How to not sabotage results with a cheat day
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@Raegold Which comes first the binge eating or the diabetes. Between you and me,
I think binge eating is the handwriting on the wall for the diabetes to come. The appetite that will not be abated. Eating by automatic pilot and remote control. It's a driving force that has a life of its own. You don't understand it and you have no idea why it suddenly happens. For me, it was around age 19 or 20.
There's genetics and it does run in my family. My mother has 12 siblings. Only 2 of them don't have it. The oldest 2, my mother and her brother weigh what they did in high school. The rest of them, binge eating earlier in life and then came the diabetes diagnosis. My grandfather and all his siblings had diabetes. It ruined his life and the older ones all died waaaay before their time.
My grandmother's side. All long lived peoples into their 90's. No diabetes. No heart problems. No binge eating. I don't like the cards I've been dealt but I will continue fighting like hail against them. I'm not going out like that.
I was thinking about you said, the brain freaking out. That's the point and exactly where you want to be. Let the brain go cuckoo for cocoa puffs until it begins to settle down. I don't want you to go through this hail. You can turn this ship around before it happens to you.
Have you ever trained a dog or a horse. A mule. I like shelter dogs but they often come with some baggage.
There are dogs who will grab food out of your hand and gobble everything they can. Emotional eating.
You can break that dog from doing it but it takes patience and love and caring.
Pet parents and animal guardians are in charge of their health. We often treat our pets better than we do ourselves. I don't overstuff my animals because it shortens their lifespan. Wildlife moderates their food. No binge eating, no diabetes or obesity.
I'm not saying you're a binge eater or that anyone here is... I'm speaking only in general. If you can prevent this cycle from really taking hold and taking over your life you'll be so much further ahead of the game. You can prevent all of this.
Don't start none. Won't be none.
Measure your ice cream. Sit with it. Eat it. The kitchen is closed. Ride it out. Your brain will not like it. On a one day at a time basis you can win this battle.1 -
Oh also, to answer the question of how I came to 1300/1350 calories per day, that's basically taking my 1400-1500 per day and subtracting a little so I can have one day per week at 2000 calories. I've always done better with weight loss when I have at least one day with higher calories, I have felt like it prevents plateaus
What got you to 1400-1500 per day? Just want to make sure we are the proper ball park...
TDEE is about 1900-2000 so I subtracted 500 daily for a 1 lb loss per week-ish. I'm quarantining with my two kids, so I don't always have a lot of exercise, it just depends, but my fitbit usually says I'm around 2000 calories
Gotcha!1 -
You could also tinker with your deficit. With 5 - 10lbs to go lowering it to 1/2lbs per week loss would give you more flexibility...0
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I think maybe I need to think more about how I have been wording things and "cheat meals/days". I definitely appreciate what everyone said, because I can see how that isn't really a mentally healthy attitude. I DEFINITELY struggle with binge eating- not like pathologic or insane amounts of food, but for example, I want to eat the entire pint of ice cream. Like I don't want just a 1/2 cup serving, I want the whole thing. Which I don't think is that uncommon but also it's probably more than is necessary and ends up being 900-1000 calories in one sitting. So I guess the question really is, can I have one serving of ice cream, which I could fit into my calories, or will that be extremely difficult to do mentally.
This is a bit of a tangent, but I'm going to toss it in. Brains and habits are weird things, idiosyncratic. Ditto for strategies that interrupt those habits. Sometimes what helps one person, doesn't help another, but sometimes it does.
Like you, I want the entire pint of ice cream (or more extreme yet, gelato). But bizarrely, I discovered that I can moderate the little single-serve cups. If I buy a quart of good ice cream, it'll be gone in a week. A pint can disappear in a day. Something about that opened carton calling? Dunno. But I've found I can buy several of the single-serve cups, open one, eat it, and let the rest sit quietly in the freezer for much longer. Between that, and otherwise just buying ice cream by the cone or cup when out and about, I can moderate ice cream.
So, dunno whether this specific thing works for you, or not. But - bigger picture - sometimes there are strategies that help moderate hard-to-moderate foods, while still eating some. Only eating a serving when out of of the house. Not keeping a treat in the house, but requiring yourself to walk to the neighborhood store to buy a single one if you really want it. Preportioning. An explicit treat budget/allowance.
Brains and habits are weird. Mess with them, as an experiment.
P.S. I don't believe in cheating either, in much the same sense that I don't believe in Santa Claus. It's an attractive myth. For myself, I do believe in calorie banking, especially now that I'm in maintenance: Eating a little under maintenance most days, to have a more indulgent meal or day sometimes. As long as I don't take a big daily cut in calories, and manage the intake averages over the long haul, it works fine, for me. Different things work for different people.0 -
So today is my "cheat day"- ie: now I'm renaming it my higher calorie day or "refeeding" day. So I'm going for around 1800-2000 calories. I'm going to be eating a normal breakfast and lunch and saving the calories for dinner, but we are ordering out from a mexican restaurant, and I just hate the anxiety around trying to track take out foods. Like I know we normally get churros for dessert, we each have one. In the tracker, the calories vary from 170-300something. I wish it was easier to estimate these kinds of things, and it's why I don't like eating out when I'm losing weight.1
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So today is my "cheat day"- ie: now I'm renaming it my higher calorie day or "refeeding" day. So I'm going for around 1800-2000 calories. I'm going to be eating a normal breakfast and lunch and saving the calories for dinner, but we are ordering out from a mexican restaurant, and I just hate the anxiety around trying to track take out foods. Like I know we normally get churros for dessert, we each have one. In the tracker, the calories vary from 170-300something. I wish it was easier to estimate these kinds of things, and it's why I don't like eating out when I'm losing weight.
As long as it's not a super frequent thing, estimate: It'll be fine. If the calories of database entries vary from 170-300, just pick something on the medium to high side of the range, and go with it. Then don't give it another thought.
If you're losing a pound a week, and you guess too low, you've wiped out a couple of hundred calories from one day, and will lose 0.9428 pounds that week instead of 1 whole pound. Whoop-ti-doo. If your maintenance calories are around the 2000 calorie average kind of number, you'll reach goal weight 2.4 *hours* later than without the 200 calorie "mistake". Whoop-ti-doo, again.
Y'know what? There were probably variations in your daily routine activity that amount to 200 calories on one day vs. another, that you don't even think about. (More errands, or harder housecleaning tasks, or whatever.) Sometimes those variations net you out a fraction of a pound faster loss one week, and a fraction of a pound less another week. It's too small a difference to notice on the scale, amongst a healthy body's normal water weight and digestive contents fluctuations. Same for food.
Really, there's no reason to obsess about it, or stress about it, or worry, as long as we're talking relatively occaisional things, and you try to make a good estimate, maybe err a little on the high side out of concern. Even doing this once or twice a week, not worth stressing over. As long as you're not one of those people who picks the lowest calorie name-matching item in the database and thinks they're winning - which doesn't sound like you, frankly - sometimes you'll estimate some things high, sometimes you'll estimate some things low. Even in the course of the one meal, it'll tend to average out pretty close to correct - plenty close enough for managing calorie counting. Over many weeks and months, the averaging is likely to come even more powerfully close because of overs'n'unders in clear-eyed honest estimates.
Don't let it stress you. Estimate as well as you can, then go on with life. As you see this play out over weeks, you'll learn that this is OK, and get calmer about it in the process.
Don't start down the road of stress and compulsion, about needing every little thing to be exactly exact, of cutting enjoyable things out of your life (restaurant meals, foods your friends/relatives cook) in order to get more accurate calorie numbers. That's not a path of good life balance, happiness, success. It's a baby step down the path of compulsion, obsession, isolation. Don't take that first step, it'll save later troubles.
Plan sensibly, enjoy your meal, estimate, best guess, log it, forget about it, and go on with life. Stress burns no calories, and causes unhappiness in the moment: No benefit.
P.S. I'm in year 4+ of maintaining a healthy weight, after 3 decades previously of being obese. I trust the process pretty well at this point. Really, the majority of our days determine the majority of our progress. Close is good enough. Things average out. 🙂5 -
I think maybe I need to think more about how I have been wording things and "cheat meals/days". I definitely appreciate what everyone said, because I can see how that isn't really a mentally healthy attitude. I DEFINITELY struggle with binge eating- not like pathologic or insane amounts of food, but for example, I want to eat the entire pint of ice cream. Like I don't want just a 1/2 cup serving, I want the whole thing. Which I don't think is that uncommon but also it's probably more than is necessary and ends up being 900-1000 calories in one sitting. So I guess the question really is, can I have one serving of ice cream, which I could fit into my calories, or will that be extremely difficult to do mentally.
This is a bit of a tangent, but I'm going to toss it in. Brains and habits are weird things, idiosyncratic. Ditto for strategies that interrupt those habits. Sometimes what helps one person, doesn't help another, but sometimes it does.
Like you, I want the entire pint of ice cream (or more extreme yet, gelato). But bizarrely, I discovered that I can moderate the little single-serve cups. If I buy a quart of good ice cream, it'll be gone in a week. A pint can disappear in a day. Something about that opened carton calling? Dunno. But I've found I can buy several of the single-serve cups, open one, eat it, and let the rest sit quietly in the freezer for much longer. Between that, and otherwise just buying ice cream by the cone or cup when out and about, I can moderate ice cream.
So, dunno whether this specific thing works for you, or not. But - bigger picture - sometimes there are strategies that help moderate hard-to-moderate foods, while still eating some. Only eating a serving when out of of the house. Not keeping a treat in the house, but requiring yourself to walk to the neighborhood store to buy a single one if you really want it. Preportioning. An explicit treat budget/allowance.
Brains and habits are weird. Mess with them, as an experiment.
P.S. I don't believe in cheating either, in much the same sense that I don't believe in Santa Claus. It's an attractive myth. For myself, I do believe in calorie banking, especially now that I'm in maintenance: Eating a little under maintenance most days, to have a more indulgent meal or day sometimes. As long as I don't take a big daily cut in calories, and manage the intake averages over the long haul, it works fine, for me. Different things work for different people.
It's not so bizarre - it's the Completion Compulsion. Like you, my brain sees a pint as an amount to be consumed within a sitting, or best case, within a day, but I can also buy single-serve cups and let them sit in the freezer for a while.
https://www.businessinsider.com/why-americans-eat-so-much-2015-1
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4105579/
‘In cookie consumption, compulsion is marked enough to stimulate a chuckle. On only one occasion was a fraction of a cookie left behind.'2 -
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Ok, OP here, my high calorie day is tomorrow and now I'm feeling nervous about eating more! I have the room calorie wise to eat some ice cream, but I'm having anxiety about the amount of sugar that is in one sitting. It's kind of funny how your brain can be used to eating pretty crappy, and then after tracking for 2 weeks, now I can't imagine going back to eating all of that. Also, it doesn't help that I'm a NP and so I keep thinking about my blood sugar and insulin spikes. Like a 1 hour glucose test for pregnant patients is 50g and the ice cream I want to eat is 70g! I really do think that ignorance is bliss, I need to just not think about some of this...0
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Ok, OP here, my high calorie day is tomorrow and now I'm feeling nervous about eating more! I have the room calorie wise to eat some ice cream, but I'm having anxiety about the amount of sugar that is in one sitting. It's kind of funny how your brain can be used to eating pretty crappy, and then after tracking for 2 weeks, now I can't imagine going back to eating all of that. Also, it doesn't help that I'm a NP and so I keep thinking about my blood sugar and insulin spikes. Like a 1 hour glucose test for pregnant patients is 50g and the ice cream I want to eat is 70g! I really do think that ignorance is bliss, I need to just not think about some of this...
I honestly feel like you are majoring in the minors, which is totally natural once you dive into the calorie tracking world of fat loss. Just stay in your calorie range, exercise, be consistent, be patient, and all will be well..1 -
Ok, OP here, my high calorie day is tomorrow and now I'm feeling nervous about eating more! I have the room calorie wise to eat some ice cream, but I'm having anxiety about the amount of sugar that is in one sitting. It's kind of funny how your brain can be used to eating pretty crappy, and then after tracking for 2 weeks, now I can't imagine going back to eating all of that. Also, it doesn't help that I'm a NP and so I keep thinking about my blood sugar and insulin spikes. Like a 1 hour glucose test for pregnant patients is 50g and the ice cream I want to eat is 70g! I really do think that ignorance is bliss, I need to just not think about some of this...
Keep in mind that for a glucose test, you get pure glucose. Your ice-cream also has fat and protein, slowing the absorption of the sugar. Don't stress 🙂2 -
Ok, OP here, my high calorie day is tomorrow and now I'm feeling nervous about eating more! I have the room calorie wise to eat some ice cream, but I'm having anxiety about the amount of sugar that is in one sitting. It's kind of funny how your brain can be used to eating pretty crappy, and then after tracking for 2 weeks, now I can't imagine going back to eating all of that. Also, it doesn't help that I'm a NP and so I keep thinking about my blood sugar and insulin spikes. Like a 1 hour glucose test for pregnant patients is 50g and the ice cream I want to eat is 70g! I really do think that ignorance is bliss, I need to just not think about some of this...
Keep in mind that for a glucose test, you get pure glucose. Your ice-cream also has fat and protein, slowing the absorption of the sugar. Don't stress 🙂
Haha, good point!!!!!
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There are days I eat too much. These are not "cheat" days because I am not cheating anyone. I don't get away with anything. The piper will be paid. It's my choice of what to eat. It effects my weight loss journey to the degree it does. How does one prevent a "cheat" day from ruining one's weight loss journey? By making sure it is only an occasional digression and by recognizing its implications.0
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I don’t do cheat meals or cheat days because I feel the connotation of “cheat” being a bad thing. And i am not a bad person because of what I eat. So instead, sometimes I just take time off from tracking. for me, it’s because I get weary of logging. Lately, I take sundays off from tracking. I give myself permission to eat whatever I want. And I have yet to eat an entire pizza AND half gallon of ice cream AND 2 bags of chips AND a milkshake AND AND AND. I am more relaxed, but I don’t eat everything. I still make reasonable choices. And I’m doing just fine. But I recognize that everybody is different. So what works good for me, might not work great for you. However, you won’t know unless you try it.0
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i have sweets every day. go ahead. look at my diary LOL when im actively trying to lose (as now)... i dont go over my limits and i dont eat back many of my exercise calories.
that said, if i have a random day where i do eat more, whether its a holiday or we are travelling and eating out more or whatever ... i dont really worry about it. just as i dont worry about it when we are on vacation.
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I find that for the best results with anything consistency is key, when you cheat you are really only cheating yourself. Stay disciplined and you will thank yourself tomorrow.0
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Take 100 calories per day x 6 days and add them to the 7th. Same deficit.1
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