“I’ve been so good about sticking to my diet throughout the week and really losing some weight. My problem is that my diet plan calls for a “cheat day” and I find that after my cheat day I have to spend the next three days losing the weight I gained on that one day! I’m only really making progress three days a week. How can I make better progress and still get my cheat day?”
Cheat days are wonderful things. By giving ourselves a cheat day once a week, we allow ourselves to rest easy in the assurance that we will get that pizza we craved on Tuesday and the chocolate cake we craved on Thursday. A cheat day is an amazing motivational tool. In fact, I don’t think there is one better (unless you consider Stephen King’s story “Quitters, Inc.” and quite frankly that is not a motivational method I would care to use!). But I digress. Cheat days are great. They ease our minds and they keep our metabolism revving.
Some of us really take advantage of those cheat days though. Yes, some of us crave more pizza and cake than others. When that is the case, we need to consider shortening the cheat day. You never want to eliminate the cheat day altogether because it does provide a necessary physiological response but you can cut back on the time you allow yourself to cheat.
On your next cheat day, consider having a breakfast in keeping with your usual diet and then starting your cheat day at around noon. See how that affects your progress the next day.
If that isn’t enough, consider going with a cheat meal instead of a whole day. Have breakfast and lunch in keeping with your diet and then cheat on dinner and dessert. This will still boost your calories and provide the necessary physiological response but it won’t boost your calories so much that you need to spend the next three days burning them off. After all, if you stick to your diet all week, you’ll only be able to eat just so much at one sitting, right?