How to stop ‘weekend eating’ holding you back

How do you play the weekend food and exercise-wise? Are you strict through the week with all bets off over the weekend?

Enjoying eating and drinking at the weekend without letting it interfere with your fitness and fat loss goals is a real challenge..

I know this is something I’ve struggled with. Along with pretty much anyone who wanted to improve how they look and feel.

Take Janet for example:

Every Monday she used to wake up regretting the weekends’ ‘anything goes’ attitude (which typically ended in a Sunday night food coma).

She’d start the week feeling lousy, bloated and prickly. But it was cool. She’d be super strict with her food and train like a boss all week.

Dude definitely ate too much at the weekend

How’d that work out for Janet over the long run?

After a couple of years of battling with this she was heavier than she’d ever been and felt bad about repeatedly ‘letting herself down’.

Dieting and deprivation through the week leads to rebellion at the weekend

Janet noticed that to the degree she knuckled down with the diet and exercise during the week, she’d seek reward for ‘being good’ in equal measure come the weekend.

This set up – while totally normal – was playing havoc with Janet’s progress. The couple of days of overindulgence at the weekend totally negated the 4-5 days where she was on it.

And it was costing her. She wasn’t making progress towards how she wanted to look and feel (despite training regularly). And she was mortified about the extra pounds creeping on here and there.

So she took action.

A different approach to weekends

Once Janet realised this routine wasn’t working for her she decided to do things differently.

• – She stopped trying to be perfect through the week. Instead she aimed for ‘good enough’
• – She still went out for dinner on Saturday night. Except she let appetite be her guide. She’d practice stopping when she was full (instead of mindlessly eating until the plate was clear)
• – She still had the Sunday roast, but if she wanted dessert she’d share instead of having a whole one to herself. 

While seemingly small, these changes cascaded overtime. Not only did Janet see a turnaround with her weight, she noticed she’d stopped beating herself up.

Instead of waking up feeling guilty and disgusting on a Monday she actually felt pretty good about herself for making better choices.

She felt like she was taking care of herself. Rather than staying in the negative cycle of depriving herself through the week and ‘letting herself down’ at the weekend.

Habit vs Disordered Eating

Now Janet didn’t have an eating disorder. She didn’t all out binge in a way that felt outside of her conscious control (This kind of disordered eating is tricky and generally requires the help of a qualified professional to work through it).

The weekend overeating was just a habit of a lifetime that she’d kinda fallen into.

Fortunately for Janet a few adjustments and a little support was all it took to break those habits. And pretty soon she was back to seeing progress and feeling good.

Where you’re at determines what you need to do

For Janet, these small adjustments were enough to get the weight moving. And more importantly to break the weekly cycle of ups and downs.

Depending on where you’re at on your health and fitness journey determines how much you’d personally need to change to see results.

So, I wanna wrap up with a quick question for you:

“What would today’s food and exercise look like for you if you were shooting for ‘pretty good’?”

Need more support and guidance?

Let us know if you’d like a little more support in changing how you look and feel. Request more info and we’ll be in touch to explain how we work, and learn more about you and what you’d like to achieve