Life After Diets

How to Stay Healthy on Vacation

Tips for feeling your best while away from home

Photo by Alex wong on Unsplash

My busy season at work has finally come to an end, and I’m off to celebrate at the happiest place on Earth. For one week, I’ll be traipsing around Disney World, eating my way around the Epcot International Food and Wine Festival, enjoying cookies and hot cocoa at Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party, and generally living my best childless Millennial life.

This vacation, like most vacations (let’s be honest), will be spent moving leisurely from one activity to the next and eating far more food, especially dessert, than I usually do in my real life. For most people, this will add up to an average of an extra pound or two that’s likely to stick around, even weeks or months post-vacation.

But what’s a pound or two in the grand scheme of things, really? Well, it’s a lot, particularly if you’ve been taught to be extremely weight conscious for most of your life.

Vacation and resting should not be such a challenge, but for those of us recovering from disordered eating and diet cycling, letting go of often rigid schedules and allowing ourselves to relax can be a job all its own. I’m learning to be okay with disruptions to my routine and letting myself enjoy the rest and extra food that a…