dietary changes?

[Gail]

Hi Shannon,

Thanks for the chance to think about kids and food choices. I just twigged - adolescence opting for carbs and fats - what are their bodies asking for? Don't all their puberty hormones need fats for their synthesis? Maybe this desire does have an instinctual base - but the fats we have easily and readily available aren't always the best fats which gives them the added attraction of assisting the adolescent need to separate themselves from the parent. So what could the carbs be giving them... maybe concentrated energy, especially if they're in the middle of a growth spurt or active in sports... maybe some sort of calming effect because it's such an anxious period? Might be interesting to look at the grain family issues from a homoeopathic point of view. I just remembered there was a Saccharum Album case recently at http://www.interhomeopathy.org/index.ph ... vids_case/

and there was a summary of the themes...
The Themes of the Grasses might be seen to be:
v Feast or Famine. All or nothing. Monomania.
v Fighting within the family - sugar fights carbohydrate for dominance. [Sugar and cereal carbohydrates are all Gramineae]
v Nurture or domination
v Enslavement / Addiction
v Empty, weak and without support: full, heavy, clinging, dominating.
v The Road of Excess leads to a Palace of Wisdom [Sex, food, attitude!] to excess.
v Formication, itching, crawling, prickling sensation. Something alive and moving inside.
v Knotted sensation
v Heaviness, weight
v Burning pains, consumed by fire. [Ardent, passionate, intense]

Gail.
--- In minutus@yahoogroups.com, Robert & Shannon Nelson wrote:

[Shannon Nelson]

Hi Gail,
Wow, what a neat Summary of Themes! And a great article--thanks for
that link.

Yeah, fats for hormones--that seems to make sense! (Glad he is
*mostly* eating at home right now...) Also energy, tho mine at the
moment is not putting out much energy for anything *other* than growing
like a weed! And I guess that's where his occasional meat
binges come in. Veggies tho--they don't stand much of a chance!
)
Shannon

[Pauline Ashford]

Hi Shannon I sympathise with your fears about teens and cereals - had 2 boys myself who seemed to live on weetbixs and milk endlessly - for breakfast, after school and as desserts - even if I didnt buy it, they would!!! However they and their mates grew out of it around the end of puberty, and they both eat pretty well now even after they have left home. I always found that to get veges into them at teens was things like Tacos - with heaps of lettuce (darker green the better), tomatoes, chopped onions, grated carrot etc so long as there was salsa and sour cream the plates were empty, and I used to make big vats of soups (which were frozen into individual size packs that i pulled out and left in fridge for after school snackes etc) and filled them full of veges the ones they werent keen on grated so unidentifiable. My son who hated pumpkin - grew well on 'carrot' soup - (with pumpkin in it!!!) I used to grate them (or with things like spinach or greens chopped them really fine and put them in at the last minute so goodness preserved) and put them in stews so they became more or less part of the gravies. Its amazing how much you can get into them if youre innovative (and a bit sneaky). It is the fact that they are used to seeing good food in the house that seems to make a difference when they go out on their own, the fast food only seems to have such a hold until they realise that their health and energy is just not the same on Maccas. Its the kids who dont know anything else that are the biggest worry. Anyway I commiserate Regards Pauline
________________________________

[Rochelle]

My son who had been brought up on healthy food had a splurge when he first went to University and was cooking for himself (which he was perfectly capable of doing). He came home after the first term (semester) overweight from eating all the things he didn't get at home - burger, fries, pies, junk. He was so shocked as his new size that he trialled some diet pills(aaaahhh!!!) for a pharmaceutical company and got paid for it the second term and stuck to the diet, lost the weight and has been eating healthily ever since other than the alcohol!!! He is now in his 30's and lives in Singapore and still eats well. So there is hope for them all.
Rochelle
Registered Homeopath
EFT(Advanced) Practitioner
www.southporthomeopathy.co.uk

[Shannon Nelson]

Pauline and Rochelle,
Thanks for the encouraging reports, and Pauline for the good recipe
ideas!
Vegetable "gravy" and blenderized into soups do work well here--they
make a great thickener, no flour needed!

Pauline, interesting that yours too went on a cereal binge around
puberty. Hm, I wonder what that's about...
Shannon

[Tanya Marquette]

shannon,

i think that teens and junk food are almost synonomous. my kids
were totaly impossible and when i said they should earn their
own money if they wanted things that i wouldn't/couldn't buy,
my daughter in particular did just that. and boy was there a pile
of junk food in her room. my son was even worse.

today, my daughter who worked in restaurant and camp kitchens
in her teens learned somethiing about cooking and vegetables. later
in her life she wound up on fishing boats and in seattle (major fish
city) and learned more about food. and that city afforded her
contacts with people who were very healthy food cs. she is a
much better eater today. my son also wound up in kitchens and
is now a chef with a better cs about eating better.

i think that is it true the kids come back to the ideas they were
taught as younger children--unless they vehementaly rebel and go
in the opposite direction and that usually happens when the
home envrionment was too extreme to live with. you don't sound
like you are that rigid and extreme a parent.

tanya