I almost didn’t do this video.
I honestly thought it would be too wacky and out of the box for some readers to handle.
My change of heart occurred when one of my children said, “Mom, you HAVE to do that video”.
Out of the mouths of babes.
So here I am posting a video about the best trick I know for teaching your kids about the dangers of fast food and hopefully keeping them far far away from it forever – even once they are out of the house and making their own decisions.
While this trick won’t work for older children, if your kids are still quite young, it should work well.  My three kids want absolutely nothing to do with fast food and that includes my teenager who has more freedom away from his parents and has the opportunity to indulge if he chose to.
So here it is.   What do you think? Too wacky or totally on target?
Mom Versus Fast Food (Mom Wins)
Sarah, The Healthy Home Economist
Love it! You know it’s funny when my oldest was 2 1/2 I had just had her little brother and friends were bringing us meals and one in particular brought us pasta and vegetables but brought my daughter a happy meal thinking she wouldn’t eat the “real” food they brought us. Well I thought lets see if all this training on what real food really is has paid off and see what she does with it. It consisted of all things she had never had before: mcdonalds hamburger, french fries, and milk, oh and a toy of course. I handed her the meal and she took one bite of the hamburger and looked so grossed out she wouldn’t even touch the other stuff. And that was it. She got it. I then told her I was proud of her that food was no good for her and made her some real food.
I would give ANYTHING to have had a childhood like this. I spent the first half of my childhood with my mom around. She did a lot of home cooking, but even that was canned veggies, etc…. simple stuff and lots of boxes/canned items. For a time, she worked at the cafeteria at school and I got TWO lunches. I loved this…. of course, but school food is also junk food. We had a “junk drawer” at home… the bottom cabinet drawer, filled with treats. This wasn’t heavily guarded or anything. After school, I would take bologna slices and roll them up and eat them… along with cold hot dogs… while I sat in front of the television doing nothing. My father worked a lot and my mother was too busy with her horses and my sister (who shared her love of horses and being outdoors).
Then, when my parents divorced, I moved with my sister and father. I have NEVER seen my father cook. Not even a summer BBQ. I remember having a BBQ but not seeing him use it. For a long time, breakfast was a croissantwich (no egg) from Burger King, lunch and snack at my high school consisted of cup-o-noodles/burritos/chicken sandwiches, and dinner was usually Jack In The Box. 0_0 This lasted for YEARS! I was the only one who would cook every now and then when my boyfriend at the time came would come over.
Now, as a 28yr old and mother to a 12 year old (yes, teen mom), I am STILL dealing with over 10 yrs of depression, an addiction to fast food and an ever growing mid section. My son is skinny but only because of his dad’s genes. He eats just as bad and that only adds to the guilt and depression. He also has emotional issues and is on medication (which I HATE!!!!) which the school system nearly forced me to put him on so he could be “just like all the other kids”. Mental issues run in our family. So does breast cancer.
I am sick because I grew up sick and I am teaching my child to be sick. With depression, it is EXTREMELY hard to get through the change. The hardest part is not having someone to guide you. I am almost 30 and one of my biggest wishes is for someone to be MY parent for once. I still wish for that mom or dad to parent me because I did not get it when I should have.
Thanks for reading :0)
Dear Cassandra, I feel for you, this is tough… But there’s a light on the horizon: you! You can make the choice right here, right now: no more! Please find help, you are not alone! For a start read the journey of this family: http://paleoparents.com/ start reading a lot about nutrition and cooking, get inspired, feed yourself knowledge, then feed yourself and your family healthy food, bite by bite. Feel free to drop me a note if you wish! [email protected]
Take care, be well, Mo
Hang in there Cassandra!! It sounds like you are aware of what you need to do, now it’s just the execution. It will not happen over night, but you sound like you are making progress and I applaude your awareness and efforts!! 🙂
Hi Cassandra
I think it’s great that you’re reading this blog and learning about real food. Take it one day at a time. I hope eating yummy traditional food will boost your mood and you’ll be rid of your depression. I too used to eat a LOT of junk and my mum was never a cook or role modelled good eating habits (I’ve seen her demolish a container of store-bought ice-cream on her own, in one sitting). I feel so good having started down this path and look at how far I have come in a year. Small changes regularly will get you there 🙂
All the best in changing over to real food and with teaching your son to my good food choices too XXX
Cassandra, your story brought tears to my eyes. I am a psychiatric nurse who can so empathize with your nutritional and emotional dilema. Never give up! Even small changes will improve your mood. I would be happy to mentor you and give you more and more resources. You have found one of the best already right here. Feel free to email me at natural nutrition nurse @gmail.com
I can totally relate to parts of your story. It is truly very hard when depression and other issues seem to interfere with our ability to make the changes that might make the difference in the depression (and the other issues.) How do you spell downward spiral? You hang in there. It may take some of us a long time to get there, but you will get there eventually.
Just always remember that you are better off for every little bit of success you have, better to have one meal that has less chemicals in it than to eat even that one meal with chemical laden foods while beating yourself up about how all of your meals “ought” to be. So always resist the urge to beat yourself up. Recognize that self recrimination will lead to more bad meals. Instead give yourself a pat on the back and tell yourself that you made a difference and that you will make another small difference again soon. And you will!!
I applaud your efforts, but I disagree with the methodology. You gave that industrial food giant money and added to the landfill! My kids (5 and 7) have NEVER eaten at McDonald’s or BK either. But we simply just don’t patronage them. I teach my kids at home the importance of eating and cooking healthy meals – by involving them. When traveling, we pack lunches, when life is hectic, I plan ahead with a healthy crock-pot meal and I carry snacks like nuts, whole fruit, boxes of Organic raisins and stainless steel water bottles.
My girls know that it’s bad because I show them and they taste real food and don’t even like the taste of their school lunches – because they know how real food is supposed to taste!
I bet McD’s is thinking – go ahead, keep showing this video…we’ll keep making money!
Best thing I did to get my kids OFF fast food was let them watch Jamie Oliver’s demonstration of how big business makes chicken nuggets and how big business makes pink slime. Kids have never asked to go to McDonald’s or Burger King again. Another way to avoid the fast food is to just never buy it. We have a KFC and Taco Bell, but because my husband and I have never darkened their doors, my kids just don’t think to ask about it. We’ve also made sure we talk to them about the TV commercials and what they’re trying to be sold. Of course that was after they were older, but I think a 5 year old can start to grasp the concepts. I think a better drink to toss would have been a soda drink, rather than milk. I cringed at the thought of the milk going into the trash. Maybe it has rgHB in it, but it was still better than the rest.
Cute, very cute Thanks for doing this video!
Absolutely brilliant! Period.
Sarah, did your kids keep wanting to go back for the toys though?
I appreciate the idea. I have a friends whose 7 yo refuses to eat out at any restaurant (except chuck-e-cheese) without them first stopping at McD’s for a burger that he takes to the other restaurant. There are a lot of lazy parents out there and a lot of people who don’t like to cook or know how, but it’s important to start the messages early. we don’t give our daughter processed sugars (except for the occasional glass of watered down oj – i typically make her smoothies from scratch), and she is a lovely, manageable, non-tantrum throwing 2 yo. setting good habits early is the best way to prevent bad habits later. people always say, “good luck when she’s older and hanging out with her friends who eat that way,” which i think is just a way for them to justify their own lazy decisions. but i also don’t think a piece of cake later is going to kill her. we’ve established a savory and ethnically varied diet for her (which is the way we eat anyway) and i think it will stick even if she does junk out on sugar at some point. it’s also easier to keep kids off of fast food if you raise them vegetarian, which we’re doing as well. i can definitely see how throwing away food you just paid for would stick with a kid, so i don’t think this is too wacky. sometimes we have to go to extremes to make our point.
I swear, there’s so many people who use the excuse that the kids will grow up to want it more when they’re ‘deprived’ of it, but I look at this differently. A child’s nervous system and brain develop 90% in the first 6 years of life, so if I can make the best nutrition choices possible for them during this critical time, it’s a good thing! What they do when they get older is out of my control, but that should never stop you from giving them the best possible food while it is up to you!
Awesome. Thank you for sharing this useful lesson!
Yeah…wacky. I’m not an extreme health nut or anything. We do consume grass fed meat/ raw dairy, lots of fruits and veggies, nuts. My kids are super healthy. We do have fast food on occasion. My problem with this approach is going to the extreme so that if my kids spend the night with a friend, and that family “treats” the kids to McD’s…what will my child do? Will he/she have a breakdown because this family is forcing them to eat something that will poison him/her? Or what about the birthday party at McDonald’s? My kids never knew toys came with food until they got into the restaurant. And we had that conversation about the toys being made by kids in China and that’s why we purchase the food we want and not the “kid’s meal” just for the toy. I think we can educate successfully without going to extremes like this. I don’t want my kids going into panic mode if they are ever confronted without the choice to avoid fast food. Because it will happen.