Always cheating – does your plan work?

Cheat days!
Cheat meals!
Forbidden foods that you are allowed to eat once a week.

This is a thing now.

But why?

It’s simple really, the point of cheat meals is to reset your metabolism after a long period of lower calories, they are rewarding both physiologically and psychologically. Some people can use them very effectively but they’re not right for everyone.

The question isn’t whether cheat meals work, the question is;

When do cheat meals become disordered eating?

It’s possible to use cheat meals strategically, along with intermittent fasting and carb cycling with alternate day keto to achieve your desired body composition, but these are advanced methods of eating.

For the purposes of this post I’m not talking about professional body builders using these techniques to drop body fat for a competition. I’m talking about the all or nothing approach we take to diets.

It’s doing the 30 day no sugar challenges only to binge on sweets on the 31st day.

Wishing away the week to get to the weekend to earn the cheat snack of choice but struggle to put it down again.

Using the ‘cheat day’ as a day to reset their willpower by binging until they feel sick and thinking

“this feels awful, I will remember this awful feeling next time I want to eat sugar.”

Hoping that strategy will work
.
.
.
.
.
but it doesn’t.

Sitting on the sofa on Sunday night saying “Right! Clean eating starts (again) tomorrow.”

If this is you, it’s time to ask yourself:

“Is my plan bringing me results?”
Are you using your cheat meal/day/weekend to boost your metabolism and get the physiological benefits, or are you just fed up of hardly eating and feel that you deserve a biscuit?

Do you feel miserable all week until you sit down to that cheat meal and suddenly you feel happy?

Don’t get me wrong,

if you’re being strict all week and “cheating” at the weekend and you feel great, look great, your sleep is great, your energy levels are high and you feel on top of the world – excellent.

Keep doing that.

But if you feel moody, if your energy is low, if your sleep is crap if you feel like you’re getting nowhere then something has to change.

Just because cheat meals are popular doesn’t mean they are right for you.

If your current plan is one of fierce restriction followed by the unstoppable eating of junk food under the guise of “cheat day” and the scale stays the same (or increases) it’s time to change and find what actually works for you.

This isn’t about ditching one plan and jumping on the next popular thing. This is about listening to your body, finding out what works for you and transitioning into a plan that makes you energetic and happy.

The last ‘diet’ you will ever be on happens when you start listening to your body.

Are you ready?

Ainzlie “graduate of the cheat meal” McMaster