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Good afternoon. Cheating, why not?
Side Effects of Cheating
Hunger and cravings
Carbs make you hungry. You know this if you have given them up for any meaningful period of time. Cheating means inviting hunger and cravings back into your life.
Weight gain
Cheating nearly always leads to immediate weight gain. First, carbs put your body back in fat-storing mode. Second, carbs can lead to hunger and cravings hence you eat more. Third, the water weight associated with high-carb diets returns.
Blood sugar spikes
If you are keeping diabetes at bay with your low-carb diet, cheating is generally a bad idea. When you eat carbs, your blood sugar can spike to dangerously high levels. Every time this happens you increase the risk of long-term complications like blindness, dementia, amputations, etc.
On the other hand, every time you manage to avoid a cheat, you're one step closer to reversing your type 2 diabetes.
For those with diabetes or prediabetes, the price of cheating may be too high.
Sickness and acne
For some of us, cheating can lead to dramatic and fairly immediate setbacks - bloating, stomach upset, gas, or even seizures (if you have epilepsy). Some people get acne and other types of skin trouble, too. If this happens to you, is cheating really worth it?
Feeling bad
One of the most annoying effects of cheating is that you often don't feel great after having cheated. In addition to weight gain, blood sugar spikes and so forth, your mood can suffer - enthusiasm, focus, and confidence fall.
This is tough - and with hindsight, makes the decision to cheat seem questionable.
Addiction
For those of you who are sugar (or carb) addicts, it's really dangerous to cheat. Sugar addiction is real. Most scientists agree that sugar is psychoactive - it triggers the reward centers in your brain (similar to other addictive drugs). As a result, relapse can be immediate.
What Is Sugar Addiction? What can happen when an alcoholic grabs just one drink? The same can happen to a sugar addict, and you may end up going off the rails. Moderation is not an option for some, and the only safe choice may be complete abstinence.
Cheating on yourself
Finally, let's be clear about what cheating means. Simply put, 'to cheat' means:
to take something from someone by breaking a rule; or
to prevent someone from having something that he or she deserves or was expecting to get.
Remember this: when you stray from your low-carb lifestyle, the someone who loses out is you. You are not cheating on 'a diet' - you are cheating on yourself.
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