I expected that the holidays would introduce more than the usual calories and sugar to my diet; what I didn't anticipate was just how many desserts would be available, and how low my threshold of self-control would be. Being pregnant, I'm hungry constantly, and dessert beckons at every turn. My pregnancy weight gain so far has been on a healthy track, but the week-long binge does not bode well for my next appointment on Monday. I'm not particularly looking forward to stepping on the scale.
Last night I laid awake, guilt-ridden and vowing to throw out the remaining ice cream, pie and cookies and replace them with fresh fruit and vegetables. During this time of year, and with the abundance we have at our disposal, it seems there's always a reason to celebrate something with a sugary confection. Most of the year, I don't allow myself to purchase ice cream or cookies, and I rarely bake desserts. It should be clear why these measures are necessary for me, given this past week's track record.
No, I haven't yet thrown out the remaining desserts in the house.
Eowyn's cake looked pretty. No wonder you wanted to eat so much of it! I have become such a sugar addict, it is so sad how much sweet stuff I eat...of course, you know that from coming to visit me. I don't think you should feel bad because most of the time you eat very healthy. You shouldn't worry about it too much!
ReplyDeleteWhat a pretty cake!!! Or is that cupcakes?
ReplyDeleteEither way... you can't throw that out! However, you may have to invite some neighbors over to help you eat it because, yeah, you probably don't want to eat that whole thing by yourself.
But I know how you feel! I don't normally eat sweets, either, but a couple of weeks ago I borrowed my mom's stand mixer so I could make applesauce cake (my favorite) and I made two cakes because making the applesauce results in enough for two cakes and I was planning on giving a fair bit of it away. But Michael and I ended up eating pretty much the entire first cake I made all by ourselves and if I really want to be honest, it was really mostly me and I don't even have the excuse of being pregnant! Eek! LOL!
A portion of the pictured cupcake-cake was eaten by guests, a portion was frozen, and another portion was just thrown away because I didn't feel it necessary to keep 15 cupcakes in the freezer. It was a ton of cupcakes! But very pretty, I agree.
ReplyDeleteI think part of why I feel so guilty is because the midwife I'm going to is very big into proper nutrition during pregnancy. She once told me that she's had to stop seeing some mothers who refused to change their eating habits to healthy ones. That kind of freaked me out! But maybe those were moms who ate Big Macs and fries for breakfast, lunch and dinner every day. I know I'm not like that.
I think we've all done things like eat most of an applesauce cake by ourselves for no reason other than it tastes good, especially during the holidays. Our bodies are made to like sweets, after all!
I think I was pretty lucky with Michael. I can't say that I ate very healthy over the first 12 weeks only because I was nauseated all the time; I found that if I ate protein in the morning, I wouldn't be sick in the afternoon. Because I didn't have morning sickness, I had afternoon/evening sickness. But it was a LOT less if I managed to eat a hamburger or something in the morning. I would just feel a bit queasy as opposed to actual vomiting, if I'd had enough protein. I could never consume any food in the evenings during that time, though. What I ate in the morning was all I ate all day just for those first weeks.
ReplyDeleteHowever, after the illness eased I was lucky because I CRAVED fresh fruit and vegetables. I remember the two things I ate most were a big bowl of mango, banana and kiwi (I had that for dinner pretty often) or a homemade tostada which was a baked tortilla with a little bit of beans and salsa topped with lettuce, tomato, green onion and avocado. YUM! I would also go to the Smoothie King on Saturday mornings and get a vitamin-laden, low-fat fruit smoothie. I do remember very late in my pregnancy that I did enjoy stopping by Sonic for a root beer floats once a week after my parenting class.
I think I did okay, but as I said, I feel like I was kind of lucky that I just naturally craved pretty healthy foods. I can imagine it would be MUCH more difficult if you had spend the entire time fighting against cravings for sweets and junkfoods. Pregnant women aren't known for an incredible amount of willpower when it comes to food cravings. Maybe that's what your mid-wife had to deal with... I'm sure you're fine.
so true about the abundance of sugar...my body seems like it's craving more and more each day. I've decided to cut the coffee intake (sugary creamer), and stick to water. I'm also trying to bring sweets to parties but limit how much i eat! We'll see if that plan works...so far it's not looking good.
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