When a Cheat Meal Isn't a Cheat Meal
by
, 11-25-2007 at 10:13 PM (1385 Views)
WHEN A CHEAT MEAL IS NOT A CHEAT MEAL
...but a binge-fest. That's right! There's a fine line between eating what you want and eating all you want. Now, I am on a strict diet, even for my PCT: eating clean six times a day, keeping my macros in check, taking my ancillaries to make sure I retain as much LBM as possible. But every Sunday I get a little loose. It is the day I eat whatever I'm craving that particular week, and it somehow always ends up being ice cream.
Not this past week. On Wednesday, I had the sudden urge for donuts; generous wallops of chocolate icing oozing atop soft doughy pillows with holes in the middle. Wait till this Sunday, I said to myself, and went on with my life. On Thursday I somehow had bad cravings for cheesecake; those rich slabs of cream cheese and golden caramel. This Sunday, I said to myself, and went on with my life. Then, on Saturday, the anticipatory craving for ice-cream reared its ugly head. Tomorrow, I said, and continued with my life.
So it's Sunday and I'm looking forward to my cheat meal, which was lunch. I had my breakfast and took off to the supermarket to get all my craving supplies: Half a dozen of cinnamon and chocolate glazed donuts, a carton of Haagen Dasz chocolate ice-cream and two generous slices of caramel cheesecake. I get home in time for lunch and I'm looking at all three things and I'm like, "Holy $hit, I can't have all of this!!!" I decided to take a small serving of everything; a small scoop of ice-cream, one donut and half a cheesecake, thought I to myself.
10 minutes later, 3 donuts were gone, half the carton of ice-cream and two cheesecakes. And then, as I was about to reach for my fourth donut, an unexpected phone call from a friend woke me up to my senses!! What happened!? How could I eat all that? 2000 calories of sugars and saturated fats! Arrrgh! I wanted to punch something, but instead ended up light headed from the sugar rush. This is the weird part: It was almost as if my body just shut off my mind and went on autopilot. You know, that same shocking sensation after you've driven home from work lost in thought; you get into the house and all of a sudden wonder how the hell you managed to drive home and not remember any of it. Man, the last time I lost it like that was back in '04 when I did my first cutter. I was so carb depleted, my cheat meal, which was a humble Snickers bar, turned into a binge-fest of 9 candy bars!
And here I thought I was big on self-control! I'm officially scared of my own mind now. I mean, I've stared into the jaws of gluttonous temptation and conquered that demon years ago, but this! This was another beast all together. My mind is evolving; it's found a way to circumvent my conscious control centers and completely render it useless. How the hell do I overcome that!
Then, this morning, as I drove to work, I got smart. It was so simple: I just have to arrange everything one day before hand. On Saturdays, I will get all my craving foods and portion them out on a plate and keep it; I will toss the rest (except the ice cream: how can anyone throw away something precious like that!), or give it to one of my friends or neighbors or something. Then, I won't be able to binge on my cheat meal even if my subconscious decides to take over: Haha sucker, you can't eat what's not there! I figured you out, my devious little mind, and next Sunday you're gonna find out you're not the boss of me! Then I got to a really disturbing thought: How the hell did I drive all that way to work without even remembering starting the car!?
MORAL OF THE STORY: Self-Control has an ugly twin, and it's called Auto-Pilot.
Rant over,
Insane