Worst Mom in the World

That's what Matthew called me today.

I went with him on his class field trip to Usery Mountain Park. We went on a delightful one-mile, one-hour (truthfully!) ranger led hike. It was a simple stroll through the desert in which the ranger stopped several times to tell us about the mountains, cacti, birds, lizards, javelina, and other plants and animals in our desert. The weather was beautiful and it was a very pretty hike, but all the kids were getting hungry towards the end. We arrived back to our ramada, some dads fetched the baskets full of our packed lunches, and we found a spot to enjoy our lunch.

That was the plan--to enjoy our lunch.

If it had been just me and Matthew and Elizabeth, he would have been happy. As it was, our group included another boy and two girls, and whoever packs their lunches is way more fun than I. Though I'm not sure fun is the right word. Would you believe that every one of those three kids had a Lunchable? One kid's had chicken nuggets, dipping ketchup, and an Oreo-like cookie. Along with that he had a bag of tortilla chips and a two-way packet of salsa and liquid cheese, a bag of Doritos, and a bag of Cool Ranch Doritos. One girl's Lunchable was chips, salsa, liquid cheese, and a brownie, while the other's was a sandwich but she dropped the meat on the ground so it was simply bread and cheese. She also had a bag of yogurt covered pretzels that would feed our family for a week.

All those kids seem healthy, and I do not judge their parents. I understand parents are busy, especially if they work, and because I do not work I acknowledge that I have more time to make my kids' lunches a priority. It's my choice to not send heavily processed and overly packaged junk food for them to eat at school. I admit to making things harder than they should be with the six lunch containers I have to wash after school each day (three for each kid), but it's my small contribution to making the world a better place by keeping that many more plastic bags and drink boxes out of landfills. As to their lunch contents, my kids get a peanut butter and honey sandwich, some plain yogurt with a small container of granola to mix into it, an apple or pear, and a "candy treat" which is a cookie or, depending on the season, a piece of their Halloween, Valentine's Day, or Easter candy. They get a treat, but their entire lunch is not a treat. And that's what Matthew can't understand.

Have you ever tried to convince a seven-year-old boy that he gets the lunch that he gets because you love him and want to keep his body healthy? Don't even try; it's futile. I can only hope that he wraps his head around this concept sooner rather than later because if feeding my kids low-fat, highly nutritious, healthy, real food is wrong, then I don't want to be right. I'll wear my World's Worst Mom crown with pride.