4 Tricks for Halloween Treats

Halloween is coming up in a few days and for many of us this signals the beginning of what can be a disastrous time for our weight loss plans. Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years – it seems like there are just so many excuses to over-indulge during the next few months.

I always enjoyed Halloween as a kid and now as a parent I enjoy it doubly so. Not just for the candy of course – Halloween is a reminder of Fall and the upcoming Winter (here in Minnesota we often get snow before Halloween but knock on wood not this year), a chance to see the creativity of neighbors coming out with awesome spooky displays and of course a chance to maybe even walk around with your kids. At least until they turn 12 or so.

But despite my enjoyment of Halloween it really does make for some weight loss and dieting challenges. Looking for some ideas for how to get through this Halloween? Here are 4 Tricks for Halloween Treats:

1. Don’t participate – OK so this probably isn’t a reasonable option but it serves as a reminder that just because there is cultural if not community pressure to participate in Halloween there is no reason you have to if you know that buying bags of candy is going to be a problem for you. Plan to go see a movie with the family, visit a local haunted house, do anything other than staying at home handy candy out to strangers. Sometimes the easiest way to be strong is to go away.


2. Put the candy bowl outside – The bane of the dieter is leftover Halloween candy. It sits there in your candy bowl just beckoning you to take one or two little pieces. The problem is those one or two little pieces turn into five or six and suddenly you are doing some serious damage to your diet. So if you must participate in Halloween plan to do so with having no leftovers. How to do that? Buy all the candy you think you need, put it in a big bowl and instead of having that bowl inside the house put it outside on your porch with a sign for the kids to take “1 or 2″ pieces. One way or another you probably won’t have any leftovers to worry about. Of course you may only have made one kid really happy but that is a risk us dieters have to take.


3. Hand out large candy bars – It probably seems counter-intuitive that handing out large candy bars rather than the traditional mini bite-size morsels would help you on your diet but I think it is much more likely you will be able to contain yourself from eating candy if the leftovers are huge bars rather than the normal innocuous little pieces. We’ll see – this year for the first time we will be handing out normal size candy bars. Not only should this make it easier for me to not nibble but it also makes it very likely there will be no leftovers as word spreads throughout the neighbor that our house is the place to visit.


4. Throw the leftovers away – This little trick is probably the hardest of the bunch because nobody likes to throw anything away, especially chocolate. But if you have decided that you want to participate in Halloween you must have a plan to deal with possible leftovers and despite your good intentions, establishing a plan to eat “just one small piece” every day just won’t cut it. At some point you will break down. So if you must participate do so with the plan of throwing away any leftovers you have. In fact you should be sure to have a similar plan for any new candy your children bring home. Let them munch on it for a few days but set the expectation with them that there is a statute of limitations on their candy as well.

Halloween is a fun time year but it can be troublesome for dieters. Use one or more of these tricks to help you get through it.