The Mommy Diet

I used to be skinny. No, that's not true. Why would I lie on my own blog? I DID used to be in shape, however. And I had a flat stomach. (Excuse me while I indulge in imaginary dreamy music and visions of swimsuits with no skirt attached and no puffiness above my jeans.) OK. I'm back.

Things started to change when I got married. While I was content with a salad for dinner, my husband would say things like, "That was really good. Now what's for supper?" So I learned to eat meat with every meal. We used to try to share food at restaurants to save on the cost, but I learned that I had to eat really fast in order to get any (or have them split the order before they brought it out). Then I started having children. It's not their fault I gained the mommy weight. While with my first I ate mostly organic and worked out every day, by the time the second one came along I started to slip. I ate mostly healthy with the addition of chocolate chip cookies or peanut butter and honey at night. Oh, and sometimes I drank whole milk because that's what my firstborn was drinking and well, it was yummy. I still walked some, but I was starting to get tired. When my second was 9 months old and I found out I was pregnant again, I went completely crazy indulged a little more. Trying to push a double stroller while pregnant was nearly impossible, so I gave up walking.

So that's the sad demise of my once young, once curvy-in-the-places-you-should-be physique. I'm working on trying to remember what normal girl portions are--you know, when you're not pregnant or breastfeeding or both. It's been quite some time since I had to think about that. And I'm trying to exercise more. I don't know which is the bigger challenge. As I've been trying to be more aware of my food intake, I have been amused at what I actually eat now that I'm a mom. Here is an example of a day on the Mommy Diet:

Breakfast:
cold coffee (because after microwaving it twice it just doesn't seem worth it any more).
soggy cereal (because inevitably someone needs help right AFTER I've poured the milk on my cereal)

Lunch:
pizza crusts (because none of the kids will eat them and I can't throw away the entire perimeter of a perfectly good pizza)
6 oz. yogurt (2 oz. left in Little Buddy's, 2 oz. left in Big Sissy's, and 2 oz. left in Little Sissy's)
mommy juice (Pepsi. I don't think this one needs explained.)

Supper:
meat, meat, meat (because my husband LOVES meat)
asparagus or broccoli stumps (because only the tops are easy to for little teeth to chew, leaving the stumps for the well-developed mommy teeth)
lukewarm water with nasty floaty things in it (because all the children love to eat my ice, and water is way more fun to drink out of a glass than a sippy cup)

So after being on the mommy diet for a while, I'm figuring out that this may be why I LOVE going out to eat. Everyone gets their own food, cooked how they like it, AND I don't have to prepare it, share it, de-spice it, or disguise it. Then when we're done I don't have to finish it, sweep it, clean it, wipe it, wash it, store it, or load it. That's a mommy diet breakthrough.