Having read this post on my son's blog, I am reminded again of the stupid nutricional mistakes that I made with my kids. In my defense I will say that I grew up breakfasting on Tang and Poptarts, but I know that is really no excuse. So as penence, I will describe some of the worst offenses and offer a healthful suggestion for each.
1. Deep Fried Taco's - This was a family favorite!
This is a variation on Indian Taco's that we ate at the Oklahoma State Fair. It consisted of making a dough out of masa harina and water, filling it with taco seasoned ground beef, sharp cheddar cheese and frijoles, then deep frying it. Hey in the south we will deep fry butter, so...
I served these with salad and guacamole. The dressing for the salad was inevitably ranch. A heart attack in the making...
Suggetion: Don't deep fry anything! Warm a corn tortilla in a heated iron skillet. Fill it with taco seasoned ground turkey, black beans, lettuce, tomatoes and salsa. If you must have cheese, use fat free or low fat cheddar cheese. Serving it with a salad is still good, but use a fat free dressing like Newman's Own Balsamic Vinegarette. Guacamole or sliced avacado can be served as a side or in the taco.
2. Hotdog Pizza - I swear I don't know what I was thinking!
I think I may have been pregnant when I came up with this one. Make a dough out of Bisquick and spread it on a greased pizza pan. bake it for 5 minutes. Cover it with Ragu Spaghetti Sauce, mushrooms, green peppers and hotdog slices. Cover that with grated Velveeta Cheese and cook until the cheese browns. The only good thing I can think of here is that the kids did get a full serving of vegetables.
Suggestion: If you must eat pizza, Kashi has several healthy choices for this. They can be found in the freezer section of your grocery store. If you want to make your own, make it with a whole grain crust. Cover it with Prego Light Tomato Sauce and season it with pizza seasoning. Use a lot of vegetables like onions, mushrooms, sweet peppers, artichokes and black olives. I just don't like brocolli on pizza, sorry. Mozzarella is a better choice of cheese, but get a part low fat or part skim version. If you have to have meat, try grilled chicken or Canadian bacon.
Layered Lettuce Salad - This is a heart attack posing as a salad.
Again, the only nice thing that I can say is that my kids did actually eat vegetables. Layer a 9x13 pan with chopped iceberg lettuce, then a layer of sliced tomatoes. Add a layer of chopped sweet Vidalia onions and a layer of chopped celery, then a layer of crumbled bacon. Add a layer of frozen sweet peas and a layer of chopped boiled eggs. Cover that with 2 cups of mayonaise and sugar mix. Then sprinkle on a layer of sharp cheddar cheese.
Suggestion: Just about any salad out there would be better than this! Right now my favorite is brocolli slaw with roasted ginger dressing. Most of the time I don't even use the dressing. I just like to munch on the slaw.
Chicken and Brocolli Casserole - Deceptively Evil
You think that because you are eating a lean meat, brocolli and a healthy grain this would be a good meal. And it tastes oh, so good. You mix rice, brocolli, chicken breasts, cream of mushroom soup, a couple of eggs, a little milk and cheddar cheese together in a casserole and bake it until it bubbles. Cover it with more cheddar cheese and continue baking for another few minutes until the cheese is melted.
Suggestion: Don't eat any dish that includes cream of mushroom soup. If you really want this at least substitute the soup for the low fat version. Use brown rice instead of white and low fat cheddar instead of regular.
I could go on and on with this. All I can say is that it is too bad that it took me this long to begin to understand the error of my ways. One of my biggest regrets is that I wasn't more healthy with what my children ate. But they did always have plenty of fruits and vegetables available. So son, if you are reading this, I'm glad that you are serving a better diet to your son. Keep up the good work.
Love,
Mom
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
Friday, June 18, 2010
Breakfast Meetings
"Let's gather for a brief moment to celebrate Maureen's birthday. We will have be having a well balanced breakfast. Please join us in 37009.
Please accept this invite if you will be attending so that we can have a headcount.
Thanks,"
This was the actual message in a meeting request that came in this week. Don't get me wrong, I was happy when it stressed that the breakfast would be well balanced. But when I got into the meeting this morning what I found was assorted doughnuts from Dunkin Doughnuts, mixed fruit, cream cheese, bagels and crossants from Publix, orange juice, fruit drink and coffee. Not what I would consider a balanced breakfast. I usually have an egg, whole wheat toast, probiotic yogurt and fruit with water for breakfast. So I ate the so called balanced fare and now I feel bloated. Yuck!
The thing is that the very thin person that wrote that invitation and catered the breakfast actually does think that is a balanced breakfast. I hate that everyone else seems to be able to eat absolute crap and get away with it and I have to eat right or my whole metabolism freaks out. It's not just being fat, it's glucose, triglyceride and potassium blood levels that get all out of whack.
Please accept this invite if you will be attending so that we can have a headcount.
Thanks,"
This was the actual message in a meeting request that came in this week. Don't get me wrong, I was happy when it stressed that the breakfast would be well balanced. But when I got into the meeting this morning what I found was assorted doughnuts from Dunkin Doughnuts, mixed fruit, cream cheese, bagels and crossants from Publix, orange juice, fruit drink and coffee. Not what I would consider a balanced breakfast. I usually have an egg, whole wheat toast, probiotic yogurt and fruit with water for breakfast. So I ate the so called balanced fare and now I feel bloated. Yuck!
The thing is that the very thin person that wrote that invitation and catered the breakfast actually does think that is a balanced breakfast. I hate that everyone else seems to be able to eat absolute crap and get away with it and I have to eat right or my whole metabolism freaks out. It's not just being fat, it's glucose, triglyceride and potassium blood levels that get all out of whack.
Saturday, June 5, 2010
You are just like Daddy!
I've heard that phrase coming from the mouths of my siblings on many occasions. I've heard it from various aunts and assorted other relatives with the change of "You are just like your Dad." I had an inkling that it was true. Then I did something that I wouldn't necessarily recommend to anyone. I asked the VA for my father's medical record. My father died of sudden cardiac death in 1983, so as a next of kin I have a right to those records. But the VA didn't cough them up easily or willingly. I had to physically go to the VA with my father's death certificate and my birth certificate to prove that I had a right to them. Then I had to endure several phone interviews with women who interrogated me about my need for and rights to the information. I pointed out several times that I'd already given them the proof they were requesting. The records arrived on Tuesday in two envelopes. There are about 1000 pages of records and they weren't in any particular order. First I read through them as they were sent and then when the jumbled information wasn't giving me the story that I was looking for, I put them in chronological order as closely as I could. The story that unfolded was sobering. I was not shocked by anything that I learned. I had suspected it for a long time.
The first thing that I learned is that I am truly my father's daughter. The physical and medical similarities that we share are profound. I was hoping when I ordered the records to find something that would enlighten me as to what is going on with me medically and I did. I now believe that the cardiac and nephrological conditions that I'm dealing with are profoundly genetic in nature. I know that there is much I can do to change the risk factors environmentally, but I no longer believe that this is happening because I used to eat white flour or became overweight. It has also made me believe that perhaps the weight problems are also profoundly genetic. That isn't being said as an excuse to not exercise or eat right, but now my goals are changing. I am going to continue to exercise and eat right as a means of not aggravating my weak genetics, and not as a way to lose weight to appease my doctors.
I also learned that despite my former beliefs the care my father received at the hands of the VA medical system was very adequate. For whatever reason, my family has long maintained that in the clinic atmosphere that my father was treated in he was passed from hand to hand and never received the attention that he deserved. What I learned from the records was that there were doctors who not only treated the condition, but tried to get to the cause of the condition. As I say this, I am hoping that the cause of the conditions were two conditions that are now medically recognized but were not appreciated in the years that my father was being treated. One of the conditions was directly addressed in on a page of the records that I received, but not as naming the condition, but describing it and attributing it to another cause.
The most important thing I learned from the records is that high blood pressure, as unsexy as it is medically, isn't just that ho hum thing that everyone gets as they grow older. It is a serious medical condition and it needs to be treated as seriously as my breast cancer was treated. I no longer feel embarrassed that I am wasting a nephrologist's time with my well controlled hypertension. I now see the toll that it took on my father's life and will take on mine if I don't continue to actively control it.
So the next step is to take the information that I gleaned from my father's records and present it as questions to my cardiologists and my nephrologist. That is going to be tricky. I picked up on things, similarities that my father and I shared that have been noted in my medical records, but not appreciated. Should I say to my nephrologist "Well, my father also had this and it lead to that, and it became a major problem. How do I prevent that from happening to me?" My fear is that without asking them to read my father's records they aren't going to appreciate my views or concerns.
The down side is that I feel that I have totally violated my father's privacy and he would be terribly upset and embarrassed if he was alive. There were things in those records that he never told us. It didn't matter because we had long suspected it anyway and it didn't change my opinion or love for him. Still, if my father had been alive and could give me the information without reading them, I think I would have preferred going that route.
The first thing that I learned is that I am truly my father's daughter. The physical and medical similarities that we share are profound. I was hoping when I ordered the records to find something that would enlighten me as to what is going on with me medically and I did. I now believe that the cardiac and nephrological conditions that I'm dealing with are profoundly genetic in nature. I know that there is much I can do to change the risk factors environmentally, but I no longer believe that this is happening because I used to eat white flour or became overweight. It has also made me believe that perhaps the weight problems are also profoundly genetic. That isn't being said as an excuse to not exercise or eat right, but now my goals are changing. I am going to continue to exercise and eat right as a means of not aggravating my weak genetics, and not as a way to lose weight to appease my doctors.
I also learned that despite my former beliefs the care my father received at the hands of the VA medical system was very adequate. For whatever reason, my family has long maintained that in the clinic atmosphere that my father was treated in he was passed from hand to hand and never received the attention that he deserved. What I learned from the records was that there were doctors who not only treated the condition, but tried to get to the cause of the condition. As I say this, I am hoping that the cause of the conditions were two conditions that are now medically recognized but were not appreciated in the years that my father was being treated. One of the conditions was directly addressed in on a page of the records that I received, but not as naming the condition, but describing it and attributing it to another cause.
The most important thing I learned from the records is that high blood pressure, as unsexy as it is medically, isn't just that ho hum thing that everyone gets as they grow older. It is a serious medical condition and it needs to be treated as seriously as my breast cancer was treated. I no longer feel embarrassed that I am wasting a nephrologist's time with my well controlled hypertension. I now see the toll that it took on my father's life and will take on mine if I don't continue to actively control it.
So the next step is to take the information that I gleaned from my father's records and present it as questions to my cardiologists and my nephrologist. That is going to be tricky. I picked up on things, similarities that my father and I shared that have been noted in my medical records, but not appreciated. Should I say to my nephrologist "Well, my father also had this and it lead to that, and it became a major problem. How do I prevent that from happening to me?" My fear is that without asking them to read my father's records they aren't going to appreciate my views or concerns.
The down side is that I feel that I have totally violated my father's privacy and he would be terribly upset and embarrassed if he was alive. There were things in those records that he never told us. It didn't matter because we had long suspected it anyway and it didn't change my opinion or love for him. Still, if my father had been alive and could give me the information without reading them, I think I would have preferred going that route.
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