Scared of getting fat???

Terrified that those Halloween cupcakes are going to make you put on weight?

I hate to frighten you, but they can!

Can you have your cake and eat it too???

Read about this wee metabolic trick to get around any Spooky Halloween waist expansion…

As of November 1st for most houses (especially those with kids) temptation is literally at the door.

There is no holiday quite like Halloween.

It is essentially organized and socially acceptable begging – but we call it trick or treating.

We dress our kids up and say “look how sweet they are – NOW GIVE US CANDY!”

 

By the end of the night, your kids end up with their body weight in chocolatey treasure to take home.

After the kids go to bed (if they go to bed after eating all that sugar) it’s time for all good parents to remove the temptations from their little angels – one for you, two for me…

So by morning the kids’ treasure trove has gotten a whole lot smaller due to parental ”safeguarding”.

 

It’s all in the little Johnny or Jane’s best interest of course – all good parents know that sweets are bad for their kids!!!

Even if you don’t have kids you always stock up on feedbags of snack-sized sugar bombs for those persistent little Trick or Treaters that don’t care if you’ve turned out ALL of the lights in the house in the hope that they’ll give you a miss (hands up, I do this – my bad I know).

And God forbid if you hand out something healthy…

 

I actually handed out walnuts (in the shell) one year.

Needless to say most of them were fired back at high velocity within moments of me shutting the door.

Bah Humbug.

 

All joking aside though I do truly love Halloween…. come along to the Million Dollar Fitness Halloween Coffee Morning tomorrow and see for yourself.

10.00am till 1.00pm.

Fancy Dress and there’s a Bouncy Castle for the kids (and adults too if it floats yer boat!)

It going to be a CupCake filled blessing of a day.

Don’t forget your purse though – we’re fundraising for Jamies Journie, a local charity for children with Cancer.

But on to the point of it all …

 

CHEATING. On most of the fat loss nutrition programmes I design for my clients, “cheating” is as mandatory as any other aspect. Every 7 -10 days, I would recommend one cheat meal.

My personal cheat day is Saturday.

Now it’s not just simply for fun,there is a good reason for intermittently changing your food choices.

There are 2 benefits to cheat meals you should be aware of: psychological and physiological.

 

Psychological Benefit of Cheating: I honestly think this is the more important one. Let’s say you come to me and say you need to lose a decent amount of fat. The bottom line is you do not get to eat the way you eat now, and look the way you want. The way you look now is a direct result of the way you eat now. That should make sense: regardless of training programming, the nutrition has to change.

Say you love Snickers bars (you could substitute anything …vats of pasta etc.) and you have one every day.

You know I’m going to tell you to quit it.

No more Snickers.

Well for you that’s just s***. But there is light at the end of the tunnel: Your cheat day.

Go ahead and have your Snickers on Cheat day. Cheat Day allows you a day when you don’t have to worry about carbs or even fat intake. You have a sanctioned day off. So during the week you can more easily forgo the crap you would normally eat because come cheat day it is all yours.

You are not depriving yourself as technically there is nothing that is not allowed.

This keeps fat loss clients relatively sane.

 

The Physiological Benefit of Cheating: Your body is teaming with hormones. Some hormones want to keep you fat, some want to make you thin. They are constantly at battle, and guess which one is winning? The deal is that your body is wonderful at adapting.

From an evolutionary standpoint that is awesome – from a fat loss perspective it’s a massive pain in the arse. Your body wants to keep fat on for many reasons – not the least of which is the famine that is right around the corner.

Silly body – there is no famine around the corner.

Well I wish it were as easy as just telling your body that, but it isn’t.

Your body’s main purpose is to ensure survival, and stored body fat ensures survival during times of restricted consumption. When we alter our nutrition to promote fat loss, we have to create a caloric deficit.

That means we will be eating less calories then we did before.

But your body is not stupid, it will see that the calories are dropping, and do whatever it can to slow and even halt fat loss.

Again, body fat ensures survival, and your body thinks it is doing you a favor.

Silly body – The body will alter levels of key hormones that will essentially slow metabolism and blunt fat loss.

 

One of these key hormones is leptin.

When calories are low, leptin levels fall.

It is actually a very complicated system, but, in a nut shell, if the body’s levels of leptin fall below a certain level, fat loss will cease.

High levels of leptin tell the body it is ok to give up stored body fat for fuel.

That is where the cheat comes in.

When you cheat you are essentially creating a short term caloric spike. The body responds very quickly to this spike (thankfully) and leptin output is increased.

The increased leptin levels will allow for continued fat loss on non-cheat days.

You can think of it as taking a half step back to allow you to take 2 steps forward. With this approach continued fat loss is achievable.

There is a fair amount of research going on about what makes for the best cheat foods.

Currently thoughts are that high carb foods work best.

Cool.

 

Alternatively, you just take leptin injections.

That should only run you about 2 grand a week.

Let me think …… 2 grand a week or have a Cheat Meal once a week…..hmmmm……

Conclusion: So now here we are, Halloween with all that sugar Mmmmmm….sugar.

Used strategically with a proper nutrition programme, cheating can improve your fat loss program.

 

My RAK today involved Donating.

I held a Pledge My Pounds Challenge for my girls at Million Dollar …. for every pound they lost, I pledged to donate £1 to Jamie’s Journie. Judging by the weighins so far, I’m going to be skint this time tomorrow.

YIKES!!

Now these girls all had to pledge a forfeit if they didn’t manage to meet their target weight and the coolest thing is that even though they smashed their targets, they still donated their forfeit

#TeamMillionDollar at it’s finest

Happy Halloween

 

Dee x

milliondollartrainer.com

PS – My 6 week Little Black Dress Challenge kicks off soon, jump on it <<< here >>>

Million Dollar Fitness Little Black Dress Challenge