If you click my profile, you can read my intro post. Basically a decade ago I lost 50 lbs doing phase 1 atkins for 5-6 months. The next decade, I put on 10-20 lbs a year while saying to myself "I know I'm getting big, but I did this pretty well in college (cutting the weight) so when I get to a good place in terms of career and other stuff, I'll just do it again. I didn't know how much I weighed....and when I started I was in shock how far I had let it go.

Anyways, my short term goal was to do 4 months of induction until Thanksgiving (have some travel and think that would be a good few days to take off). I am a month in. Down 22 lbs. I feel good about the path I am on. I can and NEED to continue on this path.......for a LONG time.

With that said, for someone like me who really needs a full year plus of low carbing and can't just do this for a few months, does it make sense to plan a cheat day every once in awhile? I know that might be a slippery slope and not good, but right now I feel a bit overwhelmed by the fact that the light at the end of the tunnel is so far away.

Maybe every 20 lbs lost? Once every 45 days? Does that help with the long term strategy? I find myself thinking about foods with carbs a good amount.

If that indeed makes some level of sense, what's the best way to do it? I read somewhere that you can really mitigate the impact of this by doing a 24 hour fast and then as close to a 0 carb day the day after. I'd gladly do that if I could cheat a handful of times a year.

Not looking for an excuse to start slipping but just hoping there maybe some acceptable way to get you through the long term process.

Thanks for your help and input.

Everything I have read and everything I have experienced says that cheating is a bad idea. The person who gets cheated is you. What likely will happen is that allowing yourself to "cheat" will lead to further craving for high carb food which will lead to further cheating until it derails you. That's been my experience.

I find that abstaining entirely is the best approach. Just say "no". That way you can work on changing the messages you give yourself when you find yourself craving something. You can also change your behavior, find something else to do or something low carb to eat when the craving sets in. I now consider high carb foods to be poison to my system, helps keep me away from temptation. In the long run changing my mindset has been much more helpful than allowing myself to "cheat". This is a long term lifetime process. Think long term, think healthy, think how much benefit you and your family will gain from your being able to stick with it. It does get easier with time if you can change not only your eating habits but the habits of your mind that lead you towards all the high carb food that's out there.

Jean

I agree with Jean (of course, as always ) cheating is a slippery slope and it is actually easier not to. I see you just read Ken's Year One and Two Milestones, so suggest you give them a re-read and note again that there was one key to being successful this time. NO cheating, ever. He wrote a great response to another member's "I'm AFU" post...the one thing he did not do was cheat.
Ken had a photo of his Thanksgiving meal...lots of on-plan foods, maybe more than usual, but all low carb.
From the scientific perspective, Dr Westman said in his Advanced LC tips interview on DietDoctor, that they tested ketone levels after a "cheat meal"...one person took three weeks to get back into ketosis. (Depends on individual metabolisms) That is three weeks of fighting cravings until you are back in the zone of no hunger, so a slippery slope indeed.

Hey SVDude (do your ride susuki's btw? I use to own an SV650)

Good to see you post. I wondered where you might have went. I like to see that people can do this stuff without having to blab all about it every day like me. It seems a more reasonable approach

Cheating: First, I'm not even sure I know how to define it as I think cheating involves deception of another, if that other is yourself I'm not sure how that works. If you mean you want to pound down some sugar or something than that's what I'd call it.

There are some plans that give you periodic unrestricted feeding. I think one I've seen here is called "Carb Night Solutions". I'm not for or against it. It just is.

I myself have not eaten grains, potatoes or sugar (sought these out to eat) in almost a year. I'm doing fine and don't have urges to have them. I myself don't see anything inherently wrong with them. Some on this site see them as the devil incarnate so there is a wide range of views on these food stuffs. I also believe there is a wide range of peoples tolerances to them.

The problem from my view is that that sugar, or more specifically, sugar that man refines, is pretty tuff on most peoples bodies if abused over a long period of time. So that is one that I can see myself never going back to using, even in a limited, restricted fashion. Grains and Potatoes (tubers and perhaps legumes) I see as something to consider before ingesting them again in limited amounts.

I'll cross that bridge when I get to it. I'm not even close to it yet. It's nowhere on the horizon.

You have gotten good advice on the posts above mine. Your milage will vary with the advice in this one. You are going to have to find out yourself, that's the way it works. It is my opinion that everyone should know what a hot stove feels like and not take another's word for it. You will have a deeper and truer understanding and not just parrot to others that "all stoves are hot, DO NOT TOUCH!"

Here's one other person that I'm reading. I like him. He talks a little, although grudgingly and cautiously, about what HE ATE back in the recent past. Today it is probably different.

I leave you with this and good luck!

http://eatingacademy.com/personal/a...i-circa-q1-2014

Until I realized that changing my way of eating required changing my way of life, I was just playing in the sandbox of low carb. I wasn't following a WOE rigorously enough to have an impact. Part of your thought process right now is driven by food (carb) addiction and the drive to not ever let these foods get too far away, because, hey, it's an addiction. You're thinking you need a full year plus? How about the rest of your life?

Early on, it's very hard to anticipate that your food cravings WILL disappear over time by consistently following low carb. Now? Your only point of reference is as a carb-loaded, glucose fueled individual who needs to eat frequently. Believe me when I tell you, this point of reference weakens over time, and one day you'll realize you have a brand new point of reference for food quality and eating frequency. Cheating is the fastest way to maintain your current point of reference and undermine your goal to lose weight and achieve health. Hey, it's free will, and we all make critical decisions in our lives. Good luck with your journey!

I think cheating depends on knowing yourself -- if you know that you can immediately go back to eating the way you should, that you won't have cravings, and it won't stop your progress for weeks, then maybe it's OK. However, it seems that most people here don't feel that they can do this.

Personally, I'm trying to change my attitude so that I only want the foods that are LCHF, and don't even have a desire to go back to the old ways. I think of my ketogenic diet as a way to heal my body from years of insulin resistance, and possibly prevent future illness and frailty. So it's possible that one meal wouldn't turn all my progress around, but I'm getting too old to chance it -- too many people in my family are getting very serious illness and cancers.

I had been thinking about letting myself have some carbs on my birthday in January, but that might be 5 or 6 tortilla chips and a small serving of refried beans -- I have no interest in anything with flour or sugar ever again as, in my mind, those are poisons.

Even that makes me nervous since I have a history of carb creep, and I don't ever plan on going down that path again.

I agree with Kat. This is an individual thing. I can easily have a French fry from my husband's plate and not want more. In fact, I have gotten to the point that it doesn't even taste that great to me anymore. If you are early in this, I can understand wanting cheats ahead, but you might find that you lose interest. Most of us do.

For me the question is not whether I can get away with a "cheat". What is important to do is to develop the habit of mind that no longer wants to "cheat".

Jean

I have read about long-term low-carbers having cheat days once or twice per month. Some things I realized about these successful "cheaters" are:

1. They did not "cheat" until they had maintained their weight loss for a while.

2. These people often have type A personalities. They have iron wills and and are extremely determined.

3. They usually do not have emotional connections to food nor do they have severe insulin resistance/carb addiction.

4. They usually have a consistent exercise routine which helps the body deal with these occasional "cheats".

5. The "cheat" days are planned in advance. They are not randomly chosen because "I feel like eating cookies today."

I fit NONE of those categories therefore a cheat day would be a death sentence for me.

I agree with what else has been said, and I wanted to add a couple of thoughts...

1) What is it that you're missing that can't be done LC? Practically every restaurant has decent LC offerings. What they don't have, you can make at home. If there are a few things in particular, we can help you find a recipe. And Thanksgiving? No one will notice or care if you're not having every dish offered at the family get-together. Load up on the turkey and veggies, make your own lower-carb sides if you have to. Make a nice broccoli/cauli dish and your own LC pumpkin pie (pumpkin is even an Atkins induction veggie!) I'm sure we'll have a big Thanksgiving thread in a couple of months.

2) Cheats are going to happen by accident and/or impulse anyway, so why plan them? The waiter brings you regular cola instead of diet and you don't notice. The burger joint you're at is crappy and their burgers are full of wheat and corn fillers. The salad dressing is 'lite' and has a lot of carbs. You go to a friend's house for a BBQ, but the meats were all cooked in sweet BBQ sauce and the cole slaw is a little sugary. That kind of stuff.

I guess you could call me a successful cheater, but it's because I know my own limits and I've been at this so long that I believe I've successfully 'reset' my metabolism and my brain's tolerance, sort of like how you'd have a huge tolerance for a drug if you abused it for a long time... and then when you get off it, your tolerance goes back to normal. I used to be able to eat frosting out of a can with a spoon; I had such a sugar addiction. Now, that would make me sick to my stomach. My 'sweet' taste has been reset.

I generally only eat off-plan when there's built in portion control, and stuff that just isn't all that appealing to me. We go to Dairy Queen maybe twice a year. I can handle a bit of ice cream, but I prefer not to have it in the house. I can handle some of my SO's potato chips, because I'm not a huge chip fan; the salt irritates my gums. I usually pass because I hate it stuck in my teeth. Heh.

It's important to note that with a healed metabolism and tolerance, a flat-out cheat day can make you feel like GARBAGE. It's not worth it! Besides possibly derailing weight loss for a while, you'll basically need a hangover day. If you decide you're going to do it, do not have a cheat day. Pick one thing that you think you want, eat on plan during the day, have a decent LC dinner, and have a small portion of whatever the cheat food is with/after dinner. Then brush your teeth and don't have anything else the rest of the night. And then, try to crush the carb cravings you might be left with for days.

If you're concerned about cheating at this early stage, my suggestion would be to get that thought out of your system by doing it early, and closely observe what happens. For me, my first pizza after about a month of LCHF caused me to immediately stop losing weight, and it didn't resume again for another 3-4 days (I weigh daily). That gave me the first hand knowledge I needed to assure myself that cheating simply wasn't going to be an option if I was to succeed at this.

Some might say "it's not cheating unless you get caught". Well when it comes to carbs, there simply is no cheating; the body sees all.

If you want to lose weight to get healthy, improve cardiac markers, feel better, improve mood, improve energy-then no. Would you cheat a friend? Would you cheat a co-worker? How about a completer stranger-would you cheat them? If your answers are no, they why in the world would you cheat yourself?

Try enthusiam for a new way of eating with wonderful new foods that will make you feel good and not focusing on what you won't be eating. Take a good look and think about the foods you won't be eating. What have they done for you? Made you fat? tired? Cranky? Filled your mind with constant thoughts of them? Globbed your veins with fatty triglycerides? This is what you want? Consider what they are really doing to your body in return for the few minutes pleasure you will get eating them. I know from experience the taste good is gone after the last chew and the remorse will set in. Why do that to yourself?

One of the things that has helped me avoid eating off plan is to stay ON PLAN long enough to see what happens when I have eaten off plan.

Last summer, after not eating any grains at all for over a year, I went to a movie with my daughter and ate a small box of popcorn. The next day, I felt like my head was in a fog bank. Couldn't remember what I needed to do next, etc.

So, no more popcorn. For me, it's not worth that feeling. As has been suggested, try to figure out what it is that you are missing. Sometimes, it's simply the idea that you don't "have to" pay attention to what you are eating. But not paying attention is what got each and every one of us in trouble.

It's a gift to yourself to eat and be mindful of what you are putting into your mouth. It's being disrespectful of yourself to eat whatever looks good at the moment, despite its negative effect on your health.

This is a long journey. Just as you have to break in your hiking boots for a trip on the Appalachian trail, you had to break in your mindset for eating low carb. It will come, if you have patience with yourself.

Usually if I have something off plan I find it's not up to my expectations and the cravings of my imagination. That mac&cheese just doesn't taste as good as it used to, why is that?

I used to stop buy a local bakery every time I traveled out of town for a couple cream cheese pockets and coffee. Now I don't even notice it's there, I couldn't even finish one pastry now, but I have been doing this diet for awhile.

There is a plan that allows somewhat structured "reward Meals" CALP. I never had much luck with that or South Beach, likely due to my previously carb ravaged metabolism. Hopefully its been healed via low-carb and IF, but I don't care to test it for no good reason.

Lot of good feedback folks. Thinking through this a bit more......

One thing that sticks out in my mind right now that I think about it is I am 1 month in (down 25 lbs!) and the cravings I have are not what I would expect. If you read my initial post, i had quite a sweet tooth. That really doesn't register right now on my radar at all which I think is good. Maybe a little bit for stuff you can have the AM like a donut or pastry but some of that is the convenience of having something sweet without any food prep. I also am shocked how okay I am having no pasta/noodles/dumplings/pizza which I ate a lot of. I think if I could one thing back it would be potatoes because it goes with so much stuff (fries, chips, hash browns, etc). I don't miss bread/grain really but just being able to get a sandwich or burrito.

The other thing I thought about as I mulled this a bit more, was what type of cheating did I do 11 years ago in college when I lost 50 lbs over 6 months?

This was kind of interesting to me because I have a really freakishly good memory and people always are kind of floored by things I can remember. That said, a lot of my Atkins 1.0 memory is thin. Like I struggle to remember what meals I prepared and what I ate when eating out. Retracing it a bit here is what I can remember about cheats back then:

- 2-3 weeks in went to a baseball game. After bbqing some meat in parking lot and drinking a lot, I got a burrito at the game knowing it wouldn't be as terrible as the other options I was craving. No additional cheating after that slip. (Happened before I went back to school)

- I know I went on 4 road trips that fall for football games. It's hard to think I stayed perfect given the unknown of that type of travel (staying on people's floors, not knowing the towns we were going to, being reliant on someone else who was driving). I think I tried to have as many Subway wraps as possible and we definitely bbq'd a lot with a grill I brought along but I can recall 1x I just had taco bell tacos. I think probably on those trips there was another time or two I don't recall cheating but may have. In that one instance or any others, I just continued as soon as I could logistically.

- I definitely had a normal thanksgiving meal. I think I went to a party that night after and there was pizza and I had some of that as well but started over the next day.

- I recall another time I got really blitzed one night with friends over the Xmas break and they got a pizza delivered. I had not brought any food over to this get together (poker). I ate some beef jerky in the house. It was awful. I ended up eating some pizza but again it didn't bleed into any more slippage.

Going through these incidents, I'm encouraged that none of these times cheating really led to more cheating (in terms of frequency or a streak of meals off plan) and that most of them occurred when I was drunk and with friends which sadly happens way less these days. The majority of them happened when I was home from school where I didn't have my setup and normal kitchen as well.

I have two social events the next few weeks where I imagine it will be tempting to cheat. My thought right now is if I get through them and hit 40 lbs lost, I may give myself 1-2 meals as a reward. No sweets and nothing overly carb crazy. Something like a normal Mexican meal, or breakfast, or even Boston Market. Not pasta or a lot of bread or a big sandwich. If I were able to find that to be not a big bump in the road, I may just try to do it every 20lbs lost or every other month or something. I may not even do it all but I think that would be my plan and just see how my body reacts. If the juice isn't worth the squeeze, I'll probably just abstain the best I can from any planned cheat/offplan meals. So between now and Mid September, business as usual.

In other news, I met someone for brunch yesterday. Was worried about staying under 20 carbs with the menu (tapas) +booze. Some how after a week of not really shedding as much weight as I have been, down 2 lbs today so that was good to see (being social/at a restaurant and drinking with someone of the opposite sex and not having any issues socially or with losing weight)