Can someone please explain cheat days?

i don't have cheat days.



i had plenty of cheat years.

Depends on the person you ask cheat days normally mean they eat uncontrollably or eat stuff they don't normally eat. But the purpose of it is to change up your calorie intake to confuse your body and hopefully help jump start your metabolism again. Also a plateau needs to be a bit longer than a week or 2, I normally think of a month or two as a plateau if I'm eating at a deficit and exercising and staying the same.

I would say wait 2-3 more weeks before you introduce cheat days, for me personally my cheat days are days I just increase my calories from my losing calories number to say maintenance number which for me is a 1000 calorie increase for that one day. And I only do it when I've been stuck for over a month or so.

Numero uno, cheat days keep us sane enough to stick with this thing, since never being able to go out to that fancy meal, or have a burger and beer at the bar or whatever can just be discouraging. Also, eating a bit more from time to time is thought to prevent your metabolism from adjusting too comfortably to the lower calories. You don't want to go nuts. It's more about sometimes eating as if you were just maintaining your weight. So, typically, you might go over by 500 calories, which is your daily deficit if you are trying to lose a pound a week. I do a cheat day once a week or so when I eat out with my honey or go to a party and drink some beer. It hasn't kept me from losing weight on schedule.

if its only been a week you have not hit a plateau. speed bump maybe..but not a plateau...

A cheat day varies from person to person. Everyone will give you a straight answer for what works for them.

To some, i cheat everyday cause i do not eat clean everyday. I may have an ice cream bar or a 100 cal brownie but stay within my net calories.

You can fairly easily *eat back* your exercise calories with a handful of almonds or nuts, smoothies and other calorie dense foods.

Try to do your best, but dont beat yourself up. Just stick with it... Patience is one of the biggest ingredients in weight loss.

There are several things that factor into cheat days.

1. The good thing about "cheat" days is that if you have any diet breaking cravings, it's okay to truly indulge and not worry about the calories, and by eating it on a day like that you eliminate the risk of breaking your entire healthy eating routine.

2. By having a cheat day, you also have a much lower risk of plateauing due to the variation in your calories. Often times getting stuck on one number on the scale is due to eating a certain amount of calories all the time. If you have a cheat day you probably are running into a fitness problem if your number isn't moving.

3. Cheat days are dangerous if you don't think you can stop. For example, if you are kicking diet butt by not having a cheat day and fear breaking your diet if you have one.. then don't. Don't put yourself in a dangerous situation. I only have a cheat day once every few weeks usually.

4. Keep in mind that cheat "day" is kind of misleading. For me... it's more a a cheat evening or something. I might save my "cheating" for a dinner with the family at the end of the week. I had one last night.. my family lives in the city and I am scared ***tless of highway driving which I had to do.. and my eating a ton of sweets reflects that. I'm not worried though. After counting calories and what not I know I didn't eat enough to gain a pound, and the two pounds my scale said I gained is sodium.

Frankly when deciding to have a cheat day or not this is completely your call based on what you think you can handle. You will probably get plenty of opinions on the matter, but you know you best! Good luck!

Cheat days scare the crap out of me mentally, but I do them anyways. I have one cheat day a week where I do not log anything, so I really have no idea how much I'm sabotaging myself. My husband swears by them though and it hasn't seemed to hinder my weight loss so far, I usually lose 2 lbs a week even with the cheat day. I do, however, stay on a 1200 calorie diet on the other days.

its whatever works for you, I have a relax meal once a week, usually on a saturday, Its the one meal where if i want chips, i can have chips, or tacos or roast potatoes, whatever. i don't worry too much about my calorie intake although i try not to go crazy and counter balance it with some exercise most weeks, i find it helps me to stay on track throughout the week if i know at the wekend I can have that once something i really really crave. however last weekend I didn't have a real relax meal and I'm not planning on it this week either or next week, but that's only because it's my graduation in just under two weeks and I'm hoping that if i continue my low carb, low calorie regime throughout the weekends I can shift an extra pound or so a bit faster however I do not feel that this would be sustainable long term, it is only a short term, short cut to shift a little extra weight than i would do with my relax meals. that being said, I do also believe that a little spike in calories/carbs whatever you are restricting in your diet, once a week or so is helpful to weight loss and preventing plateaus as your body does not get stuck in a rut/ too used to your restrictions so quickly.

that's just my opinion, every one has their own, i would say, if you are in a plateau then why not give it a go for a couple of weeks, log everything and see what the results are, you may GAIN weight initially, but if you are like me, you may also then find that after a few days it will suddenly drop to below your weight before the cheat/ relax meal :-)

I don't do a fullon cheat day. I have a cheat meal which is a 2 hour period of time where I eat lets day pizza and boneless wings and have a hard apple cider or two and something majorly sweet like a home made dessert. I don't do full on cheat days because I end up with food hangover the next day which can be as bad of a feeling as the hangover from being drunk.

i don't have cheat days.



i had plenty of cheat years.

lol I love this.

I don't have cheat days, but I do have one day a week where I relax a little, normally after my weekly weigh-in, and if I go over a bit I don't fret about it.

I have this to look forward to, and whilst I know there are those out there who will disagree completely, while it's working for me I'll stick with it.

I'm up 3lbs from my highest loss of 116lbs at the moment because I've just had two weeks away on holiday following surgery and a close family bereavement, but I'll take it in my stride and I'm back on track so back into the old routine.

Good luck on your weight loss journey.