Cupcakes and cheat days

I had my cupcake on Saturday, and I do believe it was the most delicious cupcake I've ever tasted. Just as I'd fantasized, the cake part was white and the icing was pink and fluffy. It was pretty big, too. I had to cut it in half to eat it. Just writing about it is getting me pretty excited.

Saturday was my cheat day. I started having a weekly cheat day a few months ago because I was beginning to feel deprived with the whole "diet" thing. I didn't want it to turn into one of those things where I'd be perfect for so long that one day I'd just snap and gain back 90 pounds in one day. I know that can't actually happen, but for now I live in fear of it.

So for a while, I had a whole day where I pretty much ate whatever I wanted. Typically, there would be a gain of 1-2 pounds the next day due to all the salt and water retention, and I was okay with that. Then, in September/October I hurt my back and couldn't work out, but I continued to have the cheat days. A temporary gain of 1-2 pounds would turn into 4-5 pounds, and not all of it would always come off. That was scary and counter-productive.

I switched to a weekly cheat meal, rather than a whole day, because that seemed more reasonable. There are some definite drawbacks, though. For example, when you eat pretty much all healthy stuff all week, you really look forward to that one meal. There's so much you want to have... Mexican, a burger and fries, cheesecake, etc. It's so difficult to focus on one thing.

Anyway, so Saturday we went to The Mixx where I had my perfect cupcake. I also had a salad they call the "Heath Nut." It has greens, grilled salmon, red onions, walnuts, and soy nuts, with a low-fat pear and ginger vinaigrette. It was really good, and I know nuts are supposed to be "good fat." However, the sheer amount of nuts they put in, combined with the salmon and other stuff, leads me to believe that the salad alone was around 600 calories. So I basically used my cheat meal for a salad and a cupcake. Kind of depressing.

So that should have been it. I should have stopped with that one meal and not had another splurge for a week. Naturally, that didn't happen. That night we went to Angie's cousin's house for dinner and a movie. She made all the food with recipes from Cooking Light magazine, and it really was delicious. Scallops and pasta with a creamy tomato sauce, a salad, some garlic bread, and sheet cake. Of course, I had too much of all of it, thus negating the "healthy" factor. On top of that, I had 4 beers.

It doesn't end there. Sunday I planned to make dinner myself, but the day wound up being a stressful whirlwind and the last think I wanted to do when it was over was cook. We wound up going for Chinese food, where I ate enough rice, beef and chicken to feed a small village. Oh, and crab Rangoon. When I die, please bury me with crab Rangoon surrounding my body.

All of this resulted in a not-so-pleasant number on the scale Monday morning. I'm pretty much back on track now, but this has left me wondering if I should be having a cheat meal/day at all.

I'm pretty sure no one actually reads this blog, but if you do, leave me a comment and let me know what you think. One caveat- please don't say something like "having a cheat meal every week is the same as an alcoholic taking a drink every week." I reject that completely. An alcoholic doesn't have to drink to survive. I gotta eat.