When should I cheat in diet ?

saynow111

I lost so far 7 kg I never "cheated "for about 1.5 months
Is it better for me to "cheat" ?

harper16

Do you feel like if you cheat you'll fall off the diet wagon?

lemurcat2

Don't "cheat" whatever that means. If you want to work in flexibility, that can be good. When I was losing I had a day where I could go out or eat whatever I wanted for dinner, so long as the day itself was no more than maintenance (estimated), and it worked well.

If you mean having dessert or something, fit it in your cals.

lgfrie

There is no hall monitor or diet cop, so there is nothing to "cheat" on. If you want to have a treat, have a treat. I think everyone has treats as an occasional break from hard core calorie deficit dieting, now and then.

I strongly, vociferously agree with @lemurcat2 's suggestion to work it into the calories for the day and ensure that the total for the day doesn't exceed maintenance. Depending on what your calorie deficit is, that could give you anywhere from 250 to 1,000 extra calories to work with, relative to your typical diet day. Maintenance calories should be the line in the sand with diet breaks. Count, log, and enjoy the extra cals, and call it a day when you hit maintenance.

I have come to believe that is the secret sauce, the critical success factor, of staying on a long term diet, in one simple rule. To wit: NEVER go over maintenance, at least not as a planned activity.

If you have a spontaneous binge, well, that's gonna happen sometimes too, but it's bad to plan for that. If it happens, it happens. You'll enjoy it for 15 or 30 minutes and then regret it afterwards; we've all been there. But as far as a planned break from the tedium of eating at a deficit, limit it to maintenance for the day and you're golden. Then it's just a "pause" - you haven't given a single calorie of your hard work back. Giving back the progress is the surest route to sliding down the slippery slope to a regain, imho.

Christmas and birthdays excluded. Eat whatever you want on those two days and enjoy every bite.

springlering62

@lemurcat2 is absolutely correct

Do yourself a massive favor. Get out of the whole mentality of “diet” and “cheat”. This is a lifelong plan. If you are creating a new you, you will need a new way of thinking, new vocabulary to match.

Diet and cheat imply temporary, and that just leads us back to wash, rinse, repeat.

We’ve worked too hard to get here, and most will tell you it gets harder to accomplish with each repeat. Why shoot ourself in the foot with casual thinking?

missysippy930

Who would it be cheating? Just yourself.
If you haven’t cheated in 1-1/2 months and you’re losing weight, why not just continue doing what you’ve done.

mkculs13

Are you craving something or wanting to binge? If so, plan to put that "something" into your calorie budget for the day or week (if it's cheesecake, you will need a week-long plan to fit it in, possibly). If you are feeling like you want a day where you can eat everything and anything, then perhaps you are over-restricting and need to add more calories to your daily budget and live more happily with a slower weight loss. I pay a lot of attention to my urge to eat everything in sight; it tells me to slow down my weight loss and eat a bit more each day. I've never tried a week-long plan, but because I want to have cheesecake on Mother's Day, my opportunity is coming. I think I'll my calorie budget by 50 calories a day for a month to "make room" for the special treat. Or maybe by 100 for the week before and after; IDK. But I'm planning ahead. And who knows--by the time we get to May, I might not want it anymore.

saynow111

Thank you guys 👍👍