Did your mother used to hide sweets from you? page 3

[ciavyn]

Yikes. It's scary to read this and realize how unhealthy some of us had it at home when it comes to food. My mother and her entire family is morbidly obese, and has been for as long as I remember. I started dieting with her ("It'll be fun; we'll do it together") when I was 11, and had a weight problem after that. It was less the weight than the sickness with food. She also hid food, would eat all of my sweets when I left the house -- whole packages of oreos, doughnuts, Little Debbie snack cakes -- then mourn feeling ill. I became very, very controlling with food, starving myself to lose to weight, then refusing to eat anything with fat on it. I think seeing her be so incredibly crazed with food created a love-hate relationship with it in my head. When I was married with stepkids, I found myself hiding candy and sweets and snacks. Now, in fairness, I had two growing boys who snarfed everything in their path! So when I found out I had celiac disease, I no longer had to hide food because no one wanted my treats. And now I'm happy to say that with a few niggling exceptions, I don't hide food, and I don't control it nearly as much as I did.

Amazing how the small things that seem insignificant can have the biggest effects. I remember my father commenting on how fat I was as a baby. I've never forgotten that. (And I wasn't fat!)

[sakura_girl]

For me, not really. I always loved salty and sour things as a kid. My mom had to limit my Chinese black vinegar consumption because I had a small sauce bowl-ful every day.

Sometimes if I was lucky, I'd get chocolate milk and that was my treat with dinner every day for the time period it lasted. For some reason I liked to drop a few whoppers candies in, too.

At school, my rich friends would have ring pops and warheads, and every week if I was lucky, I'd get some. Otherwise candy was limited to Halloween and Christmas, and I'd manage to extend all of it out the entire year even sharing with my parents.

I've been to McDonald's like 2 times my entire childhood. My favorite dinner was pork soup and being able to suck the marrow out of the bone. Mmmmmm......

[Penady]

I had exactly the opposite problem...there were always sweets in abundance in our house. Pies for Sunday dinner. At least once a week making cookies or browies. PB&J sandwiches as a snack before bedtime. Halloween candy, Christmas candy (&cookies), and on and on and on. Sweets were a reward. Sweets were how we spent family time together. No wonder I have such an f'd up relationship with sugar!

[Bron]

Despite having a very boring diet as a kid (meat and 3 veg mostly, that revolting smoked cod on occasion, always canned peaches and ice cream for dessert on Sunday, occasionally we had lollies and always at Xmas and EAster), I'm glad now. I do overeat a little but that's about the only bad thing. I love that we never had coke or take away other than fish and chips and I simply cannot stand McDonalds or any of the take away 'foods' or coke).

[lambchop]

A friend of mine has a massive Tupperware full of sweets and because her kids have constant access to it, they don't tend to binge on it because it will always be there. Strange, but it works.

[Graycat]

I never cared much for sweets as a child. Once I became young adult I developed a major sweet tooth.

[cantare]

My parents had to hide the jar of cashews.

Today, I have to hide the jar of cashews. Yay, progress.

Looking back at childhood diet I am struck, not by the attitude toward sweets per se, but by how indistinguishable the supposed healthy alternatives really were. Cookies bad, eat your "honey-glazed" cereal instead...or waffles with margarine and fake syrup. Can't eat ice cream for lunch, but a big glass of milk & a sandwich with faux-ww bread, peanut butter and sugary jelly are A-OK. There wasn't really any difference between meals and dessert apart from the packaging and presentation.

[Lizzielou]

My father was a dentist...............................so yeah, sugary treats were pretty thin on the ground in our house growing up.

We never had soda in the house, but I remember having ghastly concentrated juice for breakfast when I was in high school. My father is an 'old school' englishman, who had to have pudding every night and that was usually the only sweet thing we would have all day. He would also not tolerate any junk/fast food so we used to get McDonalds when he went away.

My parents were quite good with their food habits and what they passed onto my sister and I. My IL's though are another story! They are super obsessed with health and food, and as a consequence they are all severely underweight (issues anyone?). I cannot and do not even take food into their house as I've long since learnt that my food is not good enough for them, its just not worth the heartache of preparing something only to have it completely untouched. They are all worried about the state of my husbands health because he doesn't exercise compulsively, yet his cholesterol is great and he is of 'normal' weight. He does have a congenital BP problem (which MIL and SIL also have) and they try to convince him that extreme dietary/lifestyle changes with fix this - despite the fact that it has not helped them avoid meds because it is caused by a blip in their genes not diet/lifestyle! I'm starting to rant! Better stop now

[Zophie]

My Mom thinks that "Food is LOVE". She never bought candy or sweets but she always always had homemade cakes,cookies and pies. If I would decline them after dinner she would cry and ask why I was so mad at her. When I went away to school the weight dropped off of me like magic. Though I still used food as a feel good reward. I would always buy a chocolate if I had a hard day or something. It took me a few years to decide to buy nail polish instead of chocolate.

My husband has several sweet stashes in the house. I can't figure it out either. He could put it in the middle of the table and no one but him would touch it but him. His Mom has stashes too... a learned behavior I suppose.

[Dr. Bork Bork]

re: Did your mom used to hide sweets from you?

No. She didn't let me have sweets and didn't buy them. If she did, she shared one or two from the box. Maybe that's why I have such a sweet tooth (it was deprived for the 20 years I lived at home!)
Grace gets to have cookies and things. She has her own cupboard of food. However I must have done something right b/c she almost always chooses fruit and yogurt over cookies and candy. She also likes dark chocolate (smart 4yo!).

I think when you make naughty food fully accessible, it becomes less of a temptation.