Is there any way to minimize the effects of a "cheat?"
 

I've been calling them "treat" meals. After experiencing extreme pain (joint and muscle) after a "treat" meal tonight, I may have to re-think that name!

My original thought on "treat" meals was that they would help give me enough of a break to stick to the diet the rest of the time. So I purchased carb blockers and took them tonight.

Are there any other ways to reduce the effects of a "treat" meal? I plan on doing a 24 hour fast (until dinner tomorrow night), taking magnesium tonight and drinking plenty of water tomorrow, but am just wondering if there's anything else I can do to get back on track more quickly. Weird as I am, I feel gross enough to *want* to stick with LC now, lol. Not exactly the incentive I want to rely on!

It sounds like to me you've done all the mitigation you can, Micha, and now you need to just let it go. Do your fast then just get right back to plan.

Just don't forget that your "treat" was not all it was cracked up to be. I've slipped a couple times and now things that I craved no longer call to me. It's weird, but it just doesn't seem worth it. Not that I'm perfect or that I won't get tempted (or slip) but most times I have I'm in the same place as you.

From my own personal experience, after falling off the low-carb wagon, I go right back to low-carb, not fasting. This trains me to eat well. To get back into ketosis quicker, I'll do cardio, or fast walking for an hour. First half hour you'll burn the sugar out of your system. But I eat normal LCHF because I feel like fasting is for folks who've really got the LCHF thing under control and a cheat shows me I'm not there yet. Good you're drinking lots of water.
Approach LCHF with the idea you get to eat lots of nice food, instead of thinking you need a treat meal to stick it out. Might be a better frame of mind to achieve success. Have you read the Atkins books? They might help.

Instead of "treat" call it what it is: slow acting poison. That may lessen the desire to eat it. Carbs lead to inflammation: cavities in your teeth are the first sign, but the others are internal. Eating grains exacerbates the effects of the carbs.

And, if you are finding sticking to LC a chore, then you may want to broaden your horizons.

There are so many different ways to prepare foods that are low carb, and all delicious. Not to mention that there are so many low carb foods to prepare!

Just an FYI, the joint pain is quite possibly related to gluten sensitivity.

I see this is an older post, but from reading the 2002 Atkins book, plus a book called The Obesity Code, it sounds like fat and fiber counteract carbs to a certain extent. I mean, you subtract fiber to get net carbs, but no one really says have Metamucil and a fat bomb with that brownie. :D But it sure sounds like that would work.

Not really, Lynn. If you do net carbs, and I have successfullly, you need to look at each ingredient. It works (for some, but not all), because the fibrous carbs in a given food will not be digested. You can't combine different foods. For example, tonight I had broccoli, which had 4 carbs and 2 fiber, so 2 net. Great, because it was one food.

If instead I had bread and flax meal and the flax fiber cancels out the flour, it doesn't work. The point is, some of the carbs in the individual foods are indigestible.

As Cat says, it doesn't work that way. The carbs you eat are the carbs you eat. And, while fiber will, in most cases, modify the absorbable fiber in food it's part of, it does hunt down the carbs from other foods, as it were.

If you really need brownies, find a good low carb recipe for them. But if you find yourself craving sweets, to me, the worst thing to do is to eat sweets. Eating anything else that IS on plan, is better because it doesn't reinforce that addictive area of the brain.