Hail to the Cheat!

    Infidelity gets a bad wrap.  Now ladies, don't take that the wrong way.  I'm not telling you to kick your husband to the curb and go have wild sex with the pool boy (who has a pool boy anyway?) .  Cheating on your spouse is not cool.  But sometimes, cheating on your diet can be the best thing for you. 
      Sometimes, we get so wrapped up in the "I can't have its" that we actually do ourselves a disservice.  When we don't allow for some flexibility in our eating habits, we encourage cravings, binging, and ulitmately failure. 
     Now, common sense ought to tell you that if you cheat daily, you will never be able to reach your weigh loss goals.  You can't eat a Big Mac every day and expect to lose weight.  However, you can work an occasional "free pass" into your diet and stay on track. 
     This is what I suggest.  Determine your magic number.  Do your research.  Decide how many calories you should be eating each day and how many you should be exercising away.  This number will vary based on your current height, weight, age, activity level, and weight loss goals.  Stick to this goal six days a week.  On the seventh day, allow yourself one meal to have whatever you want.  Seriously.  If you want a chimichanga and a margarita, have it.  If you want a deep fried Twinkie shove it in.  (Well, Twinkies may not be an option anymore--but you get the drift.)  Here is why this works:  When you contol what you eat through the week and then control your cheating, you are actually setting up a situation where you can say to yourself, "I can deny my self X today because I know that I can have Y on Saturday (or whenever you choose)."  This really helps motivate me. 
    Also, special occasions can be counted as mini dieting vacations.  For example, I went to Chicago this weekend.  During our trip, we went to a swanky five star restaurant.  I'm sorry but if I'm going to pay upwards of 50 dollars for a meal, I'm going to have whatever the heck I want---AND--I'm not going to feel guilty about enjoying it either..  The key here is to choose what counts as a special occasion.  Your dog's birthday or Arbor Day probably shouldn't make the list.  Christmas, Thanksgiving, and vacation probably should.  You need to decide what is important to you and make your decisions from there. 
      The bottom line is that controled cheating actually makes it easier for me to stick to my diet.  It keeps me from feeling deprived and giving up.  Food should not be seen as the enemy.  Controled cheating keeps food on my friends list.

These lamb chops were damn good---and I'm not ashamed!