Weight Loss Tip: Weekly Calorie Budget

Have you ever had that one unexpected work dinner during which you ended up devouring 2,600 calories even though you knew 1,600 is the number you can’t go over?

What followed after is the ultimate “fuck it mode.” You realized the whole week is doomed and it’s only fair to label the rest of it as “I might as well enjoy it.”

Or maybe you went on a massive blizzard binge plowing through a bag of Doritos as if the apocalypse is imminent. The next day, you’ve been slaving on a treadmill to work all these calories “off.”

One way or another, you’ve found yourself in a situation like those. Something went sideways, not according to your plan and you ended up eating more than you should have. Still, you kept eating like an asshole promising the next Monday is the ONE.

Jilian, a recent client of mine, had her own struggle with that.

Jilian would have a work dinner every second Friday. She would go there determined to eat lean meat and salad but… What fucknut could resist having a piece of cheesecake when everyone around is digging it?

She would end up going over her daily calorie intake to the extent that it would wipe 2 day’s worth of calorie deficits.

That’s when I played my genius card to come up with the “weekly calorie budget” idea (masterpiece, Egis). Instead of tracking daily calorie intake, you stay within a certain number of calories by the end of the week.

Say, you need to be eating 1,600 kcal each day to lose weight. What if you multiplied it by 7 and got a weekly calorie target of 11,200 kcal?

This stops the “all-or-nothing” mentality to your diet. The “I’ve already fucked it up so I might as well enjoy” mentality. Here is how it helped Jilian and can help you.

Jilian used to overeat by 600-900 kcal during that work dinner. That’s almost two day’s worth of calorie deficits.

Once Jilian switched to tracking weekly calorie intake, she knew that even if she overeats by 800 kcal on Friday, she can still stay within her calorie deficit by the end of the week. She just needs to eat less on Saturday and Sunday. She doesn’t need to say “screw it!” and gobble down every cheesecake she can get her hungry fingers on.

If she kept tracking daily intake, she would have thought “Shoot… I’m over my calorie budget. Fuck it!”. Binging beast mode is ON.

Similarly, imagine you have a stressful day at work and you don’t give a crap about food. There is no time. You are being buttfucked by deadlines… As a result, you end up eating only twice that day.

Totally fine. You have more calories left for the rest of the week which you can spend going out.

NOTE: “Weekly calorie budget” method is impossible without knowing how much food you are putting in your mouth. That’s why I’m a sucker for tracking food intake.

Not only it’s the quickest way to lose weight but it also teaches you proper portion sizes and helps understand how easy it is to consume lots of calories quickly. You will never learn more about nutrition than you do by simply tracking and understanding what is in your food.

So, I dunno, download Myfitnesspal app and go track the shit out of calories, maybe? (hire me to help you with that?)

I’ve written extensively about calorie tracking. Here ya go.

The whole “weekly calorie budget” idea came from me following flexible dieting for YEARZZZ.

Flexibility is the basic fundamental for a sustainable diet. It doesn’t matter if a crazy scientist came up with The One Diet That Fits For All if that diet is too rigid and zaps your energy two weeks into the diet (I’m talking about dumbfuck keto). A diet has to have some level of flexibility and long-term sustainability.

This article will help you with designing a sustainable diet plan.

Remember, nothing worthwhile in your life comes without serious and sustained effort.

So, learn to track calories. Enjoy eating foods you love with people you love. “Weekly calorie budget” might help you to do just that.

That’s about it. I’m going to eat my donut and then reply to hate mails from keto warriors about my last Keto Is A Dumbfuck Diet article.

P.S. Don’t you dear to leave without signing up for FREE Fat Loss Course