I’m not going to lie – the last 2 days I felt sort of miserable! I couldn’t stay awake past 9pm last night, and passed out. I was up a bunch of times throughout the night! I just realized today that my cycle is set to start in a couple of days so I totally set myself up for deprivation and depression, ha! I am always an animal at this point in my cycle, have less patience and want to eat chocolate all day long. Glad I got through this day. Last night I was eating handfuls of sunflower seeds at 8pm – not good! and then when I did the “weigh in” it was the same weight as the second day. The weight is just to test if you were “reactive ” to a food. I don’t really care if I lose weight or not, but you are supposed to. My goals for this program were more to see how my body reacts to certain foods, get back on board with healthy eating, and work towards better health. (and to take some time off to rest my body, since I don’t do that much at all!)
Today, day 3! Lunch was exciting – cream of broccoli soup – I couldn’t wait. I made it this morning and was tasting it at 8am. I did pretty well with today, with the exception of breaking around 3pm when I almost always have a piece of Dove milk chocolate. I took a bite. It was excellent. I needed it. In the afternoon you could have 12-15 almonds. I probably had about 20. I think my hunger is staving off a bit, but I’m tired of eating the same foods. Tomorrow I get to have coffee. I am so excited to go to bed and make coffee in the morning. I don’t even like coffee that much. But you can have it again after the initial 3 days – with sugar and half and half. Done!! In the afternoon, I also get to have almond butter (with carrots). This program is 20 days, we’ll see if I can stick to it. Almost fell off the wagon today – and yesterday and I’m very tired!
As far as exercise, I feel fine without the exercise. I might take the rest of the week off and see how my back is feeling. I have a new outlook on exercise and feel like I don’t have to pound my body 6-7 days a week. I feel fine not exercising actually!
TODDLER SNACKING – WHY IT IS A PROBLEM
Today I saw this interesting article in Parents magazine that resonated with me. I believe the author has this blog. The article was about how the kids are being fed “treats” everywhere we look. I totally agree. It has to stop! I am all about treats in moderation and my kids have treats at home pretty regularly. Of course some of the treats in the real world and what my kids think are treats might be a little different but they’ll thank me in 20 years. 
And they do eat cupcakes and crap given out outside of my house. I’m nervous for what we have ahead of us! They go to school and get cupcakes to celebrate birthdays, cookies for holidays, and cupcakes and cake at birthday parties. It’s all CRAP! I am all for homemade non boxed non chemical treats in moderation. However, why can’t we celebrate with a piece of fruit, a granola bar, something healthy! I feel this just contributes to the obesity problem. In the article, she talks about soccer games where the kids play for 30 min – 1 hour and then there is a treat at the end – something unhealthy. And I remember reading a story about Dreena’s vegan cookies about how she made healthier cookies because her kids were getting HUGE cookies at the end of a sporting event. It’s kind of sickening.
And I will tell you that when I was making Nick’s birthday treat to bring in – I initially was going to send spinach muffins, but I didn’t want him to be embarrassed. We ended up with the granola bar cars which I believe are on the healthier side. One of the treats he brought home one day was a HUGE ball that was made out of cookie crisp cereal and marshmallows. I almost vomited! It went into the trash! It was a day they didn’t have snack at school because they had another event so the birthday treat was put in their bags. Thank GOD! But what are they eating at school that I don’t even know about!?!?
In the article, the author talks about talking to the coach at the beginning of the season and asking if all snacks could be fruit. She even included a letter you could email to the other parents. I agree with that! I’m disgusted by the amounts of junk food that is exposed to kids that are under 5. What are your thoughts on the snacks? How can we regulate?
Totally agree with the snacking! I try to give my kids fruit or granola bars for a snack, but it’s so hard to find things that are portable and unprocessed. I try to do raisins/cranberries instead of fruit snacks… it works sometimes..
Baker’s preschool doesn’t allow anything homemade – has to have a food label on it for allergy reasons. You can’t even bring in cut up fruit or veggies because they might be cross contaminated with a knife. Baker gets a lot of doughnuts and prepackaged cupcakes at school for parties and I’ve just decided it is okay. He usually is great about deciding for himself that he already had a treat at school so he doesn’t want dessert after lunch or dinner. Anyway, I just try not to even give the “fun food” a whole lot of energy. I swear sometimes when we make a huge deal about a food not being healthy, the more they want it
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That makes a lot of sense about not giving it energy, and that is smart, about not allowing food to be brought in – you never know!
A friend of mine commented that after seeing some of the homes of the kids in her daughter’s class, she wouldn’t want her kid to eat something that came out of their kitchen! I never would have thought of that, but it’s a good point – kinda gross to think about the cleanliness (or lack thereof) of some people’s homes.
But back to the food thing…it’s a concern, for sure, but if a kid has an otherwise balanced diet and gets plenty of activity, I don’t really see the big deal.
I wrote the article about snacks and am so glad you liked it! It’s such an important issue and it requires that we all take action as parents. Kids are getting snacks at every turn–and we can’t keep relying on unhealthy processed foods/drinks if we want them to live long, healthy lives. Thanks so much for sharing the piece and for increasing awareness on this topic!
Here is the link to the online version of the piece:
http://www.parents.com/recipes/nutrition/kids/the-snack-epidemic/