Is it inevitable that you'll pack on a few - or even more than a few - pounds over the holiday season? Absolutely not.

It is probable, however, if you eat like the typical American.According to the November Tufts University Health & Newsletter, Thanksgiving dinner - the granddaddy of all holiday meals - often comprises 3,000 calories. Tack on a few appetizers and drinks, and you can take the total to 4,500 calories, more than twice the amount that most healthy women need for an entire day.Because the holiday season is littered with other gut-busting meals nearly as calorie loaded as this Thanksgiving, a typical adult averages an extra 550 calories a day from that meal until New Year's.Three weeks ago, you read about another health-related holiday hitch: how the shopping and the decorating and the parties can keep you from exercising - and ways to keep that from occurring. Today, you'll read about some recent research that sheds light on how to stay light during the holidays.Don't skimp on sleepResearchers at King's College London reviewed 11 past studies of the effect of sleep deprivation on calorie consumption and determined that sleep deprived people consume 385 extra calories a day. Moreover, they found that the body does nothing different the next day to expend that extra energy.Add to that other studies that have linked sleep deprivation to impaired glucose tolerance and insulin sensitivity, and it's no wonder why a reduction in sleep anytime - but especially during the holidays - often leads to weight gain.A lack of sleep has also been linked to a reduction in impulse control, so going to parties well rested may be what you need to keep them from becoming pig outs.Drink more water, eat more proteinA study published this year in the Journal of Human Nutrition and Dietetics found that increasing water consumption during the day decreased the amount of sugar, sodium, and saturated fat ingested that day. Furthermore, the study led by Professor Ruopeng An from the University of Illinois determined that people who increase their consumption of plain drinking water by one to three cups a day lower their caloric consumption by up to 205 calories a day.If you increase protein consumption along with water consumption, the chance avoiding the addition of unwanted pounds during the holidays increases significantly. Not only do protein-based foods make you feel fuller sooner than those consisting of mostly carbs and fat, but research presently last month at the annual meeting of the Society for Endocrinology also revealed that one specific amino acid that gets produced in the stomach during the digestion of foods high in protein sends messages of satiety to the brain.Further research with mice and rats given that amino acid, phenylalanine, explained why. Administering phenylalanine caused the secretion of GLP-1, the hormone that suppresses appetite, and reduced the secretion of ghrelin, the hormone that increases the feeling of hunger.Combine this with what is known about the thermic effect of foods - that more than twice the amount of protein gets wasted in digestion as opposed to the digestion of simple carbohydrates and dietary fats - and you can see why choosing the lean cut of meat (in moderation, of course) is the smart thing to do at parties and get-togethers.Use exercise to offset the temporary increase in calsFindings of research presented at the seventh annual American Physiological Society Integrative Biology of Exercise meeting in Phoenix in November found exercise to be an especially powerful tool to use in the battle against adding body weight during the holidays.While prior research has determined that even one bad meal increases adipose tissue and metabolic abnormalities and that one week of bad eating adversely affects insulin sensitivity, protracted exercise appears to counteract much of that.In the aforementioned study, University of Michigan in Ann Arbor researchers fed four lean and active twenty-somethings 30 percent more food by calories than they would need to maintain their present body weight each day for a week. But the four subjects also exercised for 150 minutes during six of the seven days.Because of the exercise, these subjects did not display the markers to suggest inflammation of fat tissue while their rate of fat breakdown for fuel remained the same - and so did their degree of glucose tolerance. Such findings led the research team led by Alison C. Ludzki to conclude their presentation this way: "Our preliminary findings expand on existing work to support a protective role of exercise in the metabolic response of adipose tissue to brief periods of overeating."