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In Which I Quit!

Okay, maybe I'm being a little dramatic, but I definitely hit the dinner time boiling point last night.  As I've mentioned many a time before, I am in the process of learning how to plan and stick to a menu comprised of dishes we eat at home. This is a huge challenge for us because we love eating out!! If we were fabulously wealthy, we'd probably eat out for all our meals and I'm not exaggerating. Maybe we would hire a personal chef, but even that would feel more like eating out.

Last week's menu plan sort of flew out the window, but by yesterday we were back on track. I made a nice breakfast: turkey bacon, scrambled eggs, and cinnamon raisin English muffins. Delish! For lunch I cut up cheese and banana slices with crackers and raisins and jello for Brooklyn. I ate leftover pasta carbonara, and even resisted when about 15 minutes later, Dad offered to pick up Five Guys!  And even though by 5:00 I was getting really tired and swollen, I forged ahead and made homemade macaroni and cheese, chicken nuggets, and a broccoli/carrot/green bean/water chestnut medly for dinner. True, most of that meal was frozen, but homemade mac and cheese!!

Grayson took a few minutes but eventually ate nearly everything on his plate (that's my little hulk!) but Brooklyn (who has always enjoyed this recipe in the past) barely took one bite and started in with her usual dinner time excuses. She asked for a deal, said she wasn't hungry, etc etc etc. Finally I told her to clear her plate and dinner was over for her, meaning that there would be no snacks or dessert later. She put on her brave "I don't care, I didn't want dessert anyway" face (which always manages to make me angrier) and went to play. I said (in more ways than one), "I am done cooking for you!"

To her credit, she did not whine about being hungry or ask for anymore food that night even though bedtime was an hour later (thank you Spring Break!). While I cleaned up the kitchen, I thought about our constant battle with dinner. Of course she has no idea how challenging this process is for me. She does not see the effort that I put into meal planning - how I consider who will be eating and try to make sure there is always something that she will like. She doesn't realize that her lack of gratitude hurts my feelings, and she doesn't see the big picture, that I am trying to build healthy habits in her and give her a good food foundation so she won't have to struggle the way I have.

So I'm going to try a new approach. First, I'm going to get her more involved in the whole process - planning one or two meals each week, helping with food prep, and listening to her ideas and suggestions. For example, we talked about the mac and cheese and determined that she is not a fan of cheddar. She likes white cheese. So when I make it again, I'm going to try a white cheese.

Second, no more fighting. I am not going to force, bribe, bargain, or make deals about dinner anymore. Brooklyn can eat dinner when dinner is served or not. She can eat it all or some or none. But when dinner is over, it's over. Maybe a few nights of hunger pains will be able to teach what I cannot.

My hope in all this is that she will begin to take ownership of her food and that she will be more respectful of all that goes into our meals.

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