to think people try to be too healthy

[rwonknextdoor]

Sometimes I find it hard to buy proper crisps these days, so often there are baked crisps. To me these just taste too sweet as all they have done is replaced the fat with sugar and fat is probably healthier in the first place.

Read a thread where people were saying pizza once a month was fine. In my house we have pizza night, chips night and burgers night once a week. This means that out of 21 meals 18 are healthy. I think its important to feed real food otherwise once they grow up and move out they will probably binge on junk if they were not given any growing up. Ive seen this happen to a few people raised on a strict diet.

[Nooname01]

Well OP I agree with your basic point but not many people on mumsnet will!!
It's kind of an alternate universe from the real world I live in..

I feed my dc pizza every week, sausages every week, chips every week.
They also have biscuits, sweets, cake, squash, fizzy drinks.
They also have 7 or 8 a day fruit and veg a day. They also eat olives, tofu, nuts, oily fish, quinoa etcetera.
They are all active and a healthy weight.

I am realistic about the world they are growing up in, I want them to have a healthy attitude to all types of food and portion sizes, so when I'm no longer there to police them they can still be healthy.

[suzannecanthecan]

OP, but you didn't say
'people try too hard to be healthy'
You said
'People try to be too healthy'

We are just responding to what you said, how are we to know that you mea?nt something different?

[suzannecanthecan]

nothing went over anyones head
quite the opposite

[slightlyconfused85]

That point isn't clear then OP. Nevertheless I still think yabu - you can't try too hard to feed your family healthily, bearing in mind that less healthy foods are fine in moderation - there's no reason to fail at this if you are a competent cool.

[slightlyconfused85]

Cook not cool!

[Lurkedforever1]

Yanbu. All the low fat diet food tastes not only like shit, it gives people the wrong idea about what constitutes a healthy attitude to food, and what constitutes healthy eating.
Stuff like cake, crisps, choc etc that we don't need for any reason we should eat knowing we don't need it and are eating purely for enjoyment. If you eat some rank tasting supposedly healthy version it defeats the purpose and allows you to kid yourself you aren't just eating it for pleasure, therefore it's more likely to be consumed in larger quantities.
People who think reduced sugar drinks are a healthier choice wnbu to actually read the label and discover that instead of the fructose and glucose, which we do actually need in varying quantities according to physical activity and metabolism, they are instead consuming unnatural alternatives we don't need and that have more negative impact than the natural sugars.
I also wnbu to slap the next person in real life who tells me they would be huge if they ate how I did, when actually if they considered why and what they currently ate compared to why and what I eat they'd realise if they ate how I did, they'd be better off.

[specialsubject]

high summer, lots of lovely produce about and you are eating this crap?

why would you do that? And don't tell me it is cheaper, takeaway pizzas and burgers cost a bomb.

[Bragadocia]

I don't really understand the demonising of certain foods. If i take mince, squish into small balls, brown them in a pan and serve them with spaghetti (ground, shaped wheat), this is considered okay because it's 'meatballs'.

If I take mince, squish it into larger patties, brown them in a pan, and serve them in a bun (ground, shaped wheat), this is not okay because it's 'burger'.

[FlowerBomber]

I don't think it's a bad thing to try to eat healthily. I also think it's a good idea to teach children healthy habits. I don't believe that many children are compelled to binge on fast food because they are encouraged to eat an apple instead of crisps.

[Nooname01]

Flower bomber, I agree I just think if we set up "bad" foods as forbidden or only as very rare treats then we are making it harder for dc when they have the freedom to eat what they like.

I was really strict with coke/diet coke and my 2 eldest ( 6 and 9) have become obsessed with it because it is so bad and forbidden! So any chance at other houses or parties they are guzzling it like I mainline coffee!!

I have now introduced it at home and they are gradually getting over it! They can now have it with meals if it's in the house - it's not forbidden and they have control over it.

I already had the same sort of approach with sweets etc and they are very good at self regulating. It's actually been a good test because I can clearly see the effect of making something forbidden contrasted with having it relatively freely available but with heavy parental influence to learn a healthy attitude towards it.

[PrincessTheresaofLiechtenstein]

bragadocia spot on, people forget to look at the actual ingredients! Similarly, pasta with tomato and cheese apparently = a decent "hot meal" and pizza = junk. Same nutritional value.

[cleanmyhouse]

whatyouseeiswhatyouget

Can you explain the logic in your calculation please? it has baffled me. Why are you mutiplying 3 x 3?

[Lurkedforever1]

Definitely agree with noname giving the impression foods are forbidden or hailing them as treats means losing any ability to regulate your intake according to need. I've always had an open policy on crap like sweets, chocolate, cake, crisps, biscuits etc, always have them in and dd doesn't bother much as a result. Things like smoked salmon that are hailed as treats she will gorge on. Or fatty takeaway, it's rare enough to be a treat, but unlike the salmon she feels the bad side effects of too much fat straightaway because it's not the usual outcome of eating and would need bribing to eat anything that fatty again in the next week or so.

[flanjabelle]

The thing is it is perfectly possible to eat those foods in a healthy way. For example, last night we had burgers. I ate one burger, in a bun with salad and corn on the cob. there is nothing wrong with that meal.

Dd often has oven chips, but she will have it with a freshly cooked piece of chicken breast and salad/veg. Nothing wrong there.

It's all about moderation and combining the less healthy things with more healthy things imo.

For what it's worth, I have only just realised this. My weight crept up to 12stone8, despite trying every diet out there and failing miserably because I was denying myself all the 'bad foods'. I have dropped down 34lbs in the last 6 months, from a size 18 to a 12 and I haven't banned any foods. I just eat everything in moderation.

[FlowerBomber]

I don't forbid anything. My DD doesn't have sweets such as Haribo because she doesn't like them. Every time she's asked for one I've given it to her. She always hands it back, I think she finds them too sweet.

She does have chocolate but occasionally, not habitually. She almost never asks for any at, for example a supermarket checkout, but if on the rare occasion she picks up a packet of buttons I buy them for her. She has ice cream but it is normally associated with things like a day out to a country fair, so a genuine treat.

She is as happy to eat an oatcake as a digestive so I tend to offer the former. Pudding is only ever fruit or yoghurt.

She only drinks milk or water, her choice I've offered other options.

We have eaten at MacDonalds', we eat pizza and fish & chips, but we try to do it in moderation.

[FlowerBomber]

I also don't push my DD to eat everything on her plate if she doesn't want to. She still understands how to just eat until she's had enough, not until she's full and I want her to continue to recognise that feeling.

[TinklyLittleLaugh]

Exactly Bragadocia, I am the queen of fakeaway, but it's all good stuff with proper ingredients.

The best way to stop your kids eating MacDonalds is to introduce them to proper homemade burgers. We have popped in Maccies on the odd occasion because it is quick and cheap, (there are six of us). Every single time we end up sitting there going, "Meh, this is so disappointing".

[muminhants1]

Crisps are delicious - and like pouring grease down your throat. No nutritional value whatsoever.

I know what you mean about trying too hard, the "clean eating" fad for example. I eat loads of good stuff, and some bad stuff, and run and swim regularly. I am a size 8-10. If I didn't exercise I'd either eat less or get fat(ter).

I'd never darken McDonalds door though and I'm not sure my son ever has either. Certainly not with me. He likes his food, but fortunately exercises a lot.

Some people really don't enjoy food, they just see it as fuel so it's very easy for them not to overeat. My mum is like that, she like a big bowl of porridge for breakfast but hardly eats anything for the rest of the day and if you say buy a sandwich she'll only have one out of the packet of 2 (whereas I could comfortably eat three).

[Lurkedforever1]

There's a happy medium between not enjoying your food and therefore only eating for fuel, and enjoying it too much so you overeat to the point of weight gain ( or that you enjoy it too much and have to continually monitor it to avoid weight gain).
I enjoy my food, as does dd and most people I've met who are effortlessly slim. But the majority of the time I can think of/ am doing more enjoyable things so the times I eat too much because I'm enjoying it, are balanced out by the times I am enjoying something else more and forget to eat enough.

[DoJo]

how can you be 'too healthy'?
Is there a point where good health becomes pathological?
Surely that's a logical impossibility??

Of course there is, assuming (as most people are) that you are talking about physical health. Pursuing health and fitness to the exclusion of a well-rounded life in other areas is bad for mental health in the same way that any behaviour can be when taken to extremes. I know someone who is so obsessed with their health that they are unable to enjoy any occasion where others are eating unhealthily as it puts her on edge to see people 'indulging'. It makes her miserable (and it's not fun to watch for her friends or family either), but she is probably about as healthy as a person can be physically.

[Rainbunny]

What you're calling "real world" food was invented in the 1960s-1970s and perfected using chemical colourings & flavourings/preservatives/high levels of salt & sugar/transfats etc... in the 1980s.

A general return to unprocessed food for the population cannot come soon enough. Junk food really should be a rare treat not a weekly staple IMO.

[Atenco]

Is there a point where good health becomes pathological?

Well nothing to do with the OP's point, but I have a friend who is a perfectionist by nature and every now and then his perfectionism about food goes off the wall. A few years he was avoiding so many things that he considered bad for him that he got seriously thin and unhealthy.

[maybebabybee]

OP YABU posting this on MN. Have you read any section of this website before?

I fucking love junk food (the greasier and saltier the better) but I couldn't eat it every day obviously otherwise I'd be the size of an elephant. But once a month is too little too. I have a 'treat meal' once a week and everything else is healthy and balanced. Not crazy though - no kale smoothies/juice cleanses for me!

[fakenamefornow]

, but I think the vast majority of families do find a happy medium within a pretty broad tolerance

I don't. If this were the case the vast majority of people would be slim.

I used to think it was all about what people eat, increasing I'm starting to think that actually it's the amount people eat that's the problem.

I know a couple of people, have known them both for years. Person A has always been overweight, is now very overweight, she insists that all she eats is healthy food, from what I've seen this is true, she eats loads of it though. Person B eats crap, but not much, ignores mealtimes, just eats when hungry, usually take away, never cooks and is slim. I sometimes wonder who is the healthiest, I suspect it's person B. I might add person B doesn't have a family so this makes eating as she does easier.

Anyway, in answer to your AIBU, yes you are, how can there be any such thing as 'too healthy'.