Cheat day... Good or bad?

Good and bad is what you make of it. But if you indulge in cheat days:

You're undoing some of your hard-won gains from the rest of the week.

You're spiking your blood sugar.

You're probably encouraging your cravings to stick around.

DorkothyParker wrote: »

(Licking a donut and putting it back on the plate? Stealing it?)

I'm not a fan of the term "cheat day" either, but as a concept of setting aside a day or a few hours to eat treats that you normally wouldn't, I understand it. Personally, I don't do it - I have a hard enough time lately sticking to my goals without purposefully adding a day where I eat at maintenance. I don't think it has to go hand-in-hand with viewing foods as "good" or "bad" necessarily. I always saw it as a day where I don't stick to macro/micro goals like I would on a normal day of eating.

I dislike the term cheat day because it implies there are "bad" or forbidden foods. During my TOM I may eat to maintenance a few days. That's the closest I get to a cheat day.

Based on number of podcasts and other information I have read, I believe that a cheat or free day is good for a number of reason but with limitations.
- your body is smart and if you stay in a calorie deficit for too many days/weeks in a row, it will learn and adapt to burn fewer calories each day.
- calorie cycling (cheat day) keeps your body guessing and helps you continue on your path to weight loss.
- Instead of only watching your daily calorie deficit of say 500 calories, watch your weekly numbers and as long as you are at -3500 calories at the end of the week you should still lose weight, even if you had one day in a small surplus(cheat day) and another day or two in a larger deficit.
- If you believe in the concept of periodizing your weight training then you will understand why a cheat day works. It should help you avoid plateaus, the same way you should switch up your lifting routine with various weight x rep x set rest to keep your body guessing.

I am currently experimenting with a general slow-carb diet with approximately 500 calorie deficit daily with 1 cheat day in a calorie surplus and one day of 18/6 intermittent fasting per week with a goal of 3500 total calorie deficit for each week.
I weigh myself daily to track the trend weekly and I learn from the trend line not the weight number.

You might find this interesting:

http://www.bodybuilding.com/fun/refeeds-for-fat-loss-the-science-behind-leptin.html

I eat about 500 above maintenance 1 day every couple of weeks. Basically, when I haven't seen the scale drop for a few days in a row. My weight usually goes up for 1-2 days, probably water weight from the greater amount of food, and then I have a "whoosh" where I drop 1-2 lbs under where I was before the "cheat day." I usually try to coincide it with a day where I'm running, so I have even more calories to eat, and will go often go out someplace that has calories listed and still has whole foods, like Chipotle.

A once a week "cheat" day or even a meal would be more than enough to eat through not just my deficit for the day, but for several days. I do have days where I eat freely, usually for special events like birthdays, anniversaries, weddings, holidays and the like. However, none of the come to the equivalent of one day a weeks. Probably 12 - 15 days in the year. I take these free days because it is a way to keep me level mentally, and I figure the time together with friends, family is far more important than counting calories. I always try to get right back to my calorie goal the next day.

I find it easier to stick to my way of eating if I do not take breaks. That doesn't mean there will never be a day when I go over on calories, or eat something that I usually would not, but it won't be for a whole day. Routines and habits work better for me than motivation.

I used to schedule cheat days, but it would often cancel out a lot of my work. I've decided to take a new approach to things now and I don't have "cheat days" at all. If I need to have something less than ideal healthwise I will do it, but I don't make it a habit.

I stole the idea of viewing those meals a "rare and appropriate " meal rather than a cheat from Penn Jillette. Same amount of bad for me, but psychologically it feels less like I'm doing something bad. But interestingly enough, those cravings that I was filling weekly on my cheat days before have now pretty much vanished and I can't really even think of a time in the past 3 months where I had a "rare and appropriate " not-so-healthy meal.

I eat whatever I want every day. No reason not to.

If you overindulge so much that you go over your weekly target you will gain weight so what's the point
If you plan your treat to fit into your weekly target it's not cheating

Acacia_Evers wrote: »

It depends on the person. Back when I was first starting, I would have a cheat day. That cheat day turned into a week, then a month, and the next thing you knew, I was putting on more weight. So to me, a cheat day is a no. I was also really limiting my foods. Now, I eat whatever I want as long as it continues to fit in with my calorie goal for the day. No restrictions? No need to cheat.

That's what happened to my cheat days too.

I have done a lot of reading and the common thought is that eating too far below calorie requirements puts you into starvation mode which means you store fat instead of losing or you exercise too much and don't eat enough. I still tried this approach by just staying at the calories required because it is good to be open to everything. But in the end, I think that they might be right. Then, I started to remind myself usually once a week or every two weeks that I can't lose any weight if I just keep eating below the calories required. So a cheat day is a fabulous thing because it tells the body 'hey, I'm not starving!' and it seems to get weightloss going again. This is my theory based on what I've seen. The above information about the starvation mode is all over this website and in fact comes up and