Let Her Eat The Dang Cupcake- Why Sometimes It’s Ok To Let Go On Real Food

Healthy parenting moment… So as you may know cake smashes are kind of a thing now and I was totally going to make our own gluten free, sugar free cake with coconut whipped cream frosting for her birthday party. Because I didn’t want her having sugar and she never had gluten so I didn’t know how she would react…. Well her party day came and by the morning I didn’t feel like making a cake anymore. I was too overwhelmed with everything else. Throwing my hands in the air I said “screw it let her eat a dang cupcake.” And she did and she loved it. She probably only ate about 1/4 and the rest was covering her outfit and the floor. The dog ended up eating 1/2 and had a sugar rush 10 minutes later doing laps around the back yard. 

Why am I telling you this? Because as parents we want to be perfect. I want to strive to offer my child the healthiest food possible, limit sugar, and processed foods as much as possible. It has become almost an idol to me. Although I have concurred my past eating problems and I don’t hold regret or contempt at myself for eating things, I’ve held how our family eats at an unhealthy standard. I find myself mentally having difficulty eating something that is not organic or is made with margarine.

Here is the thing. Our food system is grossly troubled and we can only do as much as we can as parents to pick what is best for our families. Especially when you have friends and family who don’t hold the same values (my family regularly likes to poke fun that we only eat pasture raised animals at our house). But sometimes you have to let them eat the dang cake. If she is eating healthy 95% of the time it is ok to let her have a cheat. My husband likes to tell me she is going to rebel one day and go crazy when it comes to processed food because of my unhealthy healthy standards. I hope not. I hope I teach her to love wholesome real food, but that she doesn’t have to be a perfectionist (although some people for health reasons have to be). To be fair I did make sure her cupcake didn’t have any food dyes and it was made form scratch by a bakery. That makes it better right?

On her actual birthday we celebrated by getting another cupcake from a local bakery. Really it was for us, not her. I feel the need to celebrate that I concurred a 46 hour labor with her. So the hubby and I ate our cupcakes and gave her a small bite without frosting. You know what? She spit it out. We tried again and she spit it out again! I silently rejoiced in my head “good I’m glad you didn’t like. That sugar stuff is bad.” As I happily ate my real food cupcake. So while I plan to continue to feed our family healthy real food, I’m going to try to not obsess over the other 5% of the time when we have a treat.

Has eating healthy become an idol for you?

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