I didn’t wreck my diet yesterday, but I didn’t exactly adhere to it. One of the rules on the days that I don’t fast is to eat only once a day, or, if I break a fast with a very small meal in the morning, I don’t eat again until evening. I broke that rule both yesterday and the day before by eating a few small meals throughout the day. The whole idea behind intermittent fasting is to FAST for at least several hours to deplete glucose in the blood and glycogen in the liver so that the body burns fat for energy. Even if you don’t eat forbidden foods when eating a few small meals throughout the day, you’re not giving your body enough time to get to the point where you’re burning fat.

The problem yesterday was food availability combined with social eating. Because I had a gift card for a barbecue joint, I used it to buy some brisket, thinking that I’d spread the consumption of said brisket over the weekend. As you might guess, this didn’t happen. I didn’t eat it all in one sitting, but I couldn’t seem to resist having a second meal not long after the first, thwarting my plan of eating only once yesterday. Additionally, I went to a friend’s place last night, and she made a charcuterie plate, which I indulged in. So, effectively, I had three meals yesterday. I was not surprised to learn this morning that I hadn’t lost any weight.

I already wrote about the food availability challenge, so I won’t rehash it here. The social eating challenge, however, is something I’ve thought about a lot lately, primarily because this is how I packed on some of the weight I’m trying to lose. Self-discipline seems to go out the window when I eat with someone else. I suppose part of that is because I don’t want to make someone else feel uncomfortable by declining food offerings, but most of it seems to be thinking that it’s all right to abandon my diet when I’m eating with someone else. Maybe it’s a bonding thing?

I should point out that most of the social eating I’ve done in the past two years has been with this one particular friend. Unfortunately, we are both sugar fiends, so when we get together (at least until recently), we typically indulge in ice cream or chocolate (or some sort of sweet treat) regularly. I actually got into baking because this friend regularly cooked for me and it was my job to supply dessert. As a result, we’ve actually gained weight together; we’ve propelled each other into chunkiness. For her, this has been extremely distressing. She’s a gorgeous girl who was at her ideal weight when I met her and now she, too, is trying to lose weight. We really went off the rails during the holidays these past two years due to our mutual fondness of all things pumpkin-flavored. Whole Foods sells incredible pumpkin ice cream sandwiches starting in November, for example. I shudder to think of how many boxes of those things we consumed.

Anyway, since tomorrow is a fasting day, it’ll be an opportunity to get back on track. I’m thrilled to have lost ten pounds in the past week, but I lament the fact that it could have been more. I try not to engage in all-or-nothing thinking, however, especially when it comes to breaking bad habits. Mistakes will be made. The key is not to give up just because of a mistake here and there. Quitting bad eating habits is like quitting any bad habit: you have to keep trying to quit. If you slip up one day, you have to start quitting (the bad habit, not the diet) again the next day. Perseverance.