respond with:

• “I usually don’t talk about diet and body image. Let’s change the subject.”
• “I am aware of my body’s needs and I am honouring my body cues.”
• “Food is so much more than just calories. Let’s also focus on the pleasure of eating and bonding with each other over a festive meal.”

5. Prepare for Your Personal Triggers

Each individual can have their own personal food triggers and emotional stressors. Try to identify what are your biggest triggers and make a list of different coping mechanisms or boundaries that you can put to help you navigate those stressors.

Here are some examples:

• Trigger: Some specific fear foods that could be more anxiety-provoking: appetizers, richer foods at meal times, desserts, chocolates, etc.

Coping mechanism: may be try asking friends/families what they plan to serve at the meal ahead of time. Ensure that there are some safe foods and respect your boundaries if you feel too triggered to eat the fear foods. You could even bring a dish that you feel comfortable eating.

• Trigger: lack of food structure: not eating at regular hours

Coping mechanism: You can maintain your regular routine when it comes to your meals and snacks to feel more grounded.

• Trigger: unpleasant comments from family about food and body image

Coping mechanism: have a supportive family member you can talk to or a friend you can text for support.

Coming up with a plan often makes a big difference.

 

While many people in your surroundings can look forward to the holiday season, it is valid for you to dread it if food and body image feel stressful. You deserve a quiet and peaceful holiday season that meet all you emotional, mental and physical needs.

If you need extra support to help you navigate your food and body image struggles, please reach out to a dietitian, therapist or a trusted person from your circle. A great free resource is the ANEB’s helpline:

Seeking help is a sign of courage and can make a big difference. Feel free to contact us if you would like to chat and see how we can help you.

 

You’re not navigating this alone.
You deserve peace, warmth, and connection — in every season, but especially now.