Sugar Conformity vs. Parenting Healthy Kids
This will be another short, ranty posting where I complain that I cannot change the social environment for my kids. Stoics, you may bite your tongues (and then let the pain of doing so be as it will).
Growing up, I received a LOT of sugar. Not plain old granulated, of course, but refined and crafted into delicious morsels. I was recently recounting to myself all the ways and times in which sweet treats were used as reinforcement for me as a kid, and I was a bit shocked.
I’d get sugar for doing chores. I’d get sugar for going to church (both at church and after). I’d get sugar for reading. I’d get sugar for…going to the dentist (:face palm:). I’d get sugar for getting shots at the doctor. I’d get sugar for literally going to the bank with my mom (lollipops!). I’d get sugar for going swimming. I’d get it for playing sports, for watching movies out, for watching movies in, for memorizing scriptures, babysitting, diving off the diving board, family nights every Monday, after-dinner dessert, road trips, camping trips, birthdays, holidays, days that end in ‘y’, etc.
My childhood was somewhat unique in that way, but not as much as I once thought. As an adult, I find the same persistent use of sugar for…basically everything…all around me. And all around my kids.
There is a concept in psychology called the conformity problem. It’s the main problem highlighted in the Emperor's New Clothes — where pretty much all the kingdom believes one way but acts another way because they mistakenly believe that everyone else agrees with that way or because they fear some form of retribution for speaking up about how they really feel. At the risk of spinning this into a dumpster-fire of commentary about why I shouldn’t use the following example: this is what happened with many of the Nazi’s during Hitler’s reign.
This is how I feel about the prevalence of sweet treats in our society right now. I don’t think we actually like the fact that our kids are given candy for answering questions correctly at school, for making it to the halftime of a soccer game (phew!), for literally walking into an office building…
And yet, here we all are, putting bowls of candy on desks, buying donuts for our offices because “it’s Wednesday,” pretending that sugar is a breakfast food or that Pop Tarts are actual food at all (sorry Rory Gilmore, I do still love you). And while I can staunchly be the annoying mom who has olives, nuts, and pickles for snacks, I cannot turn off the rest of the world when my kids go out into it.
We have become an over-nourished society, having transformed the fruit of every tree into the condensed, hyper-palatable sweets on every shelf. Why are we expecting our children (and ourselves) to be able to overcome the evolution of survival by abstaining over and over and over again?
As James Clear says in Atomic Habits:
Environment is the invisible hand that shapes human behavior. We tend to believe our habits are a product of our motivation, talent, and effort. Certainly, these qualities matter. But the surprising thing is, especially over a long time period, your personal characteristics tend to get overpowered by your environment.
Have we gotten fed up enough yet (no pun intended) that we are ready to change the environment?
Sincerely — the boring mom with boring snacks.
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