Planned Cheating

So...

My DH and I have really been wanting to enjoy something we can't have on Ideal Protein.  We've been so good, and for the most part it hasn't even been that difficult to resist temptation.  We talked it over and decided that instead of giving in to random temptations, we should plan in advance for an off diet meal.  We wanted to make sure that we didn't end up blowing our meal on fast food--we really wanted to make sure it was something good.  So we came up with a few ideas, and even talked with our coach about minimizing the damage.  We figured if we have a "cheat date" every 1/4 of the way, that should be enough to help us get through.

Another thought behind this is that we want to make sure that the cheating is our choice--that we don't feel trapped into cheating when we don't want to.  We don't want to be pushed into cheating by well-meaning friends and family.  Nor because we didn't prepare our food in advance or we didn't feel like cooking.  We wanted to have something good, and be able to absolutely enjoy it.  No feelings of guilt or regret allowed.

So we did it.  We picked up our absolutely favorite pizza.  It was hot, greasy, and cheesy.  We found that our tastes have changed, and our wonderful pizza was just a mediocre dinner.  We overate a bit, but a lot less than we would have before the diet.  I even bought myself a small coke.  And it wasn't the same either.  It was just all right.

It's kind of funny though.  We felt relieved afterwards--like our fears of being overcome by the delicious carbs were just an overreaction.  No guilt.  No regret.  A little disappointment.  But plenty of relief.

We were careful not to have restricted food items that day or the following.  I'm sure we knocked ourselves out of ketosis, but we should be back in it in a few days.  So far there are no other side effects.  I'm sure we won't have as great of a weight loss in the upcoming week, but that's okay.  We are in this for the long haul and we want to make sure that we allow ourselves the very rare cheat.  Next time it will most certainly not be pizza.  Instead, we will probably enjoy some sushi.

Anyway, I'm glad we did it, and I'm glad to be back on track again.