It’s Tuesday and we’re hungry! CoupleDumb is talking about food this week. Of course after just getting off a weekend cruise where the mantra is ‘Freestyle Baby’, the food routine is a little off for us. However, as parents, we can’t maintain this. We can’t eat breakfast at 2 in the afternoon and drink a shake for dinner when you have 3 kids looking at you like Oliver Twist with a bowl saying ‘Please sir, I want some more’. But as any parent knows, kids are not eating as well as they should and the obesity level in this country for children is staggering. Today, Fat Albert would not be an anomaly but an average in some communities.
Lee says: My relationship with food has always been more like Ike and Tina meet at a buffet. My weight was an issue even when I was born. As a 9+ pound baby, I had the honor of ‘ruining my mother’. Of course, after several years of therapy, I realize that the incompetent obstetrician should have done a cesarean to yank my large yet very cute butt out of my Mommy but that was a very long time ago. So food has always been my foil, comforter, playmate and arch nemesis all rolled into a delicious role which I dip in soy sauce with a lot of wasabi.
However, as a mother and therapist, I realize that my relationship with food can be passed down to my children. Genetically they will be predisposed to heftiness but this is offset by Paul’s reed like figure. What is the bigger concern is our eating habits and attitude towards food in general. There is no mistaking that Paul and I enjoy eating. We are self proclaimed foodies and there has never been anything that Paul has been offered that he won’t try. I am more finicky but Paul, not so much.
We can see our influence on the kids already. Genetically, the three kids get my love of white rice. It’s really amazing. Paul can take it or leave it since he wasn’t raised with it. Me? I was raised to be a rice ‘sommelier’ and learned how to pair it with the proper accompaniment. For me, rice is the main course, not a side dish. Even though I stopped eating rice almost 10 years ago, my kids adore it and will often just opt to eating it plain.
The biggest issue we have at home is sugar. Sure, blame that fat girl for this one but honestly, I am all about the savory. The sugar thing boggles me to no end. We have mentioned before that at a very early age we had to do an intervention with Jeannie because of her Peep addiction (we are very happy to announce that she has been clean for 7 months) but the boys seem to be heading down the same path. Not Peeps necessarily but sugar I general. Bobby’s favorite question is ‘Is today a dessert day?’
I don’t know whether to put a ban on the sweet crack or not. I am non-committal either way. I occasionally will eat a dessert but for the most part I would rather have a slice of bread or tuna fish sandwich. But that will not change the problem. Our kids spend most of the time with us but on occasion, they do visit my parents or brother’s family. Even though we have eliminated juices and unnecessary sweets in our home, I know they drink juice when they visit others. After a few minutes of playing at my brother’s house, you will always find one of the boys at the fridge jonesing for a sugar fix. As an addiction professional, I have thought of creating a rehab center for kids with these issues. What do you think of Peepheads Anonymous or Sugar Junkies?
Paul says: I like trying different foods. I’ve been asked on numerous occasions, ‘are you sure that you want to eat that’ by restaurant wait staff. I have had to throw down with an Asian lady at a dim sum place because I wanted to order the white squishy thing with brown ooze in the middle. I said, ‘I’d like that’. She said, ‘no you wouldn’t’. I said, ‘yes I would’. She said, ‘no you wouldn’t’. She was right. I didn’t like it.
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