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I have heard recently about the so-called cheat meals. I’m wondering, do you introduce them into your diet? Will they not disturb the weight loss process? And whether they are healthy? Ela, 28 years old
Controlled derogation
The popularity of the cheat meal is growing. It has to do with ours concerns about introducing diet deviations. Still with many people there is a belief that the diet should be followed very strictly if you want to achieve your goal. By this approach, the diet becomes sometimes a torment: we dare every product, we are afraid to go to a restaurant, because no dish it does not seem appropriate to us, we refuse to meet friends for fear of having to eat something not on the menu. This is how the diet fills up our whole life. There is more and more talk about the need for flexible approaching the diet. We wrote about this in the article “Is Restrictive Diet Inappropriate?”. However, not everyone can immediately learn a flexible approach to weight loss. This is where the cheat meal comes in.
What is cheat meal?
A cheat meal is a planned, and therefore controlled, deviation from diet. The name “cheated meal” is not accidental. “Cheated” is here signify a meal that does not quite fit into the diet, but is introduced on purpose. There are two concepts for a cheat meal:
1. Swap a meal from a diet to a cheated meal
The first concept is to skip one meal from the diet in exchange for another dish that we feel like. It can be such a dish whatever, such as pizza, pork chops, chocolate, etc.
2. Adding the cheated meal to the menu
The second concept is that we don’t give up on any meal from the diet, we only add one additional meal – the one we have in feel like it at any given moment.
In both cases, moderation is important. We must ensure that the cheated meal was not too big. As part of such a meal, we can therefore allow for 1-2 pieces of pizza, a piece of dough, a pork chop with a small portion french fries etc. The concept of a cheat meal does not assume gluttony, but only gluttony satisfying your appetite. This is why portions need to be limited.
Cheat meal with a look dietetics
Introducing a cheat meal once a week or once every two weeks will not affect the effects of the diet, provided moderation is exercised. Even if the next day after a cheated meal, the weight increases slightly, then no it will be associated with an increase in adipose tissue, and only with filling intestines and water retention in the body. So we don’t have to worry about cheat meal will destroy our effects.
What’s more, it can turn up your metabolism a bit. Eating a cheated meal increases postprandial thermogenesis. It is related to with a specifically dynamic action of food (SDDP), i.e. increasing metabolism after eating a meal. It also increases the secretion of thyroid hormones (T3 and T4) and insulin. The appetite is reduced. All these factors show that introducing a cheated meal every once in a while is allowed and maybe even help a bit.
Cheat meal with a look psychologist
From a psychological point of view, it is also a cheat meal good idea. It makes it not so difficult to stick to the diet because we have knowing that in some time we will be able to eat our favorite dish. Therefore, the feeling of loss that often occurs on a diet decreases, lowering our well-being, which reduces the chances of persevering in decisions.
In addition The introduction of a cheat meal teaches that there are no foods prohibited in the diet. This is beneficial because calling some of the products banned makes it happen preoccupation with these products and enhancing the thoughts that we are trying to suppress. There may also be rebellion against the imposed restrictions. These are the reasons why we overeat on a diet. We wrote about it in the article “Why do we overeat on diets?”.
If the diet starts to tire you and you think about your favorites more and more often treat yourself to a cheat meal. It will satisfy your appetite and improve mood, so that continuing the diet will be easier.
A few rules regarding a healthy cheat meal
If we want the cheat meal to have the desired effect, it’s worth it follow a few rules:
- The cheat meal should be introduced no more than once every 1-2 weeks
- The cheat meal should not exceed 1000 kcal, ideally and when it does not exceed 500 kcal
- It’s best to eat a cheated meal at least 6 hours before sleeping
- It is better to switch from one meal to a cheat meal than to add an extra meal
- It is worth increasing physical activity on the day of introduction a cheat meal or the day after, although it is not necessary
Who is not for?
Not everyone will benefit from a cheat meal. In people with disorders nutrition, it can be a trigger for the binge eating process. Such people they are often convinced that one small deviation from the diet disturbs the whole thing the process of losing weight and assume that if “the day is already lost”, you can continue eating. Later, it is difficult for them to stop the binge eating process, which sometimes causes them to binge it even lasts several days. Only when such persons change their beliefs and learn to think in black and white terms, they will benefit from introducing a cheat meal into your diet.
As a reminder, in addition to cheat meals, there are also so-called cheat day, about which we wrote in the article “Cheat day – dietary gluttony”. However, we do not recommend these 🙂
Main photo: Photo credit: ralph and jenny / Foter.com / CC BY