One cheat day - how to not feel ill?

#1

Hi guys,

I’ve been on keto for about 3 weeks now and doing really well - haven’t had a cheat day so far and appetite is very much suppressed.
I have this event on the 2nd May (Wednesday) which I paid for prior to starting keto. It involves a set 3 course meal and a bottle of wine. I fear that I will not be able to enjoy the event so much because eating (and drinking) carbs may make my stomach super uneasy. This is the one cheat day I have planned, and I really want to go ahead with it because I’ve already paid, for it and I just want this one day to have fun with my friends (I’m currently studying for exams, and it has been mentally exhausting).
Is there any way I can prevent feeling ill from eating at the event? I was thinking maybe eating some carbs the day before, to prep my stomach. I welcome all suggestions! But not attending the event is not an option :smiley:
Thank you!

(TJ Borden) #2

The earlier you are in your keto journey, the tougher taking a meal or a day off can be. The crazier you go, the shittier you’ll probably feel. I wouldn’t prep the day before. Doing that would extend your holiday over a couple days and that is going to make it even tougher to get back in. It’s easy for s couple days to turn into the weekend, to the rest of the month, and before you know it, it’s been a year.

My experience (with years of cycling in and out of LCHF before going Keto), is a meal from time to time is pretty easy handle and keep going, and the further you are in your journey, it often doesn’t even knock you out of ketosis. At three weeks in, you’re probably not fat adapted yet, so it doesn’t take much to completely reset your system back to pre-keto.

I’m not saying to skip it, just know you’ll pat a price (like a hangover) and try to keep it to the one meal and the next day jump back on the horse. KCKO

(Brian) #3

Some people would suggest that you fast the day before or the day after or both. I’ve not tried it so have not personal experience.

Personally, I’d probably enjoy the planned meal and go right back to normal keto afterwards. If it’s just one normal meal, and it’s not a 4 hour all-you-can-stuff-down-your-pie-hole type event with a few gallons of booze on top, it’s probably a non-event.

(TJ Borden) #4

Clearly you and I have different ideas of a party, because that’s EXACTLY what I was picturing.

(Brian) #5

Well, that’s close to what I might have done years ago, without the booze anyway. (I never learned to drink alcohol, which is probably a very good thing. Native American in the background, not a good combo…) I can remember some good times at the ol’ buffet! :smiley:

The OP said a 3 course meal. That’s not a lot of courses. I don’t know much about a bottle of wine but if it’s one bottle shared among several friends, such that they each get a glass, it wouldn’t be the same things as a half dozen beers. I actually was trying to think of how bad 3 course could be if one of them was a meat or fish item and one of them was maybe a salad of some kind. And in some of the fancy restaurants, a dessert course can be small enough to require a magnifying glass to find it. Dunno. ?? Guess it really depends on what the courses are.

:slight_smile:

#6

That’s why I keep thinking that there is something called “Starting Phase” that you cannot afford to have any mistake, or else everything is reset. <_<

#7

Thanks everyone :slight_smile:
There will be three courses: I think the first is some sort of tomato soup, the second is lamb, and the last is something chocolatey. And by bottle of wine, I mean bottle of wine EACH haha. Its less of a formal event and more of a ‘lets get completely wasted’ event lol. So yeah, it will be super heavy on the carbs. It will be my only day off though. I just hope it won’t be too much for my stomach to handle. Which is why I was thinking prepping the day before and making it a couple cheat days rather than just one

#9

Hmm fair enough. I did assume I was fat adapted because I’m getting all the ‘keto adapted’ symptoms. Maybe its the case where some people adapt faster than others? I’m not sure, you’ve been doing this a lot longer than me so I trust your word

#10

Hmmm this is very interesting. I will look into trying it out. Issue is, I’ve been pretty much close to fasting for the past week because I’ve had absolutely no appetite. I’ve been averaging about one meal a day - and when I do eat, I feel quite gassy.
I’ll do some research into this though - thank you :slight_smile:

(TJ Borden) #11

Tomato soup; probably not great, but not terrible, add as much butter as you can get your hands on :yum:

Lamb; totally fine, depending on sauces and sides

Something chocolatey; really the only bad thing.

Doesn’t sound that bad overall. I wouldn’t sweat it. Like @Bellyman said, maybe fast the day after (depending on what it does to your system, you may not be real hungry anyway), or stick to basic minimal carb stuff. Above all, KCKO.

(Melissa Marie) #12

I did it early on without any ill effects. My first was a valentines day meal. So, I will have a regular meal on occasion and it hasn’t wound up to be a problem but most of the time I don’t feel the draw to it like I did in the beginning. It is just not as satisfying. I do notice I gain about 4 lbs but it comes off within a couple days. Also I have read that if you complete your meal within an hour then you really don’t have the same problems as if you stretched it out. Your body can manage things better.

If you have problems with staying on track with diets then I would suggest avoiding it but otherwise it is probably fine as long as it doesn’t become a frequent thing.

#13

Anyway, I don’t think your stomach will complain. Not at all.

Why? Just let’s say if your stomach complained, your stomach should have been suffering for years already.

#14

That’s why I don’t get it.

Why do some people say that they feel sick when they do the cheat day thing? I don’t have that kind of feeling…
(Or maybe because I am not yet adapted in that time?)

(You've tried everything else; why not try bacon?) #15

@glaoye I would probably go easy on the wine; it has a lot of carbohydrate. Could you maybe have some vodka or Scotch instead? You may or may not find the dessert as attactive as you would have before; it depends on how much your taste buds have adapted by this point. I find that I have to cut down the amount of artificial sweetener I put in things, because too much sweetness is now intolerable, but it took a while to get to that stage.

@cloudy Just be grateful. One of the things carbohydrate does to us is to make us retain water, and a lot of people really don’t enjoy feeling bloated. Also, some people react to fructose (which makes up one-half of a sucrose molecule) just as they do to alcohol—after all, fructose and ethanol are metabolized by the same pathway in the liver and have similar effects on the reward center of the brain—so they feel not only bloated, but hung over. And once you get used to how good ketosis feels, going back to the old way of eating feels even worse!

(Troy) #16

This…100% agree
Once you get to the point in this journey. For me,it’s the dreaded bloated feeling. That’s my personal motivation. No way do I want to go back to that

When asked about this WOE…I ALWAYS bring up
“ feeling good and not bloated anymore” :smile:

W food, everyone can relate to the word bloated !!:nauseated_face:
All shapes, lifestyles and WOE
Junky feeling BLOATED feeling

So it’s a GREAT conversation ice breaker for KETO

Good luck OP
AND yes, I would skip out on the wine. Just my advice

(Jay AM) #17

You are probably not fat adapted in just 3 weeks. You will probably be hungover (possibly worse than you’ve been before). You might get drunk on less. If your stomach is going to react, it’s going to react and there isn’t anything you can do about it. Bring some pepto or alkaseltzer to help if you start feeling too ill. The next day go right back to keto. Excess carbs can cause 3 or more days of cravings so just be prepared to fight it.

(Jay AM) #18

This isn’t a thing.

(Ken) #19

Nah, once you’ve depleted glycogen and gone into sustained lipolysis, you’re on your way to adaptation. True, high fat in the absence of carbs will speed this along, but Carb intake will merely suspend the adaptation process rather than reverse it. You’d have to totally go back to a Carb or carb-fat pattern to reverse it. However, you really want to follow the high fat, little or no Carb pattern until adapted.

(Melissa Marie) #20

Interesting enough I have to eat my words. I didn’t have any problems until this last cheat day two days ago. Terrible stomach pain and inflammation after. Definitely going to deter me in the future now. I am in my 4th month and ate this same thing just a month ago. Completely different body response this time.

Apparently this is true. I consider it a NSV because I enjoyed my cheat meals and looked forward to them which derails progress and doesn’t support continuous healing. My body isn’t going to have it apparently which will definitely help me stay on track!

(Steve ricci ) #21

Eat food you can tolerate. I love my cheat meal and it is a total pizza fest.