Splurges?

Whatsthemotive · January 2021

Do you think it’s helpful or harmful to splurge?

rosebarnalice · January 2021

I treat food splurges like financial splurges: I "save" calories for a few days so I can "spend" them with guilt or regret. I occasionally willbl "spend" without enough calories saved, so I "borrow" from the future and them "pay them back" over the next few days afterwards :-)

Whatsthemotive · January 2021

Thanks. I was thinking that once you create the habit of fewer calories that a splurge might lead down a slippery slope.

AndreaTamira · January 2021

Helpful, for me personally.

I get pretty obsessive about stuff. While I want to loose weight I don't want to get crazy about it. Allowing myself to go all out when I truly feel like it kind of cuts that possibility down a bit.

That said, I question myself on my choices in advance: If I am ok with going over calories right now. If this short term thing is worth it to me. And so on. - Means overeating is (nearly) always a conscious decision. Sometimes it means I end up avoiding splurging. Sometimes it does not, but because I made it a thought-out choice I don't feel bad about it, either (avoiding the weird guilt spiral that can come with splurging and sometimes actually leads to overeating more because I feel like "it does not matter now anyway" or "well, that just proves I have no self control, so...")

girlwithcurls2 · January 2021

Overeating got me here in the first place. If I splurge, I log it. I don't really have enough wiggle room to bank calories for later, so I just make sure I log it all, good, bad or otherwise. I need to see the numbers.

AnnPT77 · January 2021

Whatsthemotive wrote: »

Thanks. I was thinking that once you create the habit of fewer calories that a splurge might lead down a slippery slope.

This is where it's really important to know yourself, and figure out what works best *for you*. It may not be what works the best for every single person. Doesn't matter.

I'm now in year 5 of maintaining a healthy weight. I'm a hedonist, and a rules-rebel. Most of the time, I eat a tiny bit under my maintenance calories. Periodically, I have an indulgent meal or day. Sometimes I eat up to 2 or three times my maintenance calories in one day. I watch my bodyweight scale, when it comes to timing and magnitude of indulgences. If my weight creeps up, I creep it down again. It works fine . . . for me.

Same basic process would set some other people on a bad course of overeating, more and more often; or the scale weight fluctuations from uneven eating would stress them into misery. It doesn't affect me that way, because I'm not them. OTOH, if I ate the exact same amount every day, no indulgences, my rules-rebel/hedonist would crack, and Bad Things would happen . . . even though a steady routine works best for some people.

While you're on your weight loss mission, experiment a little with different approaches. Pay attention to what you do and how you feel. You'll figure out what works best for you, I'll bet.

Best wishes!

callsitlikeiseeit · January 2021

generally speaking, I make what I want, fit in my calories. even if I'm over, that's okay and I don't think too much about it as long as I am under maintenance.

special occasions (such as my birthday next week, holidays, etc) I don't log, or log very loosely. a few days out of the year never makes or breaks a diet. I will make myself a perfectly decadent cake next week and enjoy the slice or two I have from it.

The problem many people find with having 'cheat days' on a weekly basis is that depending on your deficit, it can be very easy to wipe out a weeks worth of work in that day. And then they wonder why they are not losing weight.

cmriverside · January 2021

I'm exactly like AnnPT.

I have my daily calories set a bit under my required calories for maintaining my weight. At least one time per week I'll over-eat by about double my allotted calories. Is that because I've set myself too low? No, it's because there are some foods I really love which won't fit into my regular rotation and I'm not going to get into the, "Rob Peter to pay Paul," routine of borrowing calories and trying to make the numbers perfect because that would lead me to unhealthy (for me) numbers tyranny.

I just eat the big meal, log it and move on. I've been doing that ever since I started losing weight, and it hasn't affected my weight loss process. I try to be as disciplined as I can over most of the week.

fitpal4242 · January 2021

Not great, but only harmful if you use the splurge as an excuse to keep splurging and give up. If you acknowledge & log your splurge, then go right back on track, it’s fine.

Splurges?

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