I’m so glad you asked. The term “cheat day” is firmly rooted in diet culture, which places food in “good” or “bad” camps. With very little middle ground, it’s easy to associate morality with our food choices when thinking in this monochromatic sort of way.
Black and white thinking
The only black and white talk I love around food involves cookies (if you’ve ever had a true NYC black and white cookie, you know what I mean). But honestly, categorizing foods as good or bad, healthy or unhealthy, sets us up for moral highs and lows that should never be associated with eating. Whenever I have a client who confesses to being “bad” or “cheating” on their diet, often in the guilty way my dog looks at me after having an accident on the rug, one of the first things we work on is food neutrality. Putting all foods on a neutral playing field – that’s right, cookies and kale in the SAME category – can help free up a lot of the brain space we use worrying about eating or not eating certain foods. It also helps take away the all or nothing thinking that often causes us to overeat or binge when having a meal or day deemed as “cheating.”
Bingeing and “cheat days”
Overeating or bingeing on a cheat day or meal not only results in excess calorie intake, but is often followed by feelings of guilt and shame that typically lead to another period of rigid dietary restriction. A recent study looking at common factors in those engaging in cheat meals and those with eating disorders such as binge eating found precipitating factors of both behaviors to be consistent – psychological and physical food cravings. These two factors often occur after periods of dietary restriction, which is both a symptom of binge eating disorder and a normative behavior in diet culture that is so prevalent today. Although dietary restriction and cheat days are a socially acceptable behavior in today’s society, the study associated symptomology to that of eating disorders. I can back this up with my own clinical experience over the years and confidently surmise that if disordered eating is not already present in those with regular cheat days, it is often a gateway to more disordered eating behaviors.
Focusing on a positive relationship with food
As a dietitian who often works with clients on healing relationships with food and their bodies, one common step towards making them a more positive one is to eschew the cheat days. Not only can this help you start to have a more food neutral mindset, but it can help take away the guilt often associated with cheat days or meals, and the restrict/binge cycle that might follow. Here are some things to try instead of “cheat meals”:
Eat a cupcake on a Tuesday - make it a point to enjoy a food you’d typically have only on a “cheat day” on any random day. Since many people plan cheat days on a weekend, this could be having a cupcake or a burger and fries on a Tuesday. By easing into the mindset that these foods are available to us at all times and they are more than ok to eat whenever we crave them, the power they have over us can greatly decrease. This often results in less overeating, less guilt and a naturally balanced diet.
Honor your cravings - instead of feeling like you’re “giving in” to food cravings and ruining an arbitrary diet (remember, this can cause guilt, shame and bingeing), honor them. Our bodies have a unique and specialized way of telling us what we need, we just have to be better listeners. For example, if you’re out at a restaurant and really craving a burger but order a salad instead, chances are it’s not going to be the most satisfying. Cue persistent thoughts about food, low-level hunger and crankiness until you eat something else. Honoring the burger craving can lead to much greater satisfaction after the meal and free up a good amount of brain space to think of more important things than food.
Think nourishment - nourishment is one of my favorite words to use with clients because it encompasses how we take care of ourselves both physically and emotionally. When it comes to food, this means that sometimes, the most nourishing choice we can make is to go for all the vegetables. Other times, we just really need a cookie. Both are ok, and nourishing to the body, soul or both when we need them. What is going to be nourishing to you one day may be different the next, so being mindful and open to what you need to best take care of yourself is an invaluable tool.
This might seem like a shameless plug, but it can be helpful to work with a registered dietitian who uses a “non-diet” approach if these ideas sound daunting or you’re having trouble getting out of the restrictive diet culture mindset. It’s our job to guide you towards a more positive relationship with food in a gentle and lasting way, no cheat days needed.
For more information on working with me, please visit my website.
Your text was very good and useful for me. Especially this sentences, “What is going to be nourishing to you one day may be different the next, so being mindful and open to what you need to best take care of yourself is an invaluable tool.”
I am dietitian too and I always says to my clients, ‘please you dont have to restrict of any food, you should your body, physological needs, so be aware of this and listen to your body’ :)
Thanks for your text🥰