Balance is the key to life, and with your diet this hold especially true. However many of us do not live true to this; we go through the week good as gold, patting ourselves on the back for our amazing cooking prowess and will power, only to arrive at the weekend and unleash our inner fattie.
On the weekend anything and everything goes. The food options that you would never even consider during the week become the only logical option on the weekend. Pub meals, takeaway pizza, indian or a cheeky kebab- often accompanied with a alcoholic beverage or two. We justify this to ourselves, because it’s the weekend and we deserve it, we were good all week!

Unfortunately the body doesn’t store fat or build muscle based on the excuses you tell yourself. All your body understands is the food coming in and what it needs to do to absorb and use the fuel you have supplied it with. It doesn’t nod wisely and put aside the large thick crust pizza for later in the week when you are doing a hard gym session.

In order to lose weight you need to be in deficit calories, especially on your rest days (which for many of us falls on the weekend when we “let our hair down”) and in order to build muscle you need to be in surplus calories- but where you get this surplus from determines whether the weight gain is in fat or muscle.

If you are under or overeating calories in comparison to your ultimate goal then you will not achieve the outcome you are working towards. Making any hard work and dedication you do pointless in terms of achieving what you want.
This is the critical, underpinning, non-negotiable foundation of nutrition and it is often the most difficult and overlooked. Eating “healthy, balanced meals” is great, however if you are eating more calories than your body needs you will gain weight- no arguments.

This is not what people want to hear, and often it is this crucial fact that causes so much frustration. Not adhering to the portion size needed to achieve your weight loss or gaining goals whilst eating what appears to be a healthy balanced, nutrient rich diet will not work.

Consuming your weekly quota of calories over Friday, Saturday and Sunday means that everything you consume during the week is overflow. The starvation and binge cycle, which is increasingly common in our society doesn’t work. Being unreasonably restrictive during the week and then binging for two or three days over the weekend will not result in positive long term outcomes.

Balance is needed, balance during the week and weekend. This starts with knowing how many calories you need to consume to attain your goal.
Your goal is dependent on whether you want to build muscle, maintain body weight or cut fat. These are three separate goals that you will have to focus on one at a time. For the vast majority of people it is not possible to build muscle and cut fat simultaneously. This is clear once you understand that to gain you must be in surplus and to cut you must be in deficit calories. You have to know how many calories you are actually eating throughout the entire week- not just the days where you were “good”.

This can be done with myfitness pal to monitor food intake. From there you need a template with your personal data and goals outlined. Then comes the hard bit- eating 5-7 balanced meals every day of the week, and consuming less on the days that you don’t work out.

This doesn’t mean giving up your social life, or being a teetotaller (although having a balanced and minimal relationship with alcohol will make weight loss easier) it just means looking at your overall diet and understanding where your calories are coming from and how to balance them. Very much like having a bank account, if you want to save money you need to be restrictive with your spending, if you spend more than you have then you will blow out your budget.

Excess calories, especially empty ones from things like alcohol, ought to be consumed on training days when the calorie expenditure is higher. However before you high-five your neighbour and run out for midweek drinks, remember that balance is key and that using your calorie balance on low nutrient, high calorie foods is not a smart investment in the long run.

Making informed and sensible food choices allows you to have these treats, within a balanced diet but beware- every weekend cannot be a free-for-all if you want to have the best outcome for your body size, shape and composition.