health, advice

Be Kind

Looking after your health over Christmas

Tips for taking care of your mental and physical health over Christmas

When we think about Christmas we think of fun, laughter, being merry… but Christmas can be a really stressful and daunting time for many people. There’s a huge amount of pressure to socialise with friends and family, massive temptation to over indulge in food and drink and of course the financial burden.Our Health Practitioner, Ellie, spoke to That's TV about how we can all take care of our mental and physical health over the festive season.[embed]https://youtu.be/KPFUMIGCwlk[/embed]

Be kind to your mind

  • For a lot of people, especially those struggling with poorer mental health, this time of year can be really triggering. The best thing you can do is seek support from your loved ones and be honest with them and yourself about how much you can take on without compromising your mental well being.
  • There’s a lot of evidence to suggest that not getting enough sleep can have negative impacts on your mental health so try to avoid too many late nights!

Eating Well

  • Although alcohol can initially make us feel more relaxed, it is important to remember that it is a depressant, so if you know you are prone to these feelings, it could be important to be sensible with your intake.
  • In terms of physical health, alcohol isn’t kind on our livers or our waistlines, not to mention the hangovers!
  • We are currently running our 12 Days of Festive Food Swaps over on our Facebook @achieveoxfordshire We are posting a food swap every day for the first 12 days of the month so make sure you are following us! We'd love to see if you try out any of our swaps so make sure to tag us and use the hashtag #festivefoodswaps
festive food swaps

Moving more

  • Of course, physical activity is really important for our physical health but on top of this, the evidence for using physical activity to improve and maintain good mental health is overwhelming.
  • Current guidelines state that we should be doing at least 150 mins moderate activity per week.
  • Either find ways to make this a fun family activity or use it as some ‘me time’ to get away from the family chaos!

Taking care of your mental and physical health over Christmas is really important, and it's ok to ask for help if things seem a little overwhelming.

We are also going to be running a health focused campaign for January so keep an eye out for that!

No items found.

related content