Birthdays and Holidays
It's a Birthday
What better way to learn to celebrate birthdays program style than with our own Radiant KD... Happy Birthday, Kathleen! (November 25, 19??)
Five minutes in the mouth isn't worth it anymore...My birthday was coming. A dear and supportive friend offered to make a special birthday cake that would fit my food plan, using whole grains, a little molasses, and very little sweetness. Chewy, moist, and spicy were what we were aiming for. The recipe we were adapting came from Martha Stewart.
My friend, who doesn't actually cook very much, came to my house for the big cake-making day. She unpacked the ingredients she had purchased and lined them up on the counter with great ceremony. Then, confusion set in.
Every few minutes she appeared in the study, where I was working. "Why do I have to simmer the ginger?" "Do I really need to sift the oat flour?" "Is baking soda the same as baking powder?" Eventually she had concocted a gooey brown mass and was ready to pour it in the cake pan. This generated another visit to the study.
"Kathleen, it says to put it in six miniature bundt pans. What are bundt pans?" By this time I was laughing so hard, I could hardly stand, let alone find a bundt pan of any sort. But my neighbor, the baker, came to the rescue and found something she thought would do. We cooked the cake and sprung it from the pan.
It looked a little strange. Like something that had died or been in the refrigerator too long. My son said it resembled a mosquito disk. I wondered how we would manage to eat it.
Everyone else at my birthday party slathered ice cream over their portions of the mosquito disk. I used applesauce. The cake was pretty strange -- actually it was awful, but it was so funny, I didn't really care that I didn't have "real" cake.
It's been many years since I have had a rich chocolate cake with white frosting on my birthday, but five minutes in the mouth isn't worth it anymore.
Don't let anyone tell you, "You won't miss it after a while." Of course you will.It's like losing a dear friend. But over time, things shift. Your attachment will move from the drug (the cake) to the love (the people). The joy will be in the party, the celebration, family, and friends. The taste of cake won't be the standard of love.
There was more love in that strange birthday cake/mosquito disk than any cake I have ever had.
(P.S. Be sure to try out any recipe you plan to adapt *before* the big day!)
(c) Kathleen DesMaisons 2006 All Rights Reserved
Friends are Better Than Cake
Just wanted to share what some dear friends did for me one birthday. It was tradition at work to have a cake for the birthday person, as many jobs do.
Everyone knew I was trying really hard to lose weight. Unfortunately, they also knew that I LOVED cake. For my birthday that year they made me a delicious fruit salad, with lots and lots of cut up fresh fruit. They had "extras" to put with it, like whole grain crackers, yogurt, and cheeses. I truly did not miss the cake at all -- nor did anyone else! There was not a crumb left after the party...unlike the half-cakes we had to try to pawn off on someone at the end of the day. I have always remembered this, because I actually PREFERRED it to a birthday cake (and believe me, it takes a lot to make me choose fruit over cake) -- it was so delicious and refreshing. Most of all, it showed how much my friends cared about me and took my food plan seriously. Friends like that are priceless.
Laurie W.
Holiday Help
As you are developing your new program, you will want to change how you deal with holidays. Historically holidays have meant food - sweet, white and fat food.
Much of what we have loved about holidays has been the food. Let's think about some ways to reframe holidays. Listen to the suggestions from some of the people in the Radiant Recovery® community.
I spend the holidays with the same family every year, and we pot-luck the meal...so I will be able to bring something on the Plan, and they probably won't notice I'm not eating a lot of the other stuff. Laurie W.
Make a firm decision ahead of time-- plan! If you know you can't resist Aunt Ethel's Pecan Pie, decide how much you will have, what you have to eliminate to help balance, what to say... People seem more responsive to my being "sugar sensitive, my body doesn't process sugar properly" said with a wistful sigh than to declarations that I'm not "eating sugar". Pat
I told family members in advance about the sugar sensitivity stuff. With that knowledge, they will hopefully refrain from offering me the things they know I don't want to eat. By the same token, I will be more likely to check myself if I reach for something I have already told them I am not going to eat. Anne
Eat before you go wherever you're going. My determination is at its lowest when I'm hungry, and I have learned that I can stay with the program much more effectively if I face all the "goodies" I can't have on a protein-full stomach. Karen
I will make sure to have a supply of my sparking mineral water on hand and possibly orange juice to put in it. Maybe some lemon juice to put in ice water, too, which I find very refreshing unsweetened. Delita
The best of both worlds: good food with no cooking or cleanup. Have it your way!
The best thing I ever did about holidays was go to restaurants for the BIG MEAL (this was over the past 10 years until my mother died in 1996). This was a good choice because somehow the food never tasted as good and there was no bird to pick at and no leftovers. Once we even went to a fish restaurant and I had Dungeness Crab Louis that I like better than turkey. Judy
My son and I lived 800 miles from the rest of the family so we had some holidays with them, some holidays with friends and some holidays with just the two of us. Instead of feeling left out, we decided to look on our "just us" as the opportunity to choose our own way to celebrate. One year we had a full course holiday dinner... all microwave! One year, pizza. One year, Mexican. Sometimes we planned a day's outing or a meal out, some years we chose a day at home playing games and watching videos. Many years we invited unattached friends and acquaintances to share in our celebration. None were more memorable than others... we loved them all! Delita
Joy is as joy does. Lots of folks find new ways to enjoy and share their holidays.
Many folks spend their holiday helping in local programs serving the needy. In most communities there are ongoing services that get swamped during the holidays, or a *special* holiday meal that you can probably find advertised in the paper. Whole families are known to find their gratitude in sharing together.
I also plan to pack my sneakers, pick a time and sign up "after --dinner-walkers" before we even eat -- I'm planning it right into the old agenda so that the idea won't wane as the day wears on. That way, we're all committed to go, and the dog will love us for it! Karen
When you are first starting your program, preparing holiday meals can be daunting. If you have always served your family sweet potatoes with brown sugar and little Marshmallows, they may balk at trying something new. You might want to introduce some of these recipes one at a time and then put them together for the celebration. I have personally tried each of the recipes and I can tell you that a sugar free holiday can be a mighty nice thing! These are all in the cookbook.
* Petite Crab Cakes With Cocktail Sauce And Tartar Sauce
* Roasted Lemon Chicken
* Oven Roasted Potatoes Provencal
* Carrots Apple Bake
* Mixed Greens with Balsamic Dressing
* Poached Pears with Blueberry Tofu Sauce
* Chicken Mushroom Pie
* Chicken Drummets w/ Blue Cheese Wraps
* Curried Chicken Salad
* Salmon Asparagus Pie
* Broccoli-Cauliflower Cheese Pie
* Quicken Oven Fried Chicken
* Baked Russets Stuffed with Broccoli and Cheeses
* Georgia Sweets
* Carrot Apple Bake
* urkey Spinach Lasagna
* Macaroni and Cheese Pie
* Roasted Pears and Squash
* Smash Root Veggies
* Turkey and Wild Rice Salad
* Vegetable Kugel
* French Apple Pie
* Peach And Blubbery Crumble
* Rice Pudding with Apples
* Apple Pear Crisp
* Baked Apples with Walnut Sauce
(c) Kathleen DesMaisons 2006 All Rights Reserved
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