I am not a big fan of so-called cheat days. And anyone with a history of addiction issues likely want to avoid this black-white pattern of planning their eating schedule as well.

Cheat days easily turn into binge days. And this leaves us in a mental state of feeling like a failure - we went overboard, we felt like we lost control and allowed our impulses to completely take-over. This is a red flag situation for anyone to relapse back into their primary type of addiction. Simply because our MINDSET is now one of "whatever", "I can't control myself" so "I might as well xyz".

When we honor our body's needs and cravings along the way, we do not need these overboard cheat days, that turn havoc on our mental sanity and also our physical health and completely crush any weight and appetite-balance goals whatsoever.

Cheat days that turn into binge days leaves us very, very weak with zero self-respect, because we are not respecting our basic needs, we are numbing them out still.

Also, the very term "cheat days" makes us feel like we are doing something "bad"; and this further separates us from our intuitive hunger and body's needs to feel satisfied - satisfied at EVERY meal. Every time we eat, it is a practice in honoring our needs - listening to what our body needs and then respecting those needs and feeding them according to it. Sometimes we will make some poor choices - i.e. a meal might feel too heavy in our body, or we might find that we need more sweet/salt/bitter/sour/crunch/softness in a meal to truly satisfy us; and the balance here is to figure out how to eat to meet those needs in a way that ALSO feels good in our body afterwards.

Every meal should basically be a treat ideally - but it is only a treat if it feels right to our body and we didn't numb it out instead.

The way we eat is a huge part of the way we are able to meet our own needs and other people's needs - it is a lesson that we can engage in several times a day, until we develop a mindful skill of intuitively knowing what we need to be okay.

Knowing that this is a practice and being okay with that it will take time to get back in tune with our body - and that, the journey of getting back in tune takes time, that is also okay.

The minute we try to override and cut corners, we lose the lesson of listening to the signals - allowing for them to show themselves.

Similar as to how our relationships with other people are - do we see the signs before it happens, or do we just ignore it til it hits us straight in the face? Nothing happens out of nowhere - there is always a build-up phase, and it is in this early stage, where we can mold the destiny of our future before it cements.