17/365 - Junk Food Day AKA Birthday Celebrations

This past weekend we celebrated our oldest daughter's birthday.  Part of our family's birthday tradition is that we let the kids choose the food menu for the entire day.  Each child has his own original palate they enjoy satisfying and it's fun to see what they come up with.  Unfortunately, it's rarely healthy.  

Breakfast: Chocolate donuts and Cinnamon Toast Crunch

Lunch: Sub sandwich with chips

Snack: Bell pepper with Ranch dipping sauce. (I may have asked the question, "Would you like to include something healthy in your day?")

Dinner: Pepperoni Pizza

Cake and Ice Cream

What was my game plan? It would be easy to eat my own special foods for the day, but that would be insulting for the kids.  They enjoy picking out the menu for the whole family and it's fun for them to eat it as a family. So to keep the peace and the spirits high, I decided to eat small portions. 

I had one donut for breakfast and I was surprised how lousy I felt. If it had been a big ol' cream filled donut, I would have understood why I felt like throwing up thirty minutes after I ate it, but it was just a small old-fashioned chocolate. Ever notice that when you've been eating healthier, your body suddenly reacts to junk food? It's also scary because junk food doesn't effect me when I'm eating a lot of it.  It's like my body gets used to it and I can rationalize it's not "so bad" because I don't feel "horrible." Substandard food trickery.

Lunch was actually pretty good.  We put a ton of lettuce in the sandwich, she said she wanted a little, so we ran with the opportunity.  A serving of chips isn't a bad thing, if you can keep from going back for seconds.

For dinner, I was running around making sure five little girls and the rest of our kids had everything they needed.  I ate two pieces and a big glass of water when everyone was settled. By the time we had cake and ice cream I was too tired for more than a sliver.

I've found that a day full of junk isn't the worst thing that can happen to your health efforts if you simply eat small portions, exercise sometime that day, and get back to healthy habits the next day. One day doesn't cause damage, it's repeating the junk food day over and over that does.