Thursday, March 29, 2012

Diet Changes For All

I read this blog post today about kids who eat processed foods.

I'm currently switching my entire eating lifestyle to "clean eating". No more processed crap, no more food with ingredient lists that are as long as a novel, and no ingredients that I can't pronounce or have no clue why it's in my food in the first place.

I will admit that Annika eats processed foods. Actually she's pretty bad, I'd say 95% of her diet is something processed. She eats fruit snacks, Goldfish, and a ton of other "snacks". I just recently convinced her to again try bananas and raisins but that's about it for fruit and don't even get me started on veggies.

Kids learn by example and she's going to eat what I serve her. What have I been serving her since she could eat normal foods??? Processed snacks. Why? Well, I have a million reasons and excuses why. It's easier, it's cheaper, she likes it. But it's not good for her.

So I'm slowing and gradually making the switch. Today I got her to take 1 bite of an apple. Progress? A little, she typically won't even look at an apple or allow it anywhere near her.

My goal is in 9 months to have Annika off all processed foods. In 9 months Annabel will be one year old and she'll be ready for real food but for her I want "real" food to be real. I don't want her to even start the processed food trap at all.

My main reason for all of this is looking back at my parents dying. Both were in the their 50s when they died. While heart disease wasn't the leading cause of death for either of them (mom had sepsis from a kidney infection and dad was a severe alcoholic) on both of their death certificates a contributing factor to their death was heart disease. My grandmother on my mom's side (who is still alive) had triple bypass surgery in her 50s, my grandfather on my dad's side (who recently died) had multiple strokes and heart disease. I can't allow this to happen to us. I don't want to not see my grandchildren grow up.

So that's our challenge and with our strong willed Annika it's going to be a tough one! By December our home will be processed food free!

1 comment:

  1. Two things ...
    1. Read "In Defense of Food" by Michael Pollan
    2. Have you ever looked into Baby-led weaning? It would be for Annabel, not Annika. We started it with Samantha when she was 6 months ...and she is an incredible eater! She had salmon and broccoli for dinner tonight! We are also very much into local, organic, sustainable, whole foods.

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