Thoughts on food...

I'm an extreme purist when it comes to food. My ultimate dream is to grow and raise 100% of the food I eat. In the meantime, I try my best to eat as if I'm doing that already.

I am nowhere NEAR that right now. Taking care of a tiny baby and not sleeping has made me forget to eat most of the time, and therefore accept what anyone places in front of me the rest of the time. I'm paying for it now... I just realized that my baby is congested and rubbing his face all the time because he is allergic to dairy protein, and I need to cut it out of my diet. I had been doing that for two weeks when I accidentally ate some cheese, and then my diet went out the window. He has been crying for two days now, non-stop, WRITHING with gas pain and hardly able to breathe through his own snot (which he keeps gagging on as it drips down his throat).

Bellow are my admittedly extremist views. Do not be offended by my insanity, please.

I became a pretty serious sugar addict in high school, and I am still paying for that today with a weak immune system and a lazy pancreas. It's still easy for me to backslide into my dependance (my mom made a tray of brownies last weekend, and I must have eaten 6 brownies a day until the whole tray was gone). In my case (as in the case with many addicts), there is no such thing as moderation and I just have to go cold turkey or live with my problem forever. Most people I know are sugar addicts as well, they just don't know it because they can't admit it to themselves or they don't see why they should. I don't want Luca to end up an addict, or worse, an addict who has no idea he is addicted. Also, I learned from nannying that if you have sugar in the house (much like television) that's all the kids will ask for all the time and you will end up using it as a bargaining tool to get them to do normal things like read a book or go outside. Kids don't need sugar or TV and both are addictive (and both produce behaviors I do not want to deal with as a parent), so I'm banning both of them.

In my mind, there is no such thing as poison "in moderation". In my experience, cutting kids off from junk doesn't make them want it more, since you can't want what you've never had. Also, there is a big difference between banning something "BECAUSE I SAID SO" and banning things for positive reasons that the whole family can get behind. If you treat your kids with respect in regards to the boundaries you set for them, they're a lot more likely to respect those boundaries.

When I think about how I want to raise Luca in regards to food, these are the things that come to mind:

1) During his first two years, ONLY WHOLE FOODS (nothing that comes in a package) and mostly local foods (definitely the first foods he eats will have to be straight from the farmer's market).

2) ZERO sugar until age 4. Only occasional honey or maple syrup (not in big amounts you would put on waffles, just a teaspoon to sweeten oatmeal, for example). Baked goods can only be consumed after 4 if I make them myself at home, with said small amounts of either maple syrup or honey. Molasses is also fine.

3) ZERO fast food. ZERO. EVER. That includes most restaurant foods. Luckily we live in an area where there is plenty of high quality food to be found in restaurants!

4) ZERO caffeine, artificial ingredients, artificial colors, etc. Not even at birthday parties (I will bake him approved cupcakes and bring them with us, so he doesn't feel left out). Not even on holidays (that's right, no trick-or-treating). Traditions of our culture based around junk will be replaced with family activities involving the outdoors, charity, or great literature ("Sleepy Hollow", anyone?).

5) After he goes through puberty, he can start making some of his own food choices. But I will not allow any junk food in the house and we will not eat out as a family at regular restaurants.

AND THEN WE WILL ALL LIVE HAPPILY EVER AFTER.