Let's Get Serious And Talk About...Serving Sizes

This is a real discussion people...excuse my french but serving sizes these days, are BULLSHIT. No, seriously, we need to reevaluate our consumer lives I think.I have struggled with weight, I DO struggle with my weight, and I've had many a battle with food issues. But yesterday it sparked something blog-worthy.

Yesterday I started to feel off. I've been very conscious about what I'm eating and that I'm eating properly. Some may call me a food extremist because I can eat everything or nothing and still function, granted some ways of functioning are better than others. Nowadays, it's about paying attention to what I'm actually eating, how much of it and when I'm munching.

It's been easier than I thought, and productive. So I had a great breakfast and packed some apple sauce, some veggies and then some more fruit. My stomach started getting crampy, so of course I went for the banana to ease this early on. When water wouldn't help it to chill out, I broke out the apple sauce. By lunch it was still unhappy and I had to run to Publix anyway so I got myself a small to go pack of Cheez-Its:

The bag says, "Grab N Go." It's roughly the same size as a sandwich bag, maybe smaller. It was just $1.00, I hadn't had them in a long time and yay for salt! There was a 150 calorie count on the front under my thumb but what I looked at on the back was that they consider this "Grab N Go" bag to be 3 servings. THREE SERVINGS in this bag. Let me ask you, who is buying this bag to revisit once a day for 3 days? Because that person is an intensely specific, careful person!

So as you can see, the entire bag is 430 calories, which is roughly the same amount of calories as a breakfast bagel. This is just considered a snack. I got weirdly annoyed by this and it sparked this whole question of, how are we supposed to be "healthy" when Grab and Go snacks have the same calorie count as a small meal?

We live in a world with endless brands, choices and opportunities. There is gluten free, vegan, real cheese, processed cheese, fat free, low fat, no trans fat, reduced fat, etc, etc. It can be overwhelming, as life is already overwhelming. Trying to maintain the idea of "healthy" is ever-changing and really hard, in my opinion.

It's like in the 50's you had bacon, eggs, ham, toast and orange juice for just breakfast but everyone smoked cigarettes and looked trim! Now it's egg whites only or a super sized Big Mac meal with a Diet Coke and all the different sweeteners give you cancer. How can we keep up?

Full disclosure, I inhaled the entire Grab and Go pack, I mean, it was on the label to Grab and Go, I was just following directions. But also, my body needed something to calm it down. I used to do calorie and points count for weight watchers but I discovered that, for me, counting calories and points and getting on the scale so often created more unhealthy habits as a result. So I just found comfort with moderation. I can have a damned cupcake, I can't have 3. I can have a glass of wine, not a bottle.

But I stared at this package and thought, this is what's wrong with everyone being unhealthy; on the front it says 150 and in tiny tiny letters it discloses, "per serving" and then the back it shows you all the negative nutrition facts. It's like when you go to Starbucks and all of the calories are in huge numbers next to the price and name. You practically pay a penny a calorie for the latte anymore. This is why I switched to just black coffee. Less to obsess about, more caffeine.

I happen to have an extraordinarily horrible metabolism. It's the worst. I'm one bad test away from hyperthyroidism on the low end, but still. I work out hard, to be able to eat what I want...within reason. So I had some pangs of guilt with each Cheez-It but they were delicious and calmed my stomach so, win.

This calorie stuff bugged me. Sometimes I just don't want to know. I used to LOVE the caramel apple cider at Starbucks in the winter on a cold afternoon. When I was on weight watchers, I found out it was 8 points and like 800 calories. I could have 3 cans of soup and still not use that many calories. I will never drink one again. Sometimes I wish I never knew it was an evil yet delicious drink. 

There are many ways in which it's important to know what you're putting into your body, especially with chemicals and preservatives and all, but can't we just have some buffalo chicken egg rolls without punishment? I just want the chocolate mousse without the side of guilt. Food is so awesome, let's stop shaming, shall we?

At and old job, I was working super hard on losing weight, and I got a serious public eating phobia. I had to be seen by these guys as the healthy person, I couldn't inhale Chik-Fil-A along side them. I had to look like the healthy girl. So I starved myself during my shifts a lot or just ate granola bars and a smoothie. It was not fun.

We are in a body positive place now more than ever, and it makes my heart happy because I want everyone to eat what they want, but there are definitely consequences when you do, and you have to be able to accept them. I do think that all of the calorie stuff, nutrition facts and serving sizes are poorly explained and marketed. These days I feel like we need need a class just to break this down for people because it's all a little crazy.

If you think about it, one meal at McDonald's is an entire day's calorie count or more, but will still leave you hungry. Some drinks could qualify as a meal's worth of calories. Keeping track can feel defeating at times and often, unfair. Every once in awhile a milkshake is due! We can splurge, just not every night. And finding that balance is so hard.

This is why "Cheat" days are a thing and they don't work for me personally, because I can pack a lot away in a day. I'd rather just be mindful of what I'm actually eating and allow myself a dessert or two when it occurs than shove it all into one day and starve myself the rest of the week. "Oh man I can't have that bread because Saturday I ate a whole loaf and then a cake, better stick with just lemon water and broth;" that's how it goes in my mind!

I used to think I could eat what I want and lose weight. Not so much. I made some pretty intense changes to allow for the occasional cupcake and a few glasses of wine. As you get older, workouts get harder, and you need to change up routines. But 400 some calories in Cheez-Its from time to time is worth an extra lap or two, in my opinion. 

I'm not saying we need to individually package each serving and waste resources and plastic but I think it should be much easier to be healthy. From organic food being more expensive, to gym memberships being costly, to junk food seemingly being "always on sale" it's kind of a lot to expect us to adhere to serving sizes and put our money where our mouths are, so to speak. It takes a lot of effort to be conscientious. 

So while this may come out as a bitter whining diatribe about first world problems, for me it is kind of a cry out of, "Can we make living healthy lifestyles, no matter what your size or preference, EASIER, and less stressful please?" I'm sure not everyone sits there, sees the serving size and thinks..."so do I not eat the whole thing even though I'm starving and it won't be good later, or do I eat the whole thing and then drink a lot of water the rest of the day?," but for those of us who already have an entire realm of food-related issues, it shouldn't be such a mental wrestling match. LET US EAT CAKE! 

And while serving sizes are necessary, they feel pretty ridiculous lately. I mean two girl scout cookies are a serving size and like 200 calories, but don't lie to me and tell me you don't eat a whole ROW of them from the package. THEY ARE GIRL SCOUT COOKIES! Let's just be real people, and give us real servings, serving sizes and calorie counts, up front! Or we could make it funny, like "Eat the row and that's the same as bacon and eggs, just have a handful and you're good." I always opt for funny.

Parks and Rec's whole satire around Paunch Burger, the sugar and the sodas was so insanely funny, because it's entirely too true! In contrast, they had an episode where they had to make Kale and Chard, "sexy," and Leslie admitted how gross healthy food could be. We need to improve upon that but also allow ourselves to love and enjoy food. It is the spice of life, after all. Or is that something else.

So after this whole post, I bring us this, let's be conscious but not completely insane about serving sizes and allow everything in moderation. And now I ask that all of the food companies actually make serving sizes realistic because if you call it a grab and go bag that highly suggests a single serving. At least at McDonald's when you super size something, you know what you're getting. So Oreos, Snack Crackers and Junk Food alike, let's be real, just put the calorie counts of the whole bag on there so we know what we're up against. Even Starbucks tells you how many calories in a pumpkin spice latte, no matter how depressing. They don't expect you to condense 20oz into two servings. 

Down off the weird soapbox, or perhaps food crate, I go!

"I Just Cleaned That!" A Mother's Memoir

Does anyone else feel like this is almost just their constant state? Work, kid care, clean up, tidy up, sleep, repeat? I feel like I'm always cleaning, always need to clean or I totally just cleaned that so how is it filthy already?

In this day and age with technology and limitless resources for things, I still feel like there aren't enough hours in the day. I don't care how "organized" I try to be or how many lists, videos or ideas I pin on my Pinterest, it doesn't make them happen. And also, I spend way longer pinning things to my boards than I have ever spent completing a real Pinterest task. I would assume I'm the only one who does this but they have too many Pinterest fails for me to feel like the sole person who is guilty of this.

This past year, which was mentally just completely defeating for me, I realized how much the tasks of cleaning and grocery shopping were just engulfing all of my weekend to the point where I was just so depressed and tired. Friday nights my daughter had demanded a movie night where she watched a RedBox on our large living room TV and I would clean the house after doing the grocery shopping. It became like a race almost, and this huge challenge. By the end I just lost steam and wanted to curl up in bed. We'd be up until 10 most nights by the time I finished so as to get it all done fast to better enjoy the weekend. 

I tried to plan and budget, budget and plan. It was so much to deal with. And then recently I discovered Wal-Mart Grocery Pick-Up. I know, I know. Wal-Mart is evil and blah blah. Here's the thing, we used to shop exclusively at Winn Dixie but their general product quality dropped. Then we switched to Publix, my favorite supermarket but, I don't care who you are, it's expensive. I tried BOGO shopping at Publix but then I ended up so obsessed with the deals I got carried away and didn't actually meal plan. We had enough Ketchup for a year though! Total score!

Finally I looked at how much we were really spending on the items we went through like no tomorrow in this house: bread, cheese, snack type foods, milk, chicken and ground beef or turkey. These were all just so much cheaper at Wal-Mart unfortunately. And grocery pick up was effortless, you pay online and they load up your trunk. Now, I still go to Publix for all of our lunch meat, our produce and many of their signature items (hello all bakery items), but the Wal-Mart app and pick up are my go to. I especially love that it shows me how much I'm spending so if I'm getting carried away I can be like "Okay that can actually wait a while, I don't need it THIS week."

My husband or I are able to pick up at Wal-Mart whenever and I go to Publix every Friday on my lunch break and am able to keep all the cold stuff in my fridge at work for a few hours. Then I'm not already exhausted and agitated when I get home. This was a game changer honestly. 

I don't care who you are, navigating a store with children is maddening. You forget something on the list. You tell yourself to remember something and forget that too, and then the child talks you into $20 worth of crap you don't even need just to keep them quiet. Or they have to stop and pee and you forget what aisle you're on. Going by myself is like a vacation, yes, I'm that cliche.

And cleaning? If I could afford a house cleaner, I would have one, but currently I can only afford myself and sometimes the help of my husband. This past year I bought myself one of those Robot Vacs as a Christmas present to myself when it was $50 cheaper than I'd been stalking all year. I saw a friend with one and she has 2 dogs and her house was so clean. I was like whoa, did you JUST clean? She showed me this thing and I was sold.

We run that thing daily and not only is the floor less gritty, it cuts my floor cleaning time in HALF each week and picks up all remnants of child and creature. I've also had more help from daughter and husband in terms of tidying up, which makes all the difference because I am always tired, which I may have mentioned in previous posts.

And I hate when you have people over and of course, you've scoured your home in preparation and they're like "I don't know how you do it all!" I know that's meant to be a compliment but I always want to say, "Yeah this is all only because I let you into my house, normally we live like gorillas and there is crap everywhere."

My house is wonderful clutter. School papers, receipts for who knows what, SHARPIES from my husband, the chef's, kitchen, food wrappers from daughter and husband and dog things. Depending on how late and how tired the husband is, clothing often ends up strewn on one or both couches. There are small blankets and random stuffed animals everywhere. My dining room table always doubles as a craft space, paint place, and area to sprawl ALL THE THINGS. We don't even actually eat there very often. Maybe twice a week on a good week.

Keeping up with everything can feel so...unending and laundry truly is the "Neverending Story" of adulthood, but cleaning, working and chores are just a part of life. I often remind my daughter that we are the ones who keep this place clean so don't trash it. Don't just toss something on the floor that could easily go in the trash.  

I think we let these parts of life bog us down. The "have to's" end up burying us alive and it all feels so heavy. I'm not an organized guru, I just caved and found something that worked for what we all wanted and needed. Sometimes schedules get crazy and money gets tight and it adds more stress, but again, par for the course. Everyone has their little luxuries and "treat yo self" moments. Mine are the RoboVac and a cup of $4 coffee each week. Other people have house cleaners or Shipt. I have Wal-Mart pick-up and lunch time Publix runs. 

Every week I still need to clean. Every week we still need food, but navigating the "I just bought that," "I just cleaned that," moments successfully and not stressfully make all the difference. Feel free to email me what works for you!