Cheat Days

cross2bear

No cheat days but lots of planning - Fathers Day was a big dinner at my house and I was serving burgers and ribs, and an ice cream cake etc. I figured out all the calories (that MFP database and the barcode reader are amazing) and fit it all in. I knew ahead of time what I was going to eat and made it happen within my calorie budget.

AmazonMayan

You're only cheating yourself by doing a cheat day. An occasional holiday or special occasion is no big deal because that's part of a normal healthy diet (as in overall food eaten and not diet to lose weight). Keep it as an occasional day and don't make every celebration a reason to gorge.

Plan ahead. Shave off a 100 or 200 calories off other meals or days and then you have more calories to have something decadent for one meal...not an entire day. Plan.

Not cheating when you do it that way and you don't get trapped in the mindset of having a list of all these things you can't wait to eat (possibly binge on) for one day. The bad cycle of rewarding yourself with food for doing so well all week long can be vicious and slow down your weight loss.

alysontennant

I feel like my weekends are becoming cheat days and when i step on the scales come monday im back to square one i find it so hard to stay on it at weekends though?

jahillegas_51

I am totally against cheat days. When I first got into fitness, I did them too...because well everyone I saw did them. Over time though, this constant restriction of food leads to some unhealthy lifestyle choices and eating habits. What if you have two social events in one week? Do you restrict for both, have a cheat day at one or both?

In my experience, I started eating clean with (1) cheat meal a week. Over time this cheat meals, turned to days, which turned to every couple, until it was basically everyday. I developed an eating disorder with binging on all the "bad" foods.

There is no such thing as good food, bad food. Placing labels on food, leads us to ban them from our intake. We say, “No, No, No, No, No…” We push for the perfect diet, once we eat this food that does not fall into this neat diet box; we throw our hands up, saying we failed so now is the time to eat everything we can. This leads to punishment. Which leads to more restrictions. This is the vicious cycle we as binge eaters face. I used to believe it myself, that there was clean food and bad food. It simply is this manifested idea. If you ask a vegan, he/she will say animal based foods are not clean. Someone who is a vegetarian will disagree, and say it is just animal products that are not clean. Then a paleo guy runs in screaming about how meat is clean, but grains aren’t. So someone has to be right? They are all wrong. Instead, adopt my grandmother’s wise old adage of “everything in moderation.”

Cheat days make life much to rigid and inflexible. Chances are if you are asking this question you probably know what your intake is for the day, I highly suggest IIFYM. Its a much more healthy, flexible, and sustainable eating lifestyle.