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If I had to marry food, I just couldn't be faithful. I love to eat way too much. Burgers, fries, chocolate, beer, pasta - I love them all.Evidently, I'm not alone. "Over-fat" is a national epidemic in this country because of crummy eating and exercise habits, and a never-ending supply of delicious, calorie-rich foods. While you and I know HOW to eat properly, it isn't always easy to do, nor do we always want to. Now, don't get me wrong. A fitness enthusiast at heart, I eat "clean" about 90% of the time. I've often advocated a diet higher in protein and lower in carbs and fat. It can work wonders, as it has on many people whom I've trained and otherwise consulted. But the reality is that there will always be that "other 10%" of the time where my diet gets a little "dirty". Maybe I've had a bad day at the office, a night of partying, a vacation (always a killer), a business trip (ditto), a "crisis" with family or friends, and so on. Or, maybe I've got no particular excuse other than I want to give in to my culinary cravings.The bottom line is there is an endless variety of explanations why our diets stop looking like "diets" from time to time. And that's okay, because if you don't cheat on occasion, you'll go freaking crazy. Furthermore, sometimes your body just needs a change of eating habits, just like it needs a change of workout habits. Guilt No More! I've been cheating on my diet for nearly a decade. About three years ago, however, I decided it was time to figure out how to get away with my dietary crimes. I was sick of feeling guilty; sick of worrying that I would wake up in the morning to see that my abs had disappeared, and that my muscles had gone "soft". I was sick of having to "do the time" and suffer an ultra-strict diet for 3-4 days - after an episode of cheating in order to get my physique back where it was. I began to examine my cheating habits in detail. I considered the type and variety of "bad" foods that I ate, the quantities I ate, and the time of day that I committed my dietary crimes. Next, I started supplementing with various dietary ingredients that I thought would either prevent my body from absorbing "bad" calories in the first place, or ensure they ended up in a good place (i.e., muscle instead of fat) in the event that they were absorbed. Home-Brewed "Cheater's Relief" Fat and Calorie Blockers: I added these ingredients to prevent the carb and fat calories found in my favorite treats from getting absorbed into my body in the first place. Insulin Amplifiers: Of course, some of the carbs in my blueberry cheesecake or chocolate sundae were going to be absorbed. I added these ingredients to "detour" them into muscle and away from fat. Carbohydrate Conversion Inhibitors: These substances prevent excess carbs from being converted into fat. Instead, the carbs are burned up for energy, or stored as glycogen in your muscle cells (not in your fat tissue). The ability of my home brew to push more carbohydrate calories into my muscles and less into fat tissue was of critical importance. Different tissues in your body respond to insulin. Muscle tissue is insulin's biggest tissue target of them all. Insulin "pushes" carbs into your muscles. The more this happens, the less likely you are to get fat. Also, because your muscles will store some of the carbs as glycogen, allowing them to look shapelier and pack even more power at the gym. How Well Did My Brew Work? I started to notice that if my diet got a little dirty for a day or two during the week, and I didn't take my home-brewed Cheaters Relief formula, it would take me 3-4 days until I got my body fat and muscle definition back to their original state. When I took Cheaters Relief, on the other hand, my physique suffered practically no ill effects. The mirror proved this to me time and time again. Consequently, I no longer got stressed about eating poorly some of the time. There was no more guilt, no more worry. Very encouraged my by results, I decided to get my wife, Julie involved. We tried to see how long we could let our diets slide before we started seeing negative changes to our physiques. Every time we planned to cheat, we'd prepare ourselves by consuming our home brew beforehand. And every time we'd end up looking great in the mirror in the days that followed. We were able to commit the crime without having to do the time. It Worked Better With Use! One thing that kind of surprised me at first was as the weeks went by I found that our Cheaters Relief formula worked better. Normally most supplements kind of hit a plateau. They stop causing any further changes after some period of use. Julie and I, on the other hand, actually started to get leaner. When I thought about it, it started to make perfect sense: muscle is the biggest target for insulin, but fat tissue is also a target for this hormone. As the ingredients in our Cheaters Relief pushed more calories into our muscles, our fat tissue shrunk in size. Relatively speaking, this made our muscles an even bigger target for insulin. In turn, this meant that the 'insulin amplifiers' and other ingredients in our formula worked better, which caused us to lose more fat, and so on. It was a vicious cycle, but in a good way. Taking Cheaters Relief To The Next Level! The scientist in me wanted to see how far I could take this. I started tweaking the formula further by improving the ingredient profile, modifying the dosage, and adjusting the times of ingestion. I also experimented with different kinds and quantities of bad foods. I found out what worked best, what just plain didn't work at all, and everything in between. Initially, I was popping up to 30 capsules before any given cheating episode. Then I honed the formula down to make it pack more punch with only having to take a few capsules per meal. After a year of tweaking and perfecting I felt I had created the ultimate carbohydrate and fat inhibitor. So, I began letting friends, colleagues, and individuals in our Beta-Testing Program give it a "real world" test. The results were uniformly amazing: everyone reported they could push the limits of "dirty eating" while maintaining their shape, muscle tone, and definition. If they ate reasonably well most of the time and used Cheaters Relief during the "Other 10%", they actually got leaner and tighter over time.
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