Hey everyone, another dieting explained blog today where I delve into IIFYM (also known as flexible dieting). If you read the blog post about macronutrients you’ll already have a better understanding of how proteins, carbs and fats benefit our diet and how you may need to balance them out to create an optimal diet. If you haven’t I recommend you check that out first (link).
Now the IIFYM will be different for everyone as everyone will have different goals and also prefer to eat a different ratio of foods. Lifestyle also plays a big part to your macro split. The main problem that can be seen from looking at IIFYM is basically you can eat whatever you want, as long as it fits your macros. Which let’s be honest will not get your return on investment. No you can’t eat McDonald’s for a day then down some protein shakes to hit your macros. Remember sugars come under carbs so you need to be making sure you’re choosing good carb sources. To fully benefit from this diet you need to be smart with your food choices, choosing nutritionally rich foods like fruit, veg and lean meat. That doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy the occasional treat, that’s where the flexible dieting comes into play. What’s important is that you hit the majority of your days, life’s about enjoyment not being super lean. So have alcohol, cake, pizza etc. Just don’t go off the rails. You can even have it that you hit your macro goals for the day and have some spare calories to play around with in your deficit. Flexible dieting allows you to treat yo self (keep in that deficit though and don’t go into a surplus FYI).
The problem with this diet I feel is the tracking, it can create an unhealthy relationship with food as you begin to view them as pure numbers or nutritional value. There’s so much more to food than protein, fats & carbs. You don’t allow yourself to enjoy certain food groups because your macro goals won’t allow it. Food isn’t just about nutrition and sustenance otherwise we’d all be eating gloop with all the nutrition and zero taste. For me if you go in knowing this mindset and track so you get an idea what you need to eat and then over time stop so you don’t have to do it all the time. Then if you feel yourself slipping up to do the occasional track to make sure you’re hitting your goals. I feel this works, but I know it may not work for everyone. There’s a lot of problems around regarding mental health and food so it’s important to be open and honest when it comes to IIFYM as it maybe isn’t for you. And that’s perfectly fine, or you may need someone to keep and eye and help you with your diet to make sure you’re enjoying it. Gym and health shouldn’t be a drag, it should be something you enjoy doing and be part of your lifestyle.
So this is the diet I choose, but I don’t really view it as IIFYM, just rather eating normally and hitting my goals of 35% protein, 40% carbs & 25% fats. It’s important to get your protein goal sorted first as priority no. 1 as that’s what’s going to best help you hit your fat lose or muscle gain goals. To keep track I use myfitnesspal & a calorie estimate with recommended macros so I had an idea of what to aim for. Over the first few weeks I played about with calories and the split to find out what best suited me. The calorie estimates are always a ball park figure. Calorie targets will take into account your activity level, gender, age and other measurements then spit out a calorie goal with your recommended percentages.
I think it’s beneficial to do to make people more aware of what they’re eating, when you start tracking and have a calorie goal you begin to make smarter food choices. IIFYM requires planning you can’t just do it day to day because you need to make sure you’re eating/have food that will fit your goals. Again planning food will help you choose better foods for you and your body will thank you for that.
You can follow this plan if you’re vegan, vegetarian, paleo etc. You just adjust your macros to best fit your lifestyle (remember to keep it high protein though). Be accountable, on the surface it looks like you can eat what you want. But if you’re smart and make good choices, it’s a winner. Diets are less about dieting, I know I’ve called it a diet throughout this blog but when I say that I really just mean the plan of it. What’s important is adapting a lifestyle change and being consistent with it, that’s what gets results.
And that’s my blog for Friday, hope you all have a good day remember to subscribe if you enjoyed it and follow me on IG.
Thanks
Cameron
Additional Sources
Buff Dudes - We Tried The Flexible Diet (IIFYM) For 30 Days, Here’s What Happened