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Episode 276:
Show Notes
Episode 276 of "The Real Health and Weight Loss Podcast" features Dr Mary and Dr Lucy discussing the "holiday mindset" and its impact on eating habits, as part of their ongoing series on mind management and unhelpful food stories.
The Holiday Mindset Paradox: People often claim they cannot eat well because they are too busy, yet when they have time on holidays, they still do not eat well because "it's a holiday". This unconscious mindset equates holidays with treating oneself through food, taking it easy, and having no rules.
Childhood Associations: The holiday mindset stems from childhood experiences where holidays meant no rules—staying up late, watching television all day, and general anarchy. Many adults carry this "free-for-all" mentality into their holiday eating patterns.
Intentional Choices: The doctors emphasize that individuals can make intentional food choices on holidays that align with health goals while still enjoying special experiences. Dr Mary shares examples of intentionally enjoying a pint of Guinness in Dublin or chocolate tart in Paris without extending these choices to every day of her trip.
Half-Assing Holidays: Dr Lucy introduces the concept of "half-assing" holidays—not going all-in on unhealthy eating just because rules seem suspended. Individuals can choose to have occasional treats without having ice cream or cocktails every single night.
Reframing the Break: Instead of viewing holidays as a break from an arduous food plan, the doctors suggest reframing it as a break from meal prep, cooking, and cleanup. Restaurant meals can provide this break while still allowing for low-carb, high-protein choices.
Practical Tips: Filling up on protein, especially at breakfast, helps maintain satiety and makes navigating food choices throughout the day easier. Camping holidays naturally lend themselves to high-protein, low-carb eating with grilled meats and eggs.
Rejecting Diet Mentality: The episode emphasizes moving away from the "on or off" diet mindset toward consistently nourishing the body with delicious food. Eating plans should not be viewed as restrictive or arduous but as sustainable ways of eating that do not require breaks.
The All-Terrain Vehicle Analogy: Health journeys are compared to driving an all-terrain vehicle that can be steered back on track at any time, regardless of detours. Perfection is not required—consistency and doing what serves the body most of the time is what matters.
Episode 276:
Transcript
Dr Mary Barson (0:04) Hello, my lovely friends. I am Dr Mary Barson.
Dr Lucy Burns (0:09) And I'm Dr Lucy Burns. We are doctors and weight management and metabolic health experts.
Both (0:16) And this is the Real Health and Weight Loss podcast!
Dr Lucy Burns (0:21) Hello lovely friend, Dr Lucy here, joined by my beautiful colleague Dr Mary, and we are continuing our series in mind management and unpacking some of our stories. Hi Miss, how are you this week?
Dr Mary Barson (00:36)
I've been using this time to reflect on the different stories that I have in my head. And they are there in all kinds of spheres of our lives. We've all got stories that we unconsciously tell ourselves. Some are helpful and some are unhelpful. And I'm excited to dive into some more unhelpful food stories that are quite common.Very good, very good.
Dr Lucy Burns (00:59) Absolutely. You know, last week we talked a bit about the idea that, you know, your body is not the bin, so you don't have to eat food to get rid of it. You are allowed to throw food out if you don't want to eat it. You know, you're also allowed to put it back into the fridge if you feel like it's nutrient-dense, expensive, whole foods. But you are allowed to throw out some old cake from Coles. You don't have to eat that. You don't have to get rid of it. You are allowed to throw stuff out if it doesn't fit with your goals or align with your values or help you achieve what you want to achieve. And then this week I thought we'd talk about a really common mindset mode, I guess, on holidays. So hilariously, this is common. And again, most of you will relate to this. Lots of people will say to me, you know, if only I had more time, like the reason I can't eat well is that I'm busy. And, you know, there's truth in this. We are busy people. You know, I'm busy. I've got kids. I'm ferrying them around. To get home, the last thing I want to do is cook food.So we just heat up something that's, you know, I bought from the freezer — a frozen lasagna or something. And so then they go, if I had more time, then I would be able to eat better. Then we go on holidays where there's plenty of time and we still don't eat well.
Dr Mary Barson (02:21) Yeah. So because it's holidays, Lucy. Yes.
Dr Lucy Burns (02:28) Yeah. So we move into holiday mindset. So let's talk about what is holiday mindset? What does it represent to you? And Mary, I'm sure you've got some stories around this.
Dr Mary Barson (02:38) Yes. So I think holiday mindset is taking it easy. It's having fun. It's treating yourself. And that can definitely extend into wanting to treat yourself with foods. And if you want to do that, you're allowed to — like, this is not about telling you what to do. This is just about uncovering a mindset that is often quite, I think, unconscious for people. I've had people sit across from me and say, oh, it was a holiday. Like it was a given. Like there was absolutely no way that they could have chosen foods that were in line with their health goals because they were on holidays. And this is not about shame or guilt. But let's just pull on that thread a little bit, because this doesn't necessarily, necessarily hold true. I can see it with my daughter. I went to a conference in Hamilton Island a few months ago, which was very, very fun. Brought my kids with me, got a babysitter. It was very, very cool. And when we were in that setting, she just knows that there are nuggets and chips available in the restaurant. And she knows that she's going to get them at least a little bit. But on this particular conference, this particular trip, she had a cold and she had a blocked nose. And from her point of view, she's a little kid, but she was having this belief that the holiday was going to be a total waste because with her blocked nose, she wasn't going to be able to taste the nuggets and chips. And that the whole point of the holidays was nuggets and chips. And she was spiraling down into this pit of despair, poor love. So it was a great opportunity to do a little bit of mindset work around this — about all the amazing things that were happening in the holiday that were separate to and not related to the nuggets and chips, and that there is no scarcity around nuggets and chips, and all of these things. I think that lots of people fall into a similar category. It might not be about nuggets and chips, but we associate holidays with cocktails, with restaurants, with taking it easy. And this is the idea that when you're on holidays, you have to have all of the sugary cocktails and you have to have all of the local foods. And you definitely can, but you can also choose to do that in a way that is aligned with your health goals if you want to. There's no reason why you have to do things differently just because you're on holidays. Lucy, tell me about your experience with people and maybe your own holidays.
Dr Lucy Burns (05:07) Oh, absolutely. So holidays used to be — they're like a free-for-all. When you're a kid, holidays mean you could stay up late. It was like there were no rules because you're on holidays. So you haven't got any obligations. You don't have to go to school or work. You can just stay up till whatever. You can watch telly all day if you want. It was like just this time of anarchy. And so for lots of us, we'll go into holidays with that mindset that there's no rules. And as you've said, you're the boss of you. You can do that if you want to, but you don't have to. The other thing is, you can go — we often talk about you can't half-ass it. So you can go, you don't have to go all in on the anarchy. You don't have to go all in on having an ice cream every single night because you're on holidays. You don't have to go on having cocktails or gin and tonics every single night because you don't have to get up and go to work in the morning. You can still have times when maybe you choose to do that, but you don't have to do it every night. So this is about the — there's not many times in the world where we would recommend half-assing it, but I think half-assing holidays is helpful. And if you want to stick to your low-carb plan, you can also do that. Again, you're the boss. So a brilliant example I can think of in my own holidays a couple of years ago was that we had group holidays and it was someone's birthday — one of the kids, I think. And so everyone got fish and chips. So I got fish and chips. So it was fish, but it was in batter, there were chips. And then there was this giant ice cream cake afterwards. We’ll have the fish — there was some salad as well. None of the kids ate that, but grown-ups did. So I had the fish, I had the salad, I had a couple of chips. Again, chips are easy for me to moderate. I don't care that much about chips. But then I just chose not to have the ice cream. I thought, well, it was ice cream cake. It wasn't actually — it wasn't good quality. It wasn't like a gelato that was homemade. It was just some random thing from the shop. So it was a processed ice cream cake. And again, this is not to — if you chose to have the ice cream, you can do what, as we keep saying, you can do whatever you want, but there are consequences or results or outcomes that are going to happen when you do that. So you just have to decide what outcome are you looking for? So for me, my outcome is I don't want to come back from a holiday and suddenly not be able to fit into my clothes because I've put on five kilos because I ate ice cream three times a day. I just want to come back from my holiday. I want to feel relaxed. I want to feel calm. I want to feel like I've still moved my body in a way that is useful. I want to feel like I have eaten in a way that is helpful, but I do probably eat foods that maybe I wouldn't always eat at home, but they can still be whole foods. So like, as an example, I might go to a farmer's market and maybe they'll have granola there. I don't eat a lot of granola. I'll usually try and get a grain-free granola because that's going to be helpful, but I might get that and I might buy yogurt from the farmer's market or something like that. Again, I could probably do that at home. We don't have a farmer's market near us, so I never go. So it's really about changing the way you think about holidays and the way you think about foods. So if you're lucky enough to have a farmer's market, you wouldn't associate that with a holiday, but for me, I do. And other people who live away from farmer's markets might do that as well. So that can be one useful tip.
Dr Mary Barson (08:44) Yeah, I think that you can be intentional as well. So we use this analogy of your health journey as you driving this all-terrain four-wheel drive vehicle, and you can take it absolutely anywhere that you want to go. And if you go off track, either intentionally or not intentionally, and eat a whole lot of sweet foods that don't serve your body, for example, then it doesn't mean you have to keep going on that track forever. You can actually just pull on the steering wheel and just move it back to the track that you want to be on at any time. This powerful all-terrain four-wheel drive vehicle that you control can handle anything, can go anywhere you want. And I can think of an example when I went to Europe. It was a while ago now, it was a long time ago, but I was eating low carb at that time. And I went to Dublin, and I went to the Galaxy Bar in Dublin at the Guinness Brewery. And I had a pint of Guinness. I just chose to, very, very intentionally chose to do that. And it was a highlight of the moment. It was fun. I just spent the whole day learning about how Guinness was made. And it was great. I was intentional about it. But that didn't mean that I had pints and pints of beer every single day that I was on holiday, just because, for me, that isn't helpful. Or another time I was in Paris, I don't travel very much. I sound like a jet setter. I'm absolutely not. But another time I was in Paris, and I got a beautiful piece of tarte de chocolat with my café au lait one morning and sat in a café feeling extremely Parisian. And I sat, and I ate this chocolate tart. And I chose to do that. It was great. It was wonderful. But it didn't mean that I was eating baguettes and chocolate tart absolutely every day that I was in Paris, because that doesn't serve me. It's not helpful. I ate a lot of cheese and a lot of charcuterie. That was great. But not a lot of baguettes and chocolate tart. So you can just be intentional. And if you want to go off track because it highlights the moment or for whatever reason, you can, absolutely fine. Probably another useful tip is, especially when you're traveling, it's often very helpful to fill up on protein, particularly for breakfast. When you're traveling in hotels, etc., you've always got your protein breakfast options. Usually, I find that really helpful. Fill up on protein for the day, you're then approaching the day from a position of satiety, feeling full, feeling good. It makes it much easier to navigate the rest of your food choices throughout the day.
Dr Lucy Burns (11:07) Yeah, absolutely. I think one of the things that we associate holidays with is having a break. Like, that's why people have a holiday: have a break from work and have a break from school if you're a student. But the way I like to think about having a break from my food plan isn't that I go, Oh, good, I'm having a break, because that implies my food plan is hard and terrible, and I need a rest from it. Whereas I'm really happy with my food plan. Like, I really — well, I have delicious food all the time. I don't really need a break from it. What I sometimes like is a break from the cooking and the meal prep and the shopping and the washing up. I could like a break from that. And so that's where restaurant meals can come into their own. You are absolutely having a break from that hard slog of food prep, but you can still make choices. There is usually something that you can find on the menu that is going to align with a low-carb, high-protein way of eating if you want to have that. I do that a lot, a lot. And it feels really good. I really focus on the fact that I have got to sit, that I'm looking around, especially if I happen to be at a restaurant that's looking out over the sea, or that I'm engaged, you know, talking to the person that I'm with, and the food arrives. Somebody has asked me how I am. Somebody brings me the food. I don't have to choose the plate. I don't have to do anything. I just have to be there. And so that, for me, is the break. And I think we can use that frequently, particularly around holidays, reassessing: are we thinking of the way we eat as arduous and that you need a break? Or are we looking at it as going, Well, this is easy and I love it, but I just want a break from the actual prep of food all the time.
Dr Mary Barson (12:59) That's right. Reframing the break. I think that is fantastic. A holiday that I go on more often than any other type of holiday is camping, which is probably the antithesis of having a break from, you know, washing up and stuff, because camping is quite hard work. But I like it. It's a break from my day-to-day routine, but definitely a break from work. I think that camping really lends itself to a high-protein, low-carb way of life. Like, you know, you've got your little barbie there, or I take my little — if I've got a powered site — my electric fry pan. I just grill steaks and barbecue and sausages and have eggs and bacon for breakfast. And the good thing about eating this way is that, you know, you just only really want one or two meals a day because you're so full the rest of the time. And I am just very able to just reframe it that this is just delicious and this is fun and this is serving my body, and I don't feel the need to have the marshmallows. I don't feel the need to eat the toast and cereal and other things that other people are doing. In fact, it doesn't even really kind of cross my mind. It's just what we do. So it is really possible. I might have a few more low-carb beers, definitely, when I'm camping. I generally don't drink much alcohol at all, but will often, with my friends, do that. But, you know, still finding a way to do that that is in alignment with my health goals and just serves me. And it's not about being perfect. It's just about doing what is helpful for me and my life.
Dr Lucy Burns (14:23) Yeah, absolutely. Because that — I mean, that is absolutely the key. It does not have to be perfect. It has to be consistent. And, you know, consistency means that you're doing something most of the time. If you deviate and you can't get back on — so you've taken your all-terrain vehicle off the path for whatever reason, and you can't find your way back — then we need to examine what are the mindset or roadblocks that are stopping you. And it may be around perfectionism. It may be around the Last Supper effect that we spoke about. We certainly spoke about the Last Supper last week. It may literally be around addiction and that dopamine that we're looking for. And we're looking for a dopamine hit. And we haven't spoken that much about that in this series yet, but we will come to that. But you need to understand, I guess, why you can't get back to the way you are. Is it because you really did think it was arduous? You really did think it was terrible? And again, for lots of dieters, dieting was hard. It was arduous. It was restrictive, because there was nothing around the management of it. And it was all around the perfection. And, you know, you had to do it properly, or you wouldn't lose weight. You know, pickers wear big knickers. There were so many — you know, nothing tastes as good as skinny feels. So much language around the restrictive nature of it, and that it was going to be hard. But, you know, it would all be worth it in the end. Whereas we want people to be able to eat in a way that serves them long term. And I know it's hard for people who have — particularly if you have sugar addiction — when you're hearing us saying it doesn't have to be perfect, and they're going, Yes, but every time I eat sugar, I, you know, I'm on a six-month bender. Again, that requires a specific set of, I guess, management tools. But for the majority of people, if you can let go of the idea that what you're doing is hard and restrictive and impossible, but you'll do it for a short time to lose some weight, that mindset's not going to serve you. So you need to let go of that and recognise that holidays — you don't really need to have a break from your eating program, because your eating program is not arduous.
Dr Mary Barson (16:41) That's right. That diet mindset of either you're on or you're off is so unhelpful, because obviously when we're on holidays, then we're going to be off. But it's not an on-or-off proposition. It's about nourishing your body with delicious food wherever and whenever you are.
Dr Lucy Burns (16:58) Yeah. And doing things that serve you well the majority of the time. Perfect. All right. Well, I think that will lead us into next week's episode, where we are going to talk a bit more on perfectionism. And if your brain loves perfectionism and really can't quite work out what to do — if it feels like it's either on and perfect or on a bender, my old philosophy — then tune into next week's episode, and we will see you all then.
Dr Mary Barson (17:25) Bye-bye now.
Dr Lucy Burns (17:29) The information shared on the Real Health and Weight Loss Podcast, including show notes and links, provides general information only. It is not a substitute, nor is it intended to provide individualised medical advice, diagnosis or treatment, nor can it be construed as such. Please consult your doctor for any medical concerns.
