Help! i want to have a cheat day but scared incase i mess up my diet!.

How often are you planning to have cheat days and how big are they going to be? It is possible to ruin things with too many and/or too big of cheats.

A potential way to go about it is to set goals and allow a cheat day when you reach those goals. For example, allow a cheat day every 20 lbs. (or whatever makes sense for your total weight loss). You may gain some back, but then you wait until the next 20 lbs. for another cheat day. This way, you have built into the plan that you can allow cheat days that won't ruin your progress because you have to lose the cheat day gain plus another 20 lbs. (or however much you decide).

chrisboyle1 wrote: »

mph323 wrote: »

If you log your calories daily (and make sure you also log your "cheat day"), you can see exactly what effect it will have on your weight loss. If you don't exceed your weekly calorie goal, you will continue to lose weight as expected in the long run (you'll probably see a temporary spike from water, additional waste, etc). If you don't exceed the calories you need to maintain, you won't gain any weight. If you exceed your maintenance calories, you will most likely see a gain in a couple of ounces which would be masked by normal weight fluctuations. Remember, you would have to eat about 3500 calories over maintenance to gain a pound. If you have an occasional "cheat day" you most likely won't see any impact on your weight loss over time, just be sure to not have them too often.

it's just the Chinese i'm craving, i doubt that will add up to 3500 will it? i've also read that your scales may say you've put on 3-4lb over night, but that could just be water weight and will go down? is that correct?.

Yes, that is correct. If you plan to have a high-calorie day weekly, I would advise you to save a couple of hundred calories daily some calories daily to use on your "cheat day" so that you stay within your weekly calorie allowance.

eta: save the number of calories you'll need to cover your "cheat" meal is a better plan. You'll have to estimate how many calories that might be by either going on-line to look up the calories for each menu item, or estimate using calories from similar dishes from other restaurants or in the MFP database. Guessing probably won't be anywhere near accurate.

If you eat more calories than you use, then yes, you can gain weight that day and it will slow down weight loss. If you eat a lot more calories than you use, then you can put you back to square one potentially.

It is, sadly, FAR easier to gain the weight back than we'd like. :-( But to illustrate it in ways that always made more sense to me...

If you are trying to lose 1 pound a week, that's about (-500) calories a day to get your 3500 calories deficit for the week. So let's say you have eaten your 'diet' calories for the day. If you eat more than that, to put it in terms of 'how many days of dieting did this erase,'


- 1 small hershey's chocolate bar (1.5 oz) takes back about 1/2 day of dieting.
- about 6 med (2 1/4' diameter) toll house chocolate chip cookies takes back 1 day worth of dieting.
- Carl's jr onion rings takes back 1 day worth of dieting
- large coke at carl's jr takes back 1 day worth of dieting
- Western bacon cheeseburger from Carl's jr takes back 1 1/2 day of dieting
- double western bacon cheeseburger from carl's jr takes back 2 days of dieting
- 1 large AMC movie popcorn, without butter, takes back 2 days worth of dieting. More if you add butter.
- 1 order of chow mein plus 1 order of egg fried rice from Panda express takes back 2 days worth of dieting.
- 1 pint chocolate Haagen Dasz ice cream takes back 2 1/2 days of dieting
- A medium buttered popcorn and a medium soda (at Regal) takes back a little over 3 days of dieting.

So, if you are having a little cheat, like a candy bar or a couple cookies, it may be worth it to you. Some folks might just do more calorie usage to make up for it, or just say that the slight slow down in weight loss is worth it because they will continue for longer with the small rewards every week.

But if you, say, went out to eat at Carl's jr, and then to the movies where you had popcorn and soda, you could conceivably gain back literally all the weight that you lost. :-(

I know some folks who find something low in calories that has a flavor they really like, to help with the cravings. Like a hard candy, or just a nicely flavored food that is lower calorie. I know some who will kind of have a, hmmm, sort of 'fast,' maybe is a way to say it? Like, one day a week maybe they eat less in the morning, so that they can have more calorie dense 'fun' food for dinner and really enjoy it, but still not go over their calorie budget. I tend to do better with not letting myself get hungry - snack all the time. Because for me, once I get that sweet flavor, I start craving even more of it, you know?

mph323 wrote: »

chrisboyle1 wrote: »

mph323 wrote: »

If you log your calories daily (and make sure you also log your "cheat day"), you can see exactly what effect it will have on your weight loss. If you don't exceed your weekly calorie goal, you will continue to lose weight as expected in the long run (you'll probably see a temporary spike from water, additional waste, etc). If you don't exceed the calories you need to maintain, you won't gain any weight. If you exceed your maintenance calories, you will most likely see a gain in a couple of ounces which would be masked by normal weight fluctuations. Remember, you would have to eat about 3500 calories over maintenance to gain a pound. If you have an occasional "cheat day" you most likely won't see any impact on your weight loss over time, just be sure to not have them too often.

it's just the Chinese i'm craving, i doubt that will add up to 3500 will it? i've also read that your scales may say you've put on 3-4lb over night, but that could just be water weight and will go down? is that correct?.

Yes, that is correct. If you plan to have a high-calorie day weekly, I would advise you to save a couple of hundred calories daily to use on your "cheat day" so that you stay within your weekly calorie allowance.

All this. If you’re going to do this weekly-do save some calories every day to allow for it.

Unless you plan to eat only your Chinese on your cheat day (and not 2-3 kinds and not deep fried and....)-you could very well be far over your goal enough to significantly reduce (maybe even eliminate) your weekly deficit. Calories dense foods (like Chinese and cookies) add up quickly.

Maybe log what you want to eat on your cheat day and see what the numbers say?

FWIW-I eat lower 6 days a week and have one higher calorie day. But it’s all very measured and calculated because I could easily blow away my entire weekly deficit on my higher day-without even trying. Even my higher day is pretty restrained and I don’t go over my weekly allowance.

chrisboyle1 wrote: »

vanityy99 wrote: »

I had a three week cheat days when I went on vacation and guess what??? It was just water weight that I gained and it went away within a week or so when I went back to my diet routine.

It stalled my process definitely but I was tripping for no reason. ONE day won’t hurt you.

Thank god for that! so if i do see say an extra 1-2lb the day after, not to worry it will go down in a day or so? what about if i continue with my 1200cal the day after? will i continue to loose or will it be at a stand still due to my cheat day?

1. If you’re male, you should be eating much more than 1200 calories regardless. You can’t possibly get all the vitamins and nutrients you need (at the bare minimum) in less than 1500 - and even more than that if you’re doing more than sitting on the couch all day.

Consider upping your calories to a reasonable level and you can probably include some of these foods you’re craving on a more regular basis so you won’t need a “cheat” day at all.

2. Whether or not you will continue to lose depends entirely on how many calories you eat overall. You can have a cheat day that’s 3k calories or 8k. Whether or not you lose depends on how much you eat altogether for the week (and how active you are and all that).

chrisboyle1 wrote: »

Hey guys!

I'm a new member here and new to the diet world. I've currently lost 5 pounds from 13st.5 to 13st.0 and i'm 5ft11, this is just under a week! i also used to eat like pig, seriously, not snacks, large meals! 3 a day maybe even 4 but i'm missing my junk food. I want to have a cheat day at the end of the week and my crave is for some gooey cookies and a Chinese takeaway (Special chow mein, egg fried rice and curry sauce) will this affect my diet? will this gain me weight in 1 day and mostly will this put be back at square one on the scales? i.e a wasted week of dieting?, Thank you.

You'd probably be shocked, about what they dump into the food at restaurants...flavor enhancers included....
Why not take your fitness journey as opportunity, and learn how to cook those things yourself.
It'll keep you in control of what goes in it, as well as calories and portion size. It's not as hard to do, and you'll find out that it won't take much time, either. You can create entire recipes/meals in MFP with all ingredients, and you only have to log your portion size for your meal...cutting out excess cheap noodles, rice....and don't get me started on all the corn syrup in the sauces...
It will certainly teach you to pack a whole lot of better quality food into a minimun number of calories, just by replacing ingredients.
You can easily blow 3500 calories on a single cheat day...I have seen my family do it. It won't get you anything, but regret.
Best of luck!

'Cheat' implies that you're doing something wrong. I hate the term cheat day or cheat meal. It's so judgemental and guilt laden.

All that matters is that for the most part you eat fewer calories than you make use of. If you maintain a 500cal per day deficit and have a chinese meal on the weekend that takes you dinner from, for example, 600cal to 1600cal then you STILL have a weekly calorie deficit of 2500cal. How in the world could anyone consider that cheating.

My advice would be to stop judging your food and start to manage it. It's not cheating, it's not bad, you're not a failure if you enjoy your food.

So ask yourself which you'd prefer. To enjoy a chinese meal (or any other food you are currently denying yourself) or would you rather lose weight at say 1/8th of a pound per week faster?