Body Shop
Beware of the season

We've just turned the clocks back, and it's time for my annual warning:

Beware, my friends! 'Tis the season for slothful living and gaining weight. Here's why.

Americans get fat little by little, year by year, hardly noticing until the pounds mount. The pattern we follow is predictable — and it starts with setting the clocks back at the end of October. The days get shorter and the nights longer. In addition, the weather takes a turn for the worse, becoming cold and nasty. These factors conspire to discourage physical activity.

To make matters worse, the end of October ushered in the holiday season. A time for eating more than usual, especially the kind of things we know we should avoid. Ironic, isn't it, that at the very time we initiate this challenging time change we see Halloween candy everywhere, screaming for our attention.

Just 100 calories a day

It's prime time for packing on a few extra pounds. From now until New Year's, we are vulnerable to eating more and exercising less. Just a 100-calorie increase can, over 10 weeks, add 2 pounds of body fat. Most of us will gain more.

Those 100 calories could come from less physical activity, greater caloric intake, or a combination of the two. Unfortunately, you can take in 100 excess calories at the drop of a hat — a cookie, a can of soda or beer, a chocolate-covered cherry — the list goes on.

Some folks gain quite a bit, especially between Thanksgiving and Christmas. Those who suffer from seasonal depression, from bad feelings about the holidays and/or lack of sunlight, often seek comfort in foods loaded with fat and calories. This, combined with less physical activity, is a formula for disaster.

After New Year's, heavy holiday eating subsides, but physical activity doesn't pick up, because of short days and rough weather. Thus, although weight gain is reined in a bit, the process continues.

Eventually, spring comes and the weather gets warmer and the days longer and we are encouraged to be more physically active. We burn more calories. This, combined with a return to more normal eating habits, causes us to reverse the tide and begin losing the body fat we gained.

Creeping obesity

Unfortunately, unless we make the effort to turn the tide enough, we don't take off all that we gained, which explains why Americans pick up, on average, a net gain of about 1 pound of body fat per year. This process starts when we are in our early 20s. Because it is subtle and barely noticeable, it is called creeping obesity.

Creeping obesity is so common that we view it as normal and natural. Ask the average 50-year-old how much he weighs. Then ask him what he weighed when he was 20. Subtract the second answer from the first. Don't be surprised if the number 30 pops up. It's very rare to find older Americans who weigh about what they did in their younger years.

Creeping obesity might be normal in our society, but there's nothing natural about it. It's also one of the reasons why we lead the world in such chronic diseases as cancer, stroke and heart disease.

Preventive maintenance

What can you do to avoid this problem? Be aware that it happens and make the decision to avoid it. Expend about 100 additional calories per day to make up for the lost physical activity this time of year. That equates to walking a mile, or climbing about 20 flights of stairs (up and down). Adding the stairs to your daily routine is a great way to document in your mind that you are getting the extra physical activity you need to fill in the gaps.

The good news is you don't have to walk a mile or climb all 20 flights at once. Your body will keep a tally of how many calories you expend per day.

In addition, start paying attention to what you eat. Drop 100 calories from your daily diet. You decide how. Drink one fewer soft drink, for example. The 100 calories lost from physical activity and the 100-calorie drop in your diet gives you a 200-calorie-per-day margin of error, which should be enough to get you through this trying time with minimal damage.

Bryant Stamford is an exercise physiologist and director of the Health Promotion and Wellness Center at the University of Louisville. If you have questions about sports injuries, health, exercise or fitness, write to Body Shop, Gannett News Service, care of The Courier-Journal, 525 W. Broadway, P.O. Box 740031, Louisville, Ky. 40201-7431, or e-mail bryant@louisville.edu.