Even health experts have to eat, drink and be merry
Anna Magee speaks to a nutritionist, fitness trainer, doctor and therapist to see if they follow their own advice over the season
They pass the year telling us how to stay well, but how do the health experts face all the festive indulgence themselves?
The nutritionist
ALLI Godbold, a nutritionist, lives with her husband Richard, a photographer, and children, Millie, 17, Dylan, 15, and Marley, eight.
“Healthy moderation” is how I describe my Christmas, but I think other nutritionists might call it a complete blow-out. I’ll be having Buck’s Fizz at 11am, made with champagne , with mince pies and sausage rolls. Then, at 4pm, a massive Christmas dinner with turkey and stuffing, roast potatoes made with goose fat and brussel sprouts with bacon, followed by gluten-free Christmas pudding. I have a gluten intolerance and so does Marley, and Dylan gets instant gut rot if he touches it.
The children will get chocolate coins in their stockings, but there won’t be chocolate lying around the house all day. I will leave satsumas within easy reach for them to pick at instead. My indulgences will be champagne and dark chocolate and some good red wine.
I get frustrated that I can’t exercise over Christmas and Boxing days and always feel sluggish during the break.
I’ll go to the gym as normal four times a week, doing pilates, some weights or yoga right up until it closes, and then make do with some walks until it opens again.
In January, I’ll do a two-week elimination diet with my clients, with plenty of vegetables, chicken, fish, pulses, nuts and nut butters but no alcohol, sugar, red meat, gluten or dairy. We’ll all feel saintly again after that.
The trainer
MATT Roberts is a personal trainer who lives with wife, Helen, and their children, Amber, 13, and Ben, 11.
As a child growing up in a small town I always went for a run around the town with my dad on Christmas Day. We’ve kept that going and this year Dad and I will go for a run in the park with the dog on Christmas morning.
At about 11am there’s present opening and I’ll make a brunch, with smoked salmon, quails’ eggs, pastries, fruit, waffles – the works.
Then, at 5pm, we’ll have Christmas turkey with all the trimmings. I avoid dairy because it can set off my sinuses, and try not to have too much gluten – though I don’t have an allergy to it, and on Christmas Day that will go out the window, as I love mince pies (and not the gluten-free type).
There’s a running joke in the family about my love of Toblerone, too; they buy me a giant one and I get through the whole thing myself.
My time off will be a busman’s holiday – I really love exercise – and I’ll be lifting weights, playing tennis and doing stretching and mobility work most days in the gym.
On an emotional level, I’m good at putting things in boxes and have got even better since I learnt a mindfulness technique in which you allow any negative thoughts to enter your mind, process them, then put them into a corner in your mind, while focusing on your breathing. I tend to do it when I’m lying in bed – it helps with stressful moments that arise.
The doctor
JAMES le Fanu is a practising GP who lives with his wife, Juliet, and they have two children, Frederick, 26, and Allegra, 23.
I delight in Christmas. Tomorrow, my wife and I and our two children will go out to a restaurant and then we will go to midnight mass.
On Christmas Day, I’ll have half a dozen oysters before lunch – my guilty pleasure. We’ll have turkey with stuffing, but there won’t be a ham this year, though that has nothing to do with the recent meat health scares – we don’t pay any attention to that in my household.
Normally, I cycle for an hour a day, but on Christmas Day, we’ll walk after lunch instead, then come back for Christmas pudding.
I get terrible nocturnal cramps, which wake me up, so I have a bottle of [sleep medication] diazepam liquid by the bed.
If my various home remedies for cramps don’t work – such as taking your upper lip and twisting it very strongly – I’ll take 2mg of the liquid.
I’ve discovered a wonderful bottle of red wine and won’t be holding back with that or the champagne, which I love.
I don’t tend to get hangovers if I drink enough fizzy water between drinks, but will probably have a dry January – just to prove that I can. For me, it’s also a good way of getting a few kilograms off.
The therapist
LINDA Blair is a practising therapist who has written four self-help books and lives with her second husband, Rob. They have six children between them, aged from 24 to 39.
When you put together grown-up kids from different families and siblings, you will get a lot of jostling for attention. This will be my house when everyone comes home for Christmas celebrations on December 29.
I suspect people will have arguments to do with supremacy among themselves, and I will have to resist the urge to step in and see them all as aged six, four and two again, when in fact they can fight their own battles now.
If I feel the emotional temperature rising, I will go out for a short dog walk, breathing mindfully, in through my nose, out through my mouth, and walking steadily. After 20 minutes of that I’ll be ready to come back and laugh with them again.
I’ll start the day the same way I start every day – with an hour of yoga. Exercise is the way I regulate my mood. I am a vegetarian, because I don’t like the way meat is farmed, but at Christmas I’ll be eating turkey.
However, it will be a free-range “happy” turkey, so I don’t mind.
I hate to sound like a killjoy, but I won’t be drinking any alcohol – I don’t know why, but after I hit menopause, I got tired of drinking. I always trust my body, it knows best what’s right for me. — The Daily Telegraph