Week 24 Weigh-in: Family

I have cracked my brain over what to write about today and when I tried putting some post together about "living healthy on a low budget" (watch out for that next), the topic "family" just popped in my mind and I decided to just pour my heart out a bit this week and also reminiscence into what my family eating style was about too.

I grew up within a family of 7 including mom and dad. We are a combo of 3 boys and 2 girls, friendly siblings in our years of growing, we did everything together and really loved ourselves. I think as we were growing we started recognizing our individual differences and it could only make us form parties, I don't mean we disliked ourselves but we started preferring one person over the other and obviously became closer with one more than others, lol. (If this has not happened in your family, raise your hands up).

Growing up was fun with dad and mom, they were our best friends. They cared so much for us, we never had doubts in our hearts that we wholly belong to them. When I talk of care it included and not limited to clothing, shelter, food, discipline, spiritual training and they gave their best.

My parents were never rich people and at a time it became worse because we were growing and the needs were increasing geometrically. My mom is an industrious woman and wanted to do many things to make sure the income increased but dad was the balance that cautioned her to make sure our welfare and growing to be better personalities exceeded other passions.

At a point dad took to farming cum teaching just to make ends meet. It looked as if that was the lowest point but right now, I can only appreciate God and my parents for giving me those foods fresh from the farm. I still crave eternally for that milky taste of fresh corn from our farm way back, the crunchiness of fresh okra, the ease of eating yam, then the fruits from watermelon, sugarcane, cashews, guava, bananas, all fresh and thriving in a natural environment. I will never lie to you it was hectic, dirty, weakening and really sounds poor but trust me there were great dividends from that life.

One of the major things I have learned is contentment, its a virtue that is irreplaceable. My parents gave to us when they had abundance but when there was nothing, we understood every bit of it and we adjusted without much complaints and delay. 

I want to say something about our feeding way back then, when we were growing we ate home cooked meals made by mom, dad cooks too. As we grew she started showing us how to do it and of course after a lot of trial and error, I personally started cooking mom's way which I later realized was not really the only way. (learned more in school)

Myself and Kiddo

Our plates also started growing bigger and by the time we were teens/adolescents, wow! We ate like we had death sentences, lol (I think the body just needed more to keep up with the energy radiating from us). We ate but we were not fat at all and for God's sake I was never conscious of body image at all (still not conscious of what my body looks like but more conscious of what it feels like now). We ate all classes of food and in good proportion even though mom was not as conscious too. Dad was probably a little careful about our meals because he had relationship with foreigners at a point in his life. We learned from our dad to eat our carbs with enough veggies, not eat heavy at night, make it light in the morning with cereal, be active through the day etc. He also made sure there was food to eat. We grew up looking really healthy (I will post a #tbt later)

Meals
We did 3 round meals (not square) a day with snacks which came in form of fruits. Dad trained us with fruit snacking and as we grew, we knew well.

Timing
Our meals were not timed because of school and other factors and we were used to late dinners (between 8pm - 9:30pm).

Portions
Our portions were large during teen years and gradually reduced as we left that stage save one of us (if he reading this, he knows himself, lol).

Taste
Mom had favorites and those are the meals you enjoy most in the house. Those meals not in her good books will get the least attention.

I asked myself today if I have learned from them and became better then they were. I think I will say YES.

My sister was around for two weeks ending today and to say I missed their departure was an understatement, in fact I cried. Seeing her made me remember a lot about my childhood and the beauty of growing up. Family cannot be underestimated at all, the feeling is just very different irrespective of how far apart you are from each other. I just loved those moments with her and the kids and then having to buddy up as she is also in a weight loss journey. I learned a lot from her as I know she did from me (she now reduces her food portions by half). The kids were fun to be with and I really wished we stay in the same city. 

Kiddo

Kiddo's awesome kids

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I weighed in at 165.6lbs this morning (-2.4lbs from last week). 3 days intermittent fasting and some walking.