A Mommy Story

I managed to erase the gain I had from Blissdom this past week with a 2 lb loss, putting me back at 187 lbs. While I’m glad for this loss, I’m a little upset that I wasted two weeks essentially going nowhere with my weight, and that my obsession with food got the better of me at Blissdom.

Food and I have a long, sordid history together. My mom was a single mom who worked all the time. While I had a babysitter in the very early years, I soon proved myself to be trustworthy and safe enough to not burn down the house after school until she got home, and so many nights I was alone in the house. This mean dinner often consisted of something easy to make – either a sandwich or something I could reheat in the microwave.

So most nights dinner would be a monstrous plate of reheated spaghetti, reheated mac ‘n cheese, or a ham sandwich with a pile of Doritos as a side. In the summertime, I nearly lived off of the freeze-n-eat popsicles in the heat. And let’s not even discuss how many trips I made to the golden arches. Vegetables and real fruit (as in, fruit that wasn’t already in a can in heavy syrup) rarely touched my lips.

I don’t blame my mom. She worked hard, and had a kid who was a real pain in the ass to deal with. Picky eater doesn’t even begin to describe my eating habits. But somewhere in college I became aware of a whole new world of foods, and suddenly my tastes changed and things I once thought gross were delicious.

Example: I always gagged at rice as a kid (maybe one too many viewing of The Lost Boys?), but now? I love rice. White rice, brown rice, jasmine rice, you name it – rice is yummy. Same is now true for broccoli. And seafood.

My hope is that I can reduce the amount of processed crap that my family eats, so that maybe my daughters will find good foods that they like instead of convenience foods with little redeeming value. Of course, this is no longer the 80’s – when Twinkies ruled the world – and we all care a little bit more about what’s in our food now. I’m sure my mom never would have bought a lot of that junk if she knew then what she knows now.

Here’s hoping to another loss this coming week, and that I can continue to make baby steps to get rid of the majority of junk in my diet.