Give up cheat days and weekend binges so that you can have sustainable weight loss (while still eating delicious food!)

It’s become increasingly popular for people to eat super “clean” during the week and then eat whatever they want on the weekends. We call them cheat days. The day where you don’t have to think about food or its consequences and you can do whatever you want. Even I went through this phase when I first started my health journey! But after I learned how our bodies process food, I realized that cheat days or weekend binges are usually what’s stopping people from losing weight. 

Why do people even do cheat meals or weekend binges if it causes weight gain? Because traditional dieting restricts us so much that we can’t stick with it long term! We can only eat broiled chicken breasts, broccoli, and brown rice for so many days before we go insane. So we tell ourselves that if we stick with our diet for X number of days, then we will get a reward.

But, what if we flipped the whole system around and ate food that we liked and nourished our bodies? What if you didn’t need cheat days because you got to eat food you enjoyed daily? Flexible dieting allows you to eat fun foods and get nutritious foods on a personalized plan that helps you lose weight. Here’s how it works.

Cheat days or weekend binges set your progress back

Cheat days actually have a purpose. A short spike in calories can help to kick up your metabolism. The problem is that cheat days are being overused and used in the wrong way! In the end, it’s setting your weight loss journey back, not helping propel it forward.

Our bodies crave consistency. When we overeat or undereat our bodies have the same response: gain weight. When we overeat, we can’t burn all the fuel we’re giving our bodies. When we undereat, our bodies hold onto the fuel because it isn’t sure when it will get more fuel. If we want to lose weight, we need to give our bodies a consistent amount of fuel. 

When you do a cheat day every week, you’re essentially telling your body that you’re going to starve it for five or six days, then you’re going to give it as much food as you can. So your body holds onto the small amount of food all week just waiting for the influx. Then once it gets the influx, it holds onto so that it has energy until the next cheat day.

If you want to lose weight, then you need to be consistent with the amount of food you eat. When you are consistent your body releases and uses the fuel (aka food) because it knows that it will get what it needs the next day. This is why when my Macros Made Easy clients start adding more food or more carbs into their diets they see weight loss! 

Change your mindset around food for weight loss

Weight loss is 80% mindset and 20% nutrition. If you want to be successful in weight loss, then you have to tackle the stories you’re telling yourself about food. This applies to cheat days too. 

To be 100% honest, I hate the phrase “cheat day” or “cheat meal.” If you have to cheat on your nutrition, then it’s not sustainable! And we know that unsustainable diets keep us not only in the diet hamster wheel, but they mess up our relationship with food.

Most of us have been raised with a good foods vs bad foods mindset. Depending on the diet fads that were happening when you were a kid or what your parents told you about food, you’ve most likely villainized food in one shape or form.

The two groups that have taken the brunt of this are carbs and fats. How many times have you tried a low-carb or low-fat diet only to give up because it was too hard? Our bodies are meant to eat protein, fat and carbs! That’s why we can’t give them up cold turkey!

Every time you “failed” at that diet you made it mean something about yourself. “I’m not disciplined enough.” “I will never be able to do it.”

Then you held onto these as truths when in reality, you didn’t fail! Your body couldn’t keep up with an unrealistic expectation.  

Until we can change how we look at food and how we feel about it we’re destined to repeat it! You have to let go of the hold that food has on your mind so that you can see real weight loss and a healthy relationship with food when you’re done with the “diet” process.

In my Macros Made Easy Program mindset is one of the top priorities. We talk about the holds that food has on us, why we feel that way about it and how to change it so that we can move forward with our journey and not need cheat days!

Flexible dieting allows you to eat delicious food and lose weight

The best way to ditch cheat days and the restrictive mindset is to simply stop restrictive diets! When you can enjoy delicious food that you love any day of the week, you won’t feel the need to “cheat” anymore!

The purpose of macro tracking or flexible dieting is to create a balanced diet. A balanced diet has protein, fat and carbs in it! You don’t cut any macronutrients out. However, you do eat different amounts of each macro so that you can leverage them to lose weight, build muscle or anything else your body needs!

The other reason macro tracking is great is that it creates consistency in your body. As we talked about before, your body needs that consistency so that it doesn’t store more food than it needs. When you hit your macro goals every day, you set your body up for success!

However, the best part of macro tracking is that it gives you complete freedom with the foods you eat. There aren’t meal plans. So you don’t have to eat foods you hate just because they’re healthy. You don’t cut out food groups. So you can still enjoy a bowl of ice cream! You simply learn how to eat the foods you love in healthy quantities.  

If you’re ready to stop bouncing back and forth between healthy eating practices and unhealthy eating practices, then let’s chat. We can take a look at where you’re at and create a plan that will take you where you want to go, together.

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