The Pound That Never Leaves

First, to every veteran reading this on November 11, thank you. Go eat a free breakfast somewhere today. You earned it.

Now let’s talk about the next six weeks.

Every January, my gym fills up with guys who look like they got hit by a truck made of stuffing. You know the type. You might have been the type. Same guy who was walking around in October feeling pretty good about himself. Then Thanksgiving hits, then the office party, then the client dinners, then Christmas, then whatever happens between Christmas and New Year’s that nobody can account for.

By January 2 he’s swearing off carbs, buying a rowing machine he’ll use four times, and telling everybody he put on ten pounds over the holidays.

Here’s the funny part. He probably didn’t.

For years, magazines and morning shows have told people the average American gains somewhere between five and ten pounds over the holidays. It’s one of those facts everybody knows and nobody checked.

Then a team at the National Institutes of Health actually checked. They weighed 195 adults before, during, and after the holiday season and published it in the New England Journal of Medicine. The average holiday gain was less than a pound. About 0.8 pounds between Thanksgiving and New Year’s. And when they asked people to guess, the volunteers overestimated their own gain by about three pounds.

So good news, right?

Not quite. Here’s the part that should make every man over 35 put down the eggnog. The lead researcher pointed out that the holiday weight wasn’t lost during the rest of the year. When they weighed people again the next fall, the extra weight was still there. The holidays accounted for a big chunk of the whole year’s gain.

Do that math across a couple of decades. One pound a year from 35 to 55 is twenty pounds. Nobody gains twenty pounds. They gain one pound, twenty times, mostly in December.

And the study found something else worth knowing. People who were already overweight were more likely to gain five pounds or more. And the two things that predicted who gained the most weren’t stress or the number of parties. They were how hungry people said they were and how active they stayed.

That’s the whole game. Manage hunger. Stay moving. Do it for six weeks.

Let’s be honest about the setup, because willpower isn’t a strategy.

The food is everywhere. The office kitchen becomes a bakery. Clients send tins of popcorn. Your neighbor drops off cookies. Every meeting has a tray.

The schedule falls apart. Late nights, travel, kids out of school, a calendar packed with stuff that isn’t your normal routine. Workouts are the first thing to get bumped.

The drinks add up. Two cocktails at a party can be 400 calories or more before you’ve touched the food. And they make the food look a lot better.

The big meals are really big. The Calorie Control Council has estimated that a typical Thanksgiving dinner runs about 3,000 calories, and drinks, appetizers, and dessert can push the day to 4,500. Some people argue with those numbers. Fine. Even if it’s half that, it’s a lot.

January feels like a reset button. This is the trap. “I’ll fix it in January” gives you permission to drop the ball for six weeks. But January never fully undoes it. That’s what the study showed.

So the goal isn’t to white knuckle your way through the holidays eating steamed broccoli while everybody else has fun. That’s miserable, and it doesn’t last.

The goal is to walk into January at the same weight you walked into Thanksgiving. That’s it. Hold the line. Win by not losing.

Here’s the plan I’ve used for years. It’s built for a guy who still wants to eat his mother in law’s pecan pie and have a drink at the Christmas party.

I know. Nobody likes the scale. Do it anyway.

Same time every day. Right after you wake up, before coffee, after the bathroom. Write it down. Don’t freak out about one day, because water and salt will swing your weight two or three pounds overnight. Watch the weekly average instead.

Here’s why it works. The study found people had no idea what was actually happening to their weight. They guessed wrong by three pounds. The scale fixes that. You can’t manage what you won’t look at, and you already know that from running a business.

Set a tripwire. Pick a number two pounds above your weight today. If your weekly average crosses it, you tighten up for a week. Not a crash diet. Just cut the extras until you’re back under. Problem caught at two pounds instead of ten.

Remember that hunger was one of the two biggest predictors of holiday weight gain. Protein is the best tool you’ve got against hunger.

Every meal starts with protein. Eggs in the morning. A real lunch with chicken, beef, fish, or something that used to walk around. Turkey first at Thanksgiving, before you touch the stuffing.

Before a party, eat a real meal with protein. Never walk into a holiday event hungry. A guy who shows up starving is a guy who eats nine pigs in a blanket by the door before he’s taken his coat off.

A simple target that works for most guys: aim for somewhere around a palm or two of protein at every meal. If you have a medical condition, especially anything with your kidneys, ask your doctor what makes sense for you.

This is the easiest win on the list, and almost nobody does it.

A 2022 review in the journal Sports Medicine looked at studies comparing sitting, standing, and light walking after meals. Even two to five minutes of light walking after eating helped bring blood sugar down compared to staying seated, and the researchers said the sweet spot is moving within 60 to 90 minutes after you eat, before your blood sugar peaks.

So make it a tradition. After Thanksgiving dinner, before the pie, everybody goes for a walk around the neighborhood. Kids, grandparents, the dog. Fifteen minutes. You’ll feel better, you’ll talk more, and you’ll probably have the best conversation of the whole day out there.

After a business lunch, walk around the block before you get back in the truck. After dinner on a weeknight, take a lap with your wife. It adds up fast.

Your training schedule is going to get wrecked. Accept it now and plan for it.

Forget your perfect program for six weeks. Here’s the minimum that holds the line:

That’s it. If you do more, great. But if December gets crazy, the minimum still keeps you in the game. The man who does a little every week beats the man who does nothing until January.

You’re going to eat some stuff that isn’t on any diet. Good. That’s what the holidays are for. The trick is to spend your calories on what actually matters to you and skip the junk that doesn’t.

Here’s how I think about it. Every holiday food falls into one of two buckets.

Worth it: The stuff that only shows up once a year and that you genuinely love. Your grandmother’s stuffing. The pie your wife makes from her mom’s recipe. The bourbon your brother in law only opens at Christmas. Eat it. Enjoy it. Don’t feel bad about it.

Not worth it: The stuff that’s just there. Store bought cookies in the break room. The candy dish at the bank. The rolls that come out of a bag. The third plate of appetizers at a party where you don’t even know the host. Skip it.

A simple rule I use at parties: one plate, sit down, enjoy it, done. No grazing. Grazing is where the damage hides, because you never really notice how much you ate.

I’m not going to tell you not to drink. I’m going to tell you how to drink like a guy who’ll still be in shape in February.

Have a plan before you walk in. Decide how many drinks you’re having before the first one. Two is a good number for most events.

Alternate. One drink, then a glass of water or club soda with lime. Nobody can tell what’s in your glass, and you’ll drink half as much without trying.

Skip the sugar bombs. Eggnog, holiday punch, and the fancy seasonal cocktails can carry a lot of sugar on top of the alcohol. A neat pour or a light beer does a lot less damage.

Remember tomorrow morning. Every extra drink tonight costs you sleep, which makes you hungrier tomorrow, which makes it harder to make good calls at lunch. It’s a chain, and it starts at the bar.

Let’s get specific, because Thanksgiving is in two weeks.

Morning: Get moving early. Plenty of towns have a turkey trot. If you’re not a runner, walk it. If there isn’t one, go for a long walk or a quick workout before anyone else is awake.

Breakfast: Eat a normal breakfast with protein. Do not “save up” for the big meal. Skipping meals makes you hungrier, and hungrier is how you end up with three plates.

The meal: Turkey and vegetables first. Then the stuff you love. Use a normal sized plate. Eat slowly. Put your fork down and talk to your family. You see these people a few times a year.

After: The walk. Everybody goes. Then pie. One slice of whatever you love most. If you love two, get two small slivers.

Leftovers: Send them home with guests. Keep the turkey. Ship off most of the pie. If it’s in your fridge, you’ll eat it at 10 o’clock at night standing in the kitchen. Every man reading this has done it.

Here’s something I want you to think about.

Your kids are watching how you handle the holidays. Not what you say about health. What you do. Whether Dad still works out in December. Whether he eats like a grown man or goes back for thirds. Whether he goes for the walk after dinner or passes out on the couch in front of the game.

You don’t have to give a speech about it. Just be the guy who says “Who’s coming for a walk?” and gets up first. Do that every year and it becomes the family tradition. Your grandkids will be doing it someday without knowing who started it.

That’s leadership too. It’s just the kind that happens in sweatpants.

I’m not a doctor or a dietitian. If you’ve got diabetes, heart disease, kidney issues, or you take medication that’s affected by food or alcohol, talk to your doctor before changing how you eat or train. And if your relationship with food or alcohol feels like more than a holiday problem, that’s worth a real conversation with a professional. No shame in it.

Three things, all before Thanksgiving:

Then on January 2, step on that scale. If the number matches the one you wrote down tomorrow, you won the holidays. Most men can’t say that.

Friday is Friday the 13th. Fitting, because we’re talking about the scariest email your business will ever get. The one that looks exactly like it came from your vendor, your banker, or you.

Refined. Relentless. Unapologetic.

Marcus