Family Challenge

How often have you been a part of this scenario: Mom wants to lose weight and eat better, but Dad and kids don’t, and continue to eat normally. Mom does well for a while, but eventually, fixing two types of meals gets old or the junk that is still left in the house becomes major temptation for Mom and she falls off the wagon.

Well, that kind of happened to me over the holidays. The junk won. The less than healthy meals took over. I didn’t lose too much ground, but a few of those previously lost pounds crept back on.

I knew something needed to change and I was ready to get back to eating right and not missing my workouts. But I needed help to succeed. I needed the junk not to be in the house.

So, in an effort to both help me, and to help my family be healthier, too, we have removed all sweets/sugar from our pantry, fridge, and candy cabinet. All four of us are now “sugar-free” until my birthday, March 24.

For me, this transition isn’t that hard. I’ve done it for most of the last 9 months, and I feel better when  I am not eating junk anyway.

But for the others in my house, it is a bit harder. Especially when the kids are at school and the school uses candy to reward. My solution: buy some sugar-free candy and send it to school with the kids along with a note asking their teachers to please use the sugar-free options for my kids when candy rewards are given. But this still means that the kids have to make good choices. They have to think before they eat when they are away from home. They have to be able to say “no, thank you” when offered something sweet. And when you are a kid, that’s hard. But they are on board and have agreed to this challenge. They are even helping to remind Daddy that sweets are not an option, even when Mommy isn’t around. 🙂

I am curious and excited to see what the results will be. Will there be changes in my children’s behavior? Will my husband’s waistline show any sign of getting smaller? How will this challenge that we are undertaking as a family strengthen our bond? What will we all learn about ourselves and one another and what we can do when we work together? What will we learn about healthy living as a family?

Now, my challenge is to find a reward for our family, that is not food based, that we get or do once we complete our sugar-free challenge. That’s where you, my readers, come in. I would love to hear some of your ideas about what our reward should be at the end of our challenge. Also, what family challenge would you like to take on this year? (Last year, we instituted family game night every Monday night and that was our challenge.)