A cheat day seems innocent enough, right?! You eat super healthy 5-6 days of the week and then you “save up” for a day where you let yourself cheat by eating sweets and desserts. With so many people talking about how they work, is it bad to have a cheat day?
My short answer: Nope!
My long answer: See below 🙂
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It’s Another Form of The Diet Mindset.
In the Normal Eaters Club, we talk A LOT about letting go of the diet mindset. It’s key to helping you shift out of the restriction & good food/bad food mentality.
A cheat day seems like a good middle ground between strict dieting and overeating, right? (Because it’s technically not dieting…)
Wrong. 🙂
Having a cheat day just perpetuates the idea that there are “good” foods (meals you should have during the week) and “bad” foods (all of the stuff you let yourself have on your cheat day).
It’s a very sneaky form of the diet-y thinking!
We want to aim for ALLOWING all foods. There are sometimes foods, foods we eat often and everything in between.
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It Can Set You Up For A Binge.
When you force yourself to eat certain things at certain times, that’s setting you up for a binge later.
Why? Because it’s the Law of Dieting: for every equal and opposite diet, there is a binge. It is the nature of the cycle.
And when you “cheat”, it can lead you easily back down the cycle of not being able to stop binging.
I got an email the other day from a woman who said she couldn’t stop binging after a cheat day…
My first thought was “of course not! It’s a more subtle version of the diet cycle. Restriction will always lead to binging”.
Our goal is BALANCE…not “6 days I eat healthy and 1 day I eat junk food”. That sounds like pressure, rules, and “shoulds” to me 🙂
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It Ruins Your Social Outings.
What happens when someone invites you to a happy hour or dinner on a Friday evening, but Friday isn’t your cheat day?
You panic, wonder what you’ll eat, get serious food anxiety, & feel obsessed and worried about the social outing (that’s supposed to be fun!)
A cheat day creates this sense of isolation, where there’s no room for being flexible and going with the unexpected twists and turns that life can take 🙂
It can create unnecessary pressure to adhere to this strict schedule you create for yourself (i.e. “Sunday is my cheat day, so I can only have dessert then.”) That will end up backfiring because life doesn’t only happen on Sundays!
What’s funny about this topic is that my fiance talks A LOT about cheat days. (Hope he’s not reading this! 😉 )
He thinks they “work” for him. I vehemently disagree 🙂
I’ve seen him cycle on and off many diets over the years. A cheat day may have worked for a few months, but long term, it’s never the solution.
(*I’ve gotten off my soap box and stopped trying to preach to him. We’re all on our own journeys, right?!)
I just have to tell you that this hit home for me. I love it when you talk about your partner who is “dieting.” I’ve been going through this. My live in boyfriend has a habit of going on “health kicks.” He will stop drinking and constantly focus on preparing and eating “good food” for 1-4 weeks – it seems like his whole world is centered around this, in the process, I feel like I am not “good enough.” If I go to the gym four days a week, I need to go for six. If I eat anything or have a beer or a glass of wine after 9:00 p.m. that is what “my problem” is (i.e. why I’m not losing weight). I just want you to know that I’ve been following your path for the past month and I feel empowered! I haven’t “lost weight” but I haven’t gained either (I only know this because I went to two doctor’s appointments 30 days apart). How have you dealt with your partners dieting? Thanks, Michelle
I’m so glad, Michelle! As I’ve strengthened my own knowing that dieting doesn’t work and that I need to find what works for ME, I let him be on his journey without criticizing him for it. It’s sometimes difficult with making dinners, but I’ll just add a carb (rice, pasta, bread, etc) if he is on a kick where he isn’t having that. Above all else, remember that we are all on different paths. And just because your boyfriend is on the kick he’s on, doesn’t mean that is what would work for you! (I also try to remind myself of the big picture where I’ve seen him go on and off different diets…we want long term “success”, not short term gains!)