Maintaining a healthy lifestyle during the holiday season can be a challenge.
When everyone else around you is eating ham, turkey, macaroni, peas and rice, rum cake, fruitcake or any other holiday special, you may be trying to hold out.
It may have been a resolution made at the beginning of the year, a promise to lose weight and lower the risk of health-related illnesses.
On the first day that you are tempted, you may say to yourself that you've been down this road before and you faltered. You may have also hated yourself in January and swore not to give in this year.
So you stick to your diet or healthy lifestyle. You don't want high blood pressure, diabetes, heart problems or other health-related issues that arise from an unhealthy lifestyle.
While there is nothing wrong with holiday food, there are those who wish to abstain in an effort to eat healthy.
But as most doctors would say, starving yourself for three days and pigging out on the fourth is not the right idea.
Skipping to the third day, when you are surrounded by family and friends and the food is being shared, you say to yourself that a little bit of ham and macaroni won't kill you. Then, you secretly break in to your parents' home and pilfer as much ham and turkey as you can.
Does this sound familiar?
Janine Carey, co-owning manager at Liquid Nutrition in Old Fort Bay, said that the best way to avoid giving in to unhealthy foods during the holiday season is to promote the change you want to see.
"I think we have to get to a point where the majority of what we eat creates health assets - food that doesn't lead to illness," she said.
"If we have to eat those foods in excess, we should only do it in small portions.
"If it only accounts for 10 percent of your diet and you are only having that once, it isn't the end of the world.
"But if you know that 90 percent of what you eat is not filled with nutritious ingredients you have to change the way you eat."
Carey said attending family functions where heavy food will be served can be tempting, but bringing healthy alternatives can make a difference.
"If I go to a family function and I know there is a lot of heavy but delicious food, I take the initiative to bring a healthy dish to contribute to the buffet," she said.
"And slowly, over time maybe, I'll influence my aunt to change her way of eating.
"You have to be the person to promote the change."
G-Fit Academy President Charles Johnson noted that one should not stop exercising during the Christmas season.
"If you are consuming those unhealthy things, don't take a break from exercising during the holiday season," Johnson said.
"Exercising and being active would help to keep your calories down."
Johnson noted that if one is maintaining a healthy lifestyle for the entire year, the holiday season should not be so challenging.
"We run into trouble when we are accustomed to eating bad all year and then when the Christmas season comes around we tend to over indulge," he said.
"My whole thing is changing your lifestyle first."

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