Before
considering having a cheat day during the ketogenic diet, it is necessary to
understand what this diet is. The ketogenic diet is a type of low-carbohydrate
and high-fat diet that provides a certain percentage of weight loss and it has
recently become quite popular.
The
ketogenic diet is a diet that allows your body to burn fat instead of
carbohydrates. But given that the ketogenic diet is strict, some people may
want to take occasional cheat day breaks from it. But this is not a situation
that is generally recommended.
People
who follow long-term diets and who have a sports routine, sometimes disrupt
these routines or allow themselves to cheat a little under the name of a reward
day or reward meal to continue with more motivation. This situation is quite
common and is known as "cheat day". This practice covers the days
when a person eats high-calorie foods to motivate themselves at certain times.
In the
ketogenic diet, this reward day is called a "cheat day" and you may
be wondering if this is allowed in any diet or if this will get you out of
ketosis state. Therefore, we have compiled a few pieces of information for you
about whether to have cheat days or not.
Does the
Award Day or the Award Meal Spoil the Ketosis?
Cheating,
which we call reward days or reward meals here, is a common strategy for strict
diets. If it is an award day, you are allowed to break the rules of the diet
for the whole day. A reward meal means the violation of the rules of the diet
for one meal.
The
basis of the idea of planned reward arises from the idea of adhering to a
long-term diet, allowing short periods of tolerance. Thus, a person who knows
that there will be times when he can take a break during a diet will follow a
stricter diet. But although reward-based eating habits, in general, provide
benefits, they are not ideal for a ketogenic diet. Because the purpose of this
diet is basically to ensure that your body remains in ketosis, and this
includes the process of entering a ketosis state, which may also be tiring with
a diet plan and special recipes that need to be cooked.
When
following this diet, it is necessary to consume less than 50 grams of
carbohydrates per day. Because otherwise, it can cause you to get out of
ketosis. Carbohydrates will usually be used before ketone bodies since
carbohydrates are your body's preferred energy source. If carbohydrates are
very limited during ketosis, the body will first start using fats as fuel in
ketosis. This will allow you to lose weight more comfortably.
It will
be very easy for you to exceed this limit at any meal, as consuming 50 grams of
carbohydrates during the day is a fairly small rate, and in this case, it will
lead to the fact that your body will come out of ketosis. It will be very easy
to exceed the limit of 50 grams of carbohydrates on a reward day, and even
cheating during one meal may spoil the diet.
In
addition to this condition, according to some experts, if you suddenly start
consuming high carbohydrates while on a ketogenic diet, your blood vessels may
be damaged. It should also be emphasized that it will be easy to gain excessive
weight when doing reward meals or days, and your efforts to lose weight may
come to naught at once.