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Tips For A Heart Healthy Christmas

Winter can be a particularly tough time of year for some of us. It’s dreary weather, the shorter days, and the often cold temperatures. Regardless of those seasonal changes, many of us look forward to the holiday parties and celebrations that come with this time of year.

Unfortunately due to the pandemic, this won’t be occurring for many of us which may leave us confused as to how to celebrate the holidays while remaining healthy.

To help you navigate how to keep active and remain heart healthy during the holidays, we’ve created some tips that you can follow during your winter break.

Tips for a heart-healthy holiday

Enjoy your favourite holiday foods in moderation

Each holiday season, each one of us craves a dish that’s served at a big holiday dinner. We look forward to it in the lead up towards the holidays, and will often skip a meal to make room so that we can eat as much of it as we can.

Since many family’s will need to remain home this year and away from loved ones, we encourage families to think about portions, and try to cook for just those within your home. It’s ok to have your favorite dish, just make sure it’s a healthy serving this year.

Load up with colour

This is a trick that is often referred by doctors to recovering heart attack patients. Aim to fill half of your plate with vegetables and fruit. This is a great way to balance out calorie-rich foods that are prevalent at holiday dinners. Optional: Try to choose fresh cut veggies, leafy garden salads and fruits, as they will tend to have fewer calories than other vegetables like mashed potatoes or maple syrup and squash.

Watch your drinks

Calories from drinks can add up quickly. This goes for both non-alcoholic and alcoholic drinks. Seek out alternatives to some drinks that you would normally have casually. Instead of rum and coke have vodka and cran. Another alternative is to treat the drink as a dessert or snack rather than an add-on.

Remain active

Balance out the extra calories that you’ll be accumulating throughout the holiday season by doing some winter activities. This can be as simple as going for a walk or shovelling the walks. Keeping active and getting the normal 2.5 hours of exercise a week is extremely important during the holidays.

Share your tips on how to remain heart healthy during the holidays in the comments below or reach out to us on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram.

Parsons Professional Corporation donates a MIKEY to Child Care Centre

L-R: Andrea Parsons, Parsons Professional Corporation and Sheila Radder, R.L. Graham Child Care Centre School Supervisor.

Parsons Professional Corporation donates a MIKEY AED to R.L. Graham Child Care Centre

Parsons Professional Corporation has been a supporter since we established The Mikey Network in 2003. One of the wonderful things they do each year is to donate a MIKEY AED to a location in one of their communities. This year’s recipient is the R.L. Graham Child Care Centre in Keswick, Ontario.

Thank you to Parsons Professional Corporation for your long-time support, and for making our communities safer.

Winter Heart Healthy Meals


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An important part of maintaining a heart healthy lifestyle is in the diet that we keep. With the cooler temperatures that Winter brings we tend to gravitate towards meals that are generally very hearty and tend to warm us up from the cold. These meals are usually very good for us, as they are often made up of many vegetables like soups, which provide us with essential nutrients.

Below are some heart-healthy recipes that we will use regularly during the winter month. Each of which was created for us by our registered dietitian, Marsha Rosen. We hope that you enjoy each of them as much as we have.

Apple Cranberry Crisp

Meal in a Bowl Soup

Miso Chicken

Tart Apple Buttermilk Cake

Warm Winter Fruit

Chicken Chili

Minestrone Soup

Zucchini Soup

Oven-Fried Sweet Potatoes

Corn, Potato and Shrimp Chowder

For more heart healthy recipes, check out the heart-healthy living section of our site.



Tips on How to Reduce Your Stress

There are stresses in each and everyone of our lives that can creep on us. This year, it most likely been heightened by the ongoing pandemic affecting the world.

Whether it’s in anticipation of a deadline while working from home, repetitive stress caused by one bad news after another or even the type that feels like it will never go away, it’s fundamental to consider the effects that stress can have on your long-term health, including your heart.

How does stress affect me?

When we face a stressful event, our nervous system is activated and releases hormones such as adrenaline and cortisol. Known as the ‘fight or flight’ response, these hormones increase our heart rate, breathing, blood pressure, metabolism and muscle tension.

The effect of putting our bodies on constant alert means we can become frazzled and worn out over time, and it can also have other detrimental effects such as weakening our immune system. Juggling multiple tasks and having a mind-set of “just push through this” can lead us to feeling overwhelmed, unable to sleep well or turning to “fixes” such as alcohol, smoking and caffeine.

Ways to Combat Stress

  1. Set boundaries: isolating at home? Setting boundaries could be as easy as having separate areas for work, for sleep and for relaxation. Rituals such as shutting down your computer and switching your phone to sleep mode during sleep can help separate your responsibilities.
  2. Make time for exercise: prioritise you, and aim for 20-30 mins a day of exercise. Walk in nature when you can, try to stand when you speak on the phone, or sign up to one of the many available yoga or strength training courses online. 
  3. Meditate: there is a lot of research available now around the power and benefits of meditation and incorporating a short mindfulness practice during the day allows you to switch off and mentally recharge your batteries. There are many apps available to help you meditate, or there are ways to be more mindful such as during your daily walk, taking time to read, or even doing chores like cooking with no TV to distract you.
  4. Look at your diet: you cannot expect to have long days, juggling multiple work and/or family commitments if you are not eating the right food. Start your day right with a hearty breakfast, snack on some roasted almonds for some Vitamin E and Calcium, eat good fats such as avocado and ensure you are having enough vitamin C from fresh fruit and veggies.
  5. Get more sleep: it is not enough to exist on 5-6 hours when it should be nearer 7 to 8 hours. Go to bed earlier and reset your body clock, ensure you have a dim room with good blockout curtains. Reduce technology an hour before bed as the LED (blue) light affects the sleep hormone melatonin which can keep you awake.

Reduce your Stress by getting Heart Healthy

Stress is an inevitable part of our every day lives – from trying to manage work, to trying to find time for family and yourself. It’s important to recognize and manage it because stress can significantly raise the risk of heart disease and stroke. It could lead to the detriment of your mental health such as depression and anxiety if stress is overlooked over an extended period of time.

Stress first develops in the mind but has huge repercussions on your body. Stress can take a toll on your physical well being, damage your heart health, and over time can increase the risk of coronary artery disease.

Sometimes it’s not as simple as changing a job you dislike, change your work schedule, or avoid difficult people and situations. Here is our advice on how to better manage stress:

Get enough sleep

Getting adequate sleep is vital for mental and physical health. Fall short on rest can take a serious toll on your energy levels throughout the day, productivity, emotional balance, and your weight. 

Avoid sleeping in on weekends. The more your sleep schedule alternates, the more likely you will experience jetlag-like symptoms. To make up for those late nights, opt for a nap during the day rather than sleep in to prevent your natural sleep-wake rhythm from being thrown off.

Get off your phone! Plenty of us are guilty of mindless browsing on our phones before bed. Melatonin, a naturally occurring hormone is needed to help regulate sleep and wake cycles. The light emitted from all the screens of electronics suppresses melatonin production. Try listening to music or read a book instead.

Follow smart eating habits

Cut down on the alcohol, caffeine and nicotine. These disrupt your ability to get good rest and interferes with your sleep cycle when you are out of it, especially if you have any of them closer to your bedtime.

Avoid eating large meals late at night. Try scheduling your dinners earlier if you’re planning on having a large meal. Your digestive system requires a time and energy to digest food which may be pulling you back from your body on concentrating to sleep.

Exercise

Exercise during the day for optimal results. Regular exercise allows you to sleep better at night and energizes you throughout the day. Exercise speeds up your metabolism and stimulates hormones like cortisol. Morning or afternoon does not make a big difference but working out too close to bed can make sleep afterwards difficult.

It can take several months of consistent physical activity before you can get the full sleep-promoting benefits. Just walking at least 10 minutes a day is enough to improve sleep quality. If you’re not a fan of intense exercise, yoga and stretching are great alternatives to help regulate your sleep.

Have any advice on how to get the best sleep you’d like to share? Please comment down below!