The Science Behind Cheat Meals

Cheat Meals?? If eating clean is the absolute best thing for your body, then what is all this talk about cheat meals? I get that sometimes you just want to indulge, but what about all that hard work you do each and every day? Wouldn't eating poorly just damage all your hard work? I have an included an article that addresses these issues and explains it better than I could if I tried to rephrase it.

"The science behind how cheat meals actually work revolve around a few principles that need to be discussed. These three principles are as follows: thyroid hormone output, 24 hour energy expenditure, and serum leptin levels. More specifically, cheat meals rely on increasing or the upregulation all of these factors
Cheating still needs to be planned and somewhat controlled, especially if it is within a contest preparation regime. This is because leptin levels are closely linked with genetics. Leptin is a protein but is hormone-like in nature. It circulates in the bloodstream and regulates appetite. Leptin is an appetite suppressant. Leptin levels decrease while dieting and in a caloric deficit. This is where a cheat meal can be beneficial to a dieter. Cheat meals are beneficial to increasing leptin levels for a period of time. Now that leptin has been increased in the bloodstream additional physiological factors result. With increased calories from a cheat meal, the body then upregulates metabolism to expend these calories. 

When dieting continues, the metabolism is still slightly elevated from the cheat meal, thus leading to an even greater energy expenditure and increased fat loss. Because metabolic rate is closely linked to thyroid output this is how the increased thyroid hormone is tied in to the cheat meal. Also, with an increased metabolic rate, thermogenesis increases as a result.
There should even be somewhat of structure
 The idea that cheat meals cause problems are derived from the idea of psychological factors rather than physiological ones."
RX muscle.com 


Dwayne Johnson, "The Rock" had the mother of all cheat meals after eating clean for a consecutive 150 days. Not quite sure how he ate all that but props to him for setting a good example on eating clean.

"This is my reward for 150 consecutive days of eating clean"


Have you planned your cheat meal for this week?

- FitWhitt