roses in my heart

I think I'm missing something...

I'm not big on McDonalds. I mean left to me, I don't think we would ever eat there, but Amanda adores their Cheeseburger Happy Meals, and so occasionally we find ourselves in line at McDonalds after a skating lesson or dance class. It's sad, I know... I think that Amanda's fondness of that place has more to do with the marketing than the food though (but she'd never tell you that). I think it has more to do with the toy of the week. When I was young, restaurants didn't give out toys or treats with meals...not even McDonalds. A few weeks ago Amanda was disappointed when Grandma & Grandpa took her out for supper and they went to Montana's...no toy to take home. Likewise when we took Amanda and her friend Britney out to Denny's before the carnival at the Church a while ago, she was disappointed again...no toy... Both times she would have preferred McDonalds even though I'm positive she preferred the food at Montana's and Denny's.

A friend of mine recently mentioned the movie,
'Supersize Me'. I hadn't heard much about it, but did check out the website and a blog on it this weekend. I actually think I'd like to see this movie, but I'm not so sure my daughter would like me to see it...as it may reduce the number of McDonalds trips she gets...afterall she already has enough toys.

Here's a quote from the blog:

"Morgan Spurlock went on a 30 day McDonalds only diet. 3 meals a day. Only food that McD's sells over the counter. And he must supersize the meal if they ask him. He started off the diet in perfect health, and at 185lbs. He got the help of 3 doctors a nutritionist and a personal trainer to monitor he progress...and for health reasons. For a man his size they recommended 2500 calories a day. The figured that he was eating 5000 calories a day.

A couple of finds:

- a regular Yogurt parfait + granola has more calories than hot fudge sundae
- only 7 things on the menu contain no sugar – french fries, hashbrowns, iced tea, coffee, diet coke, chicken mcnuggets, and sausage….even the salads contain sugar
- “results for liver are obscene beyond anything I would have thought” – one of his doctors, after 21 days

The final report:

He suffered from massive headaches when he didn’t eat McD, mood swings, and felt depressed and exhausted most of the time. His medical tests showed that he had 2x the risk of heart failure and heart disease, his liver was fat, his cholesterol was 230 and he gained an amazing 24.5 lbs. Oh, and mentioned that his sex drive was “worthless”. He also said that he had massive cravings for McD's when he wasn't eating. Overall, he ate 30lbs of sugar, 12 lbs of fat, and took him 5 months to lose 20 lbs after the fact.

Watch the movie. Think about what you are eating. Crazy, crazy stuff. Basically, the doctors told him to stop 3 weeks in because his body was (especially liver) was very sick. Insane.

Oh, he puts some of the burgers into glass jars for a few weeks to see how they decompose. After 10 weeks he throws them out. The fries look like they were bought that day. No mould. No fungus. He wanted to see how long they could go, but his intern mistakenly threw them out. Very creepy."

I find this very interesting. If you've read my blog for a while, you know the disappointing news that I learned last spring about aspartame and how it actually makes you gain weight... So as hard as it was I've given that up...

And I think everyone knows to avoid trans fats, another sometimes hidden ingredient that actually addicts us to certains foods and adds to our girth. This is something I've always been very careful with.

Well, the latest thing I've been reading about is glutamates (including MSG), which are in so many foods (not just fast food) and so hidden that I don't know how I could eliminate it from our pantry... Apparently, glutamates are very addicting and cause us to eat more of certain foods than we should (this was also shown to be a factor in 'Supersize It'). Also, glutamates fall under all sorts of names on food labels. I don't understand how food manufacturers and restaurants can continue to put ingredients into food that are so bad for us and also be able to hide them in their ingredients list...

I miss the days of Weigh Down (a Bible focused weight loss program that I did really well on). It taught me to trust my body that God made, to get in tune to it's signals of hunger and fullness and give the rest to God. Now-a-days, every time I turn around I'm forced to focus more on the food and make sure it has no artificial sweetners, trans-fats or glutamates. When I was in Weigh Down I didn't focus on the food at all, just ate whatever I wanted when I was hungry and stopped before I was full. I would focus on God and thank Him for all the jewels He sent my way. I did exercise when I could because it felt good not because I was trying to control how many calories I burned that day. Now I run around feeling guilty if I miss a day of weights or the gazelle and have to take special care reading labels to make sure the food is righteous before I put in my mouth. I think I'm missing something...maybe we all are...