Work at home moms not only face daily challenges of deadlines, running the household, the business, the kids, errands and everything else, but work at home moms also face obesity. Obesity is a fitting word because the only thing sure thing that comes from drinking those cola’s, eating those cookies, chips, sucking on lollipops and the ho-ho’s is obesity. If you’re a work at home mom, you know you’re guilty too.
It’s hard to feed a family when you’re a work at home mom, much less feed the family a healthy meal! I call it the “wahm trap”, translated, the work at home mom trap. It still makes me laugh every time I see a health feature on the news that talks about all of these “working Americans” who don’t have time to eat healthy, those who plague the drive-thru’s of our billion dollar fast food industry. What about work at home moms, doesn’t anyone care about us? I’m yet to hear a “feature” about work at home mom health and wonder how long it will be before we are truly recognized as a group of occupational professionals too.
I was swooped into the “wahm trap”, my entire family became innocent victims and I was completely out of control. My computer, being my trusty work companion also became my daily dinner date but what’s so bad is what I was eating! If you eat any two of the following, you too may need some help.
* Hotpockets
* Frozen pizza
* Microwavable dinners
* Pizza Hut
* Dominoes
* Chinese takeout
* Cheez-its
* Sourdough pretzels
* Buffalo wings
* Bread sticks
* Stromboli
* Soft drinks
* Cookies
* Chips
What’s even worse, do you feed your family:
* Chicken nuggets
* French fries
* Corn dogs
* Grilled cheese sandwiches
* Romain noodles
* Microwave mac and cheese
* Frozen fish nuggets
* Honey buns
In short, my husband gained seventeen pounds my first year as a work at home mom, my three sons gained a total of twenty-six pounds together and I was the mamajama of them all, weighing in thirty-three pound heavier after my first year of business.
Finding the time to cook healthy is hard, even if you don’t have the time to cook it’s still possible to eat healthy. I was depressed and even the grocery store was a sad place for me but I managed to pick up some knowledge and began changing our family’s diet. This is what I did.
We banned the following from entering our house:
* Soft drinks
* Chips
* Candy
* Snack cakes
* All convenience foods
* Anything with lots of sugar and carbohydrates
If you’re gonna stay home and work, you have to protect your family. Be choosy, don’t let your children or yourself simply consume whatever is at arm’s length because you’re busy working. It was hard to change, I’d never say that it wasn’t but we substituted good food for all the snack foods. There are a lot of low fat or no fat products at the supermarkets now that include milk, pudding, cheeses, desserts, some chips and ice cream so completely dumping the things you may enjoy doesn’t mean going “cold turkey.”
Another big killer in our family, bread! We all love bread but bread was packing some pounds on us, sadly there’s no substitute I’ve found to kick my craving for it.
When I go to the grocery store now, my cart is filled anything low fat or no fat, healthy cereals, fruits, vegetables, lean meats and herbs. My children eat snacks in between meals but they eat cheese, cereal, carrots, apples, melons, bananas and celery with peanut butter. I love dipping vegetables so that’s my snack option now. Sometimes we just have salad for dinner, it’s quick, it’s healthy and we all love it because we can fix up our salads the way we want them. Our kid’s even position faces from cucumbers and carrots on their salads.
Work at home mom fitness is something that I need to focus on myself because I don’t get a lot of exercise like I should. Some times we occasionally take an after dinner walk with the kids and the dog but we are trying to focus more on exercise now that we feel we have our food issues under control. If you have fallen into the wahm trap, your family isn’t eating right and it’s reflecting in the mirror or the clothes you wear. Take a stand before it goes too far. Don’t risk your family’s health to make a buck, work at home moms love our families and we take care of them whole-heartedly. Work at home without sacrificing your family’s health and pass it along, you’ll be glad you did.