Monotony with "Treats" Again--the Good Parts--and Strength to Deviate

Many thanks for all the thoughtful comments on my previous post: I'm glad that the 'treat' languaging resonated for people, and that the 'placebo/nocebo' discussion was of interest. I also greatly appreciate the concern around the potentially triggering nature of this latest self-experiment, about which I came clean.

Today, I want to come back to the 'monotonous diet with treat days' idea and discuss some of its benefits (while admitting that I'm not the prime candidate for the benefits it offers), and I also want to return to the point I made that one's basic diet should make one stronger and more tolerant of occasional deviations; not increasingly reactive to anything off the normal agenda. Back to that 'freedom to sway' concept.

I think the two ideas are connected, because I believe that one of the benefits of a monotonous or cleansing diet is that it helps you to get in touch with what actually is a treat.

Reconnecting with what you actually like

I mentioned 'hyperpalatable,' tastebud-tricking foods yesterday, and the fact that going to a monotonous diet can down-regulate weight set-point simply by re-establishing connection with hunger signals and ending dopamine overload. But neurotransmitters and hormones aside, it's a common observation that eating good quality foods, simply prepared, enhances appreciation of simple food and sharpens the tastebuds. 

I found that after a week or two on my 'tetra diet,' I was preparing these gluten free cupcakes for Phil's daughter...

...and I had absolutely no interest in eating them at all!
What's more interesting is that on a 'treat day,' I did try a little bit of cupcake, and I didn't like it! Perhaps that's not surprising for me, because there may have been some 'nocebo' stuff going on in the back of my mind about the sugar and the kind of fat used... The yams, nettles and carrots all seemed much more appealing to me. Truly!

But getting to taste the gf cupcake (as opposed to the past two years of never having any 'on principle') and getting to experience that I didn't like it, was really useful for me. I don't always feel very in touch with 'what I like,' partly because of my history of restriction and partly because of the 'placebo/nocebo' head stuff. Noticing that I didn't appreciate the cupcake enabled me to then ask myself "Well, what would seem like a treat?" And I was able to connect to the fact that I much prefer something like a chocolate mousse or truffle to something fluffy and cakey. The same in non-chocolate flavors, too. That's a useful thing to know about oneself, isn't it? Helps to decide what 'treats' to choose and which ones I could gladly skip without a twinge.

Now, I'm aware that I'm pretty unusual in my immunity to visually tempting treats: I think a lot of it has to do with having a genuine allergy (to gluten and dairy) and therefore a long habit of ignoring those foods, even when I'm the one making them. Maybe there are people who would do a monotonous diet and find it torture to fix those cupcakes, knowing they wouldn't eat any! (I have felt 'deprived' a couple times this past week, but only when, through poor planning, I didn't eat enough carrots and yams and was starving, felt like I could eat 'anything'--bad place to be, sends me dangerous places.) 

I guess there are two different schools of thought on resetting pleasure and appetite signals. There's this one that I've been outlining, that resembles some flavors of raw-foodism too. On the other side of the fence, there's the Matt Stone/RRARF philosophy (or Geneen Roth with the pillowcase of M&M's), who say to eat lots of everything, especially things that you consider 'forbidden,' with no restriction of food groups or sources. They say that this allows you to get your head out of the equation, allows your thyroid to kick back in and your metabolism to rev up to cope with the quantity, and eventually you'll burn out on the junk and no longer want it. Reading Matt Stone's followers' testimonies, though, it seems like a fair number end up gaining unwanted weight on this approach, although other health markers typically improve significantly--a tough bargain to sell me on.

The idea with this second approach is that your system ends up stronger and better able to handle any kind of input. But I want to submit that if one eats a more 'contained' diet with 'treat days,' it's likely that if it's a good diet, your system will be good to go for the sway spots that way too. I loved Raederle's report from her road trip a month ago, that (after an extended period of being completely raw) she ate a meal totally off-program in a social context where there were no 'healthy' alternatives, and felt absolutely fine afterwards! And she felt fine even though she'd had some apprehension about how she might feel with such an aberration, so even the 'nocebo' effect wasn't stronger than her system. I loved this story so much because it's the diametrical opposite of the "oh no, I found out that those dried apples had been steamed and I got so sick"-type laments. One of my bodywork teachers distinguished between being 'sensitive' and being 'reactive.' The former is a sign of strength. The latter is a weakness.

It might even be beneficial to 'challenge' your body with something other-than-optimal every once in a while: just like exercise, it's a way to build strength. This way of thinking is callisthenic for me in itself: needing to be so careful about gluten and dairy can definitely steer me toward thinking that I need to be as vigilant about everything else too.

Do you know what you like? 

Would you be more comfortable with an 'eat everything until you self-regulate' or an 'eat a monotonous/bland diet as a reset' approach?

Do you think that it's good to 'challenge' your body with occasional dietary aberrations?