12519 Party Season 2019
MetCon//
20:00 AMRAP
“While E. Coyote”- 10 Handstand Push-up, 10 GHD Sit-Up, 10 Alternating Pistols
“Road Runner”- 10 Handstand Push-up, 20 Ab-Mat Sit-up, 20 Alternating Tall Box Step Up
-because of the eccentric portion of the GHD and the length of the workout, only athletes who have been training at HCF for a year or longer may use the GHD. And to keep moving at a reasonable pace, only Rx pistols.
Since the beginning of time, and by that I mean 2014, I’ve written blogs about how to attack the holiday season— eating and training and living. As someone who is fully occupied by health and nutrition and has goals and wishes, I certainly would like to make it to January 2 seeing what abs I can, and the same scale number I’m used to seeing each morning. As someone who loves to indulge, I would also love to drink sugary lattes, dark creamy stouts, and eat warm cinnamon rolls and chex-mix until my shoes don’t fit!
In the past, I’ve gone into the party season with every good intention, “I’m going to be good and eat clean and just indulge a little.” Or “I’m only going to eat unhealthy if it’s truly special.” Inevitably, Thanksgiving happens, I eat one Triscuit, and the wheels fall off. I’m stuffing my face with snacks and candy, and I’m full even before dinner. Does that stop me? Oh hells no! After dinner, belt loosened and sipping another cocktail (my family loves cocktails) I wonder, “what just happened?” And in the morning, “I’m never eating again.” Then, the Christmas party happens… And Christmas Eve, and Christmas Day, and New Years Eve, and Superbowl, Valentines day even? Have you been there? How on earth did I go from a generally disciplined person to Kobayashi in one day, and then even repeat the process multiple times over 3 months. Well there’s some interesting processes happening when we indulge that we need to understand and there’s a lot of backwards ideas surrounding partying.
Fasting and Feasting has been central to human history. Originally, F&F were probably pretty balanced. Food took a lot of work to find, hunt, or harvest, and when we got it, we hit it hard because, who knows when it’ll happen again? Remember the Israelites hoarding manna in Exodus 16? I suspect that eating every single day is a newer phenomena in terms of the whole of human history. And early humans certainly weren’t feasting on the processed foods that we might eat even daily. We’re really just not set up metabolically to eat the 5 or 6 meals a day that a lot of people are used to eating. And so we can use that theory to understand the reality of feasting. If we look at our habits through a somewhat ancestral lens, a lot of things become clear.
First of all, feasting is important. That is really good news because we love it and we’re good at it! We’ll likely never experience a famine, but if we do, we’ll fare a lot better than we might think. And there’s a lot of secondary benefits to feasting such as time with family and the people we care about, rest, and stress relief. So yes, you should be letting your hair down and having some treats. Understand though, that the ancestral benefits of feasting do not apply to you unfortunately. We’re made to feast in preparation for a famine. The famine isn’t coming. It really isn’t. Even in the most impoverished places, there is an abundance of food. India, even with it’s poverty, has enough food to export. The poorest of poor in America don’t die of starvation. The opposite is true, the American south is absolutely ravaged by obesity and diabetes which is also the result of consistently elevated blood sugar, elevated insulin and the adaptation of insulin resistance. We feast all the time, and rarely fast.
A false idea that we have about feasting, is that we can get it out of our system. Or that it will keep us from indulging later or more often. All markedly false. CrossFitter’s or other health conscious people generally indulge less often than others, but typical Americans never give it a break. There isn’t an end-stop to eating a crappy diet. if there were, diabetes and obesity wouldn’t exist. Humans are very good at storing away energy when it’s available. We first store it in our liver and muscles, but that storage is limited. Your liver is small, and you only have so much muscle. That energy is precious, so we store away the excess in our muffin top and chin, or the place you don’t want it to the most. That capacity is endless. Processed carbs might scratch an itch, but it comes back stronger! The same is especially true for alcohol. Friday drinking equals Saturday and Sunday cravings.
Pre-funking food or drink, also has little effect on our capacity for processed food. “I’ll drink lots of water and eat a big protein breakfast so I won’t be so hungry.” You’re just lying to yourself because you’ll even admit that you want the piece of cake because your great aunt made it special. You said nothing about hunger. Hunger or lack thereof was never part of the equation, so why would “filling up on healthy food” be helpful? It’s not, and you experience it every holiday season! It’s the same phenomena that happens when your kids won’t eat another bite of dinner, but miraculously have room for dessert. The very concept of processed foods is for you to eat beyond your perceived capacity. Food companies make their money by writing minuscule portion sizes and laughing all the way to the bank. Force feeding yourself broccoli and chicken is not an effective strategy. Not any fun either.
Not only do we have an endless capacity for sweets, losing body fat is infinitely harder than storing it. Even if you only party two or three times a holiday season, the fallout can last for weeks. The regular weekend party animal see’s little progress or at least it’s very slow even with a “perfect diet” during the weekdays.
Well that was a lot of bad news! So how should I go about having a fun and happy Holiday season? I want my cake and I want to eat it too please! Should I throw caution to the wind? Or show up to a party with my Tupperware of whole, nutrient dense food?
This Holiday season, I plan to:
Make relationships central rather than the food. I want to enjoy my friends and family first, and the food is a nice perk of the party.
Understand the reality of indulging. There’s a lot of freedom from the mental stress of gaining a little holiday weight when you know that it’s probably inevitable and likely mostly water retention and bloat. Don’t make any excuses or concessions, leading into the next part of my plan.
Practice gratitude and mindful eating. This giant snickerdoodle and glass of eggnog is bad for me and I know it. I’m going to eat it slowly and enjoy every molecule and be thankful for the experience. It’s going to make me want another, and I may have one, but I’m going to eat it just as mindfully and thankfully.
Put a positive spin on things. As far as training goes, and as someone who mainly trains fasted and without eating carbs, I’m going to enjoy riding the carb train and hammering my workouts the day after these feasts. It’s not likely to benefit me from a body composition standpoint, but my board numbers won’t suffer!
Remember my routine. I have dialed in an effective diet that I enjoy and even crave. A party, even though unhealthy isn’t going to make my normal diet ineffective when the season winds down.
Incorporate the fasting portion of my routine into feasting days. I typically fast from 7pm until 1pm the following day and eat 2 meals or sometimes 1 large meal a day. On party days, I’m going to follow an eating window of 3pm to 9pm. My intentions for fasting normally are to stay metabolically flexible and avoid insulin resistance so as long as i’m giving my pancreas a break, my blood sugar and insulin will be raised at their normal times anyway. 3pm, all bets are off, fun Devin has arrived, and by 9pm I’m ready for bed and all the food tastes the same anyway! If you see me at the Christmas party at 9:45, nursing a beer and nibbling peanut butter balls, I already decided to fast until 4 the next day ;)
Make the decision to enjoy yourself and make the food secondary!