Cheat days : maintaining sanity or slippery slope?
I'm pretty good about letting myself enjoy a few treats here and there without derailing the work I've done. I used to do cheat days, usually when I reached milestones in my weight loss. It was enjoyable. However this time around I'm leery of continuing to use food as a reward. I feel it reinforces my unhealthy relationship with food, like in order to really enjoy foods it has to be unhealthy and lots of it. I will usually loosen up on Fridays and just go with the flow, no meal planning, calorie counting, structured exercise etc. For example, I'll have a cheeseburger but no fries, or some ice cream after dinner, but nothing too crazy.
What do you guys do? Cheat day, cheat meal or none at all?
My trick is to make it worth it. A burger and fries on my own in front of the TV? Screw that.
A beautiful lady, a good restaurant? Now we are talking.
Weight loss is a game of averages. It's what you eat sitting in front of the TV or at your office 99% of the time that affects your weight. Not the 1% of the time you are doing something social and special.
So use the cheats for the 1%. Not the 99%.
And life is too short not to cheat on the 1%.
So screw burger and (no) fries!
Go on a date with your husband/partner/friend to the best restaurant in town instead. And make a night of it.
It never worked for me for some reason. I tried it a few times and it erased any progress I made for that week so I stopped. Most people seem to have better luck with it though so it might just be a trial or error thing.
For me, it's mental. I have an all-or-nothing personality so I have to be completely on a diet or completely off a diet, and cheating always threw me off the diet, not just a little bit but completely. Fortunately, I found a diet that incorporates a cheat day each week into its plan so I can eat anything I want on that day and still be adhering to the rules of the diet, which means I am completely on the diet. Furthermore, the author of the diet even suggests modifying it to work even better for you as an individual, something you can stick to (as long as it works and doesn't trigger your appetite), which I've done, so even with my modifications, I'm still completely on the diet. Semantics, I know, but like I said, it's a mental thing!
Must it be called a cheat day? I call it flattering my taste buds.
In many cases, when on a diet, we tend to stick to meals which work for us. It's generally a go-to set of meals. In my case I just get tired of them and sometimes want to do things differently WITHOUT FEELING GUILTY.
I sometimes go for exotism, other times quantity, other times cravings (sour, fatty, sugary, spicy, hot, etc)
I don't measure the frequency by week.
And yes, it does it for me. No feeling of frustration.
maintaining my sanity, I low carb and every so often I need a break and/or I'd like some sugar. I don't do all meals for the day and I still avoid my big no no's rice, potatoes and pasta. I also get to have a beet...which is nice...If I don't eventually I go wayyy off plan and it isn't pretty...
I don't do cheat days because I can't jump back on track 9/10 times. Not worth it. I will occasionally do a "cheat" meal (though I account for it, so it's not a cheat so much as a treat), but nothing crazy, and then back on plan right after. Those are rare. I never do them when I feel I won't have control.
I've been thinking about this a lot lately. I think it comes down to confidence for me - there's a new café a couple of blocks away from me that looks incredibly inviting, and I've been thinking about going there one day to have a cup of coffee and a cinnamon roll, and take a book with me. As that is perhaps my favourite thing in the world. Am I confident that my body doesn't suddenly explode into a huge mass of blubber if I touch something sweet that isn't a fruit, and give up? Will a treat every now and then cause such a disastrous avalanche of fat that I will be de-motivated for life?
I think I might... not quite yet, but soon, be confident enough. Confident in my new habits and life style. Go to that café with a book. Have coffee and a cinnamon roll. I need to learn to do that, because I don't want to live the rest of my life without those moments. I still want to taste many different cakes and pastries. Perhaps one day I will even dare to touch my main vice, that is ice cream. I need to, slowly, learn this one.
When I was dieting I would try to do cheat days and it never worked. It always derailed me. With IE I try to make sure I'm enjoying every meal and avoid feeling deprived at all. I eat foods I love at every meal, no need for cheating. I don't like to participate in any activities that would incur guilt, guilt is not a valuable tool in my weightloss.
If it fits my calories for the day, I'll have a food item that I don't typically eat otherwise. I probably do that once a month or so, but I make sure to fit it into my day, not go over.
I don't recommend "cheat days" for my clients, or do them myself.
It makes ZERO sense to say that a food is "bad" and that you can't have it 6 days a week, but magically on that 7th day it is.
I advocate for tracking calories and macros, and making it fit into your daily routine. It allows you to eat what you enjoy, learn to control yourself, and realize that there aren't any "bad" foods out there.
Like some others here, I don't care for the idea of a "cheat" day. I tend to think of the times that I eat things outside of my normal daily foods as splurges. Generally a splurge is for an event (dinner out, holiday dinners etc). Sometimes though I'll plan a splurge into my day. Something like one serving of cookies or a bowl of ice cream in the evening. The rest of my day is planned to accomodate the splurge.
For me, splurges are neither bad nor good. I just need to remember they're extra special little treats. If I schedule them, they become part of the landscape and stop being special.
I just make sure my calories for the week average out to around what I want them to. If I go over on one day or two, no biggie, I'll make up for it another day. Obviously this can't run into a oh. I'll start on a different day etc. It has to be mostly on plan.
It probably works out to about once a week that I'll have a yummy dessert such as ice cream. I don't really think of it as a cheating though. If I'm going out to dinner, at a restaurant, I keep my calories low during the day and eat an apple just before I leave so I don't overdo it.
My trick is to make it worth it. A burger and fries on my own in front of the TV? Screw that.
A beautiful lady, a good restaurant? Now we are talking.
Weight loss is a game of averages. It's what you eat sitting in front of the TV or at your office 99% of the time that affects your weight. Not the 1% of the time you are doing something social and special.
So use the cheats for the 1%. Not the 99%.
And life is too short not to cheat on the 1%.
So screw burger and (no) fries!
Go on a date with your husband/partner/friend to the best restaurant in town instead. And make a night of it.
This! When something special comes along I don't fuss over the numbers or my plan, I enjoy it fully. But the rest of the time I stick to my plan or make healthy choices.
I also hate the term "cheat days." You cheat on things you don't respect. This isn't just a weight loss journey, it's a change in lifestyle. How do you expect to maintain it if you aren't respecting it?
Cheat days : maintaining sanity or slippery slope?
