Healthy Kids in School

It is Monday morning and the whole family is running late. The bus is about to pick up the kids and they haven’t eaten anything yet. So you pour them a glass of no-sugar added, “all natural” grape juice and toss a Pop-Tart their way. But they made it onto the bus and no one was late, WHEW! Thank goodness for pre-packaged “food.”

No time for breakfast meant no time to pack their lunch either, so your children ate school lunch that day; chicken nuggets, mashed potatoes, a bun, fruit cocktail and chocolate milk. After school programs and sports keep your kids at school until 4:30, so they grab a granola bar and Gatorade from their backpack to keep their energy up. Once all of the activities are over, mom is tired from driving all over the place and picking up the kids so she throws in frozen pizza with a side of garlic bread with some skim milk. Then a bowl of Lucky Charms for a bed-time snack (they are made with “Whole Grains” now). Does that sound like you?

Tuesday was a better day. Everyone had time for breakfast so the kids had Honey Nut Cheerios (10 tsp sugar), Skim milk (3 tsp sugar) and a banana sliced on top (6 tsp sugar). You packed a lunch of Lunch-ables turkey and cheddar sub (14.75 tsp sugar), Goldfish crackers (4.75 tsp sugar) and a juice box (6.75 tsp sugar). The after school snack was yogurt covered raisins (5 tsp sugar) and Gatorade (3.5 tsp sugar). You had time to make dinner so you made spaghetti (10.75 tsp sugar) with a side of garlic bread (5.5 tsp sugar), salad with fat-free French dressing (2.25 tsp sugar) and skim milk (3 tsp sugar) for dinner…oh, and fat-free frozen yogurt (5 tsp sugar) for dessert! You think you did better today…but did you? That comes to a total of 80.25 teaspoons of sugar in the blood for the day (4g effective carbs equals 1 tsp of sugar in the blood).  Do you know what a normal blood sugar level is? 1 cup? 2 cups? NO, 1 TEASPOON of sugar is a normal blood sugar! For adults, children, teens and babies. Blood sugar increases insulin and insulin is TOXIC to our bodies and cells. I feel terrible for the kids diagnosed with ADD and ADHD… maybe it is just too much sugar.

Dr. Stephen Sondike, Program Director for NEW (Nutrition, Exercise and Weight Management) Kids Program at Children’s Hospital of Wisconsin, disagrees with the assertion that low-carb diets make kids sluggish. He says the opposite is true. “Kids get tired when they eat a breakfast high in carbohydrates and their blood sugar drops at around 10:00 am.” Sondike says that a breakfast consisting of a bagel and a glass of orange juice—both high-carb items—causes a temporary spike in blood sugar for a high-energy early morning, but results in a mid-morning “crash” that leaves bodies listless and craving sugar. “When you eat more sugar, your body makes less sugar, so you need more sugar,” Sondike explains. “The candy and coke makers love it when people eat high-carb breakfasts because they need that fix around 10:00 am when their sugar drops.” We need to start healing our body with food so adult diseases don’t happen. We are too accepting to put a “Band-Aid” on our issues once the problem has already happened. We need to fix the source of the problems.

Insulin and its counterbalancing hormone, glucagon, are in charge of controlling metabolism. The word insulin may immediately call up an association with diabetes, and this is totally valid. Controlling blood sugar is insulin’s most important job. Many people with heart disease, high cholesterol, diabetes, high blood pressure in their families have inherited a tendency for their insulin sensors on the cells to malfunction by years of high sugar and starch consumption. As these sensors become tired, insulin resistance develops. Since it’s essential to get the sugar out of the blood and into the cells, the pancreas overcompensates by making more and more insulin to force the tired sensors to work. This starts a detrimental cycle of needing ever more insulin to keep the process going. If we start our children on a diet of high starch, they become so resistant to insulin that the amount necessary to make the sensors respond and clear the sugar from the blood is more than their pancreas can make; they becomes diabetic.

Excess insulin causes a variety of other detrimental problems; it increases the production of cholesterol in the liver; thickens the walls of the arteries, causing high blood pressure; the kidneys retain salt and fluid; and it tells our fat cells to store excess starch and sugar.

Insulin’s actions are countered by glucagon. Glucagon alerts the liver to slow down triglyceride and cholesterol production, for the kidneys to release excess salt and fluid, to the artery wall to relax and lower blood pressure, and to the fat cells to release stored fat to be burned for energy. But, insulin is a stronger hormone and when it is high, it suppresses glucagon’s actions. After a childhood of sugar and starch consumption, metabolic syndrome and insulin resistance happens. This is why what we feed our children is so important.

What we eat controls the production of these hormones. In my recipes, you will be able to stimulate glucagon by keeping insulin low, which will allow the metabolism to heal and the malfunctioning sensors to regain sensitivity. Once this healing occurs, the metabolic disturbances that elevated insulin has caused will improve or disappear; cholesterol and triglycerides return to normal, blood pressure returns to normal, blood sugar stabilizes and you can achieve a normal body weight.  There’s no need to spend huge amounts of money on medications to put a “band-aid” over these problems. I have seen it time and time again; nutrition is key to a healthy body. You can pay the doctor or you can pay the farmer.

Sure, it takes time planning and preparing meals, but we all make priorities with our time… When your kids attitude and grades improve (as well as YOU lose weight, feel great and look amazing), you will never regret the time you put into it!

1. “Healthified” Cereal or Granola: If you use coconut oil, no refrigeration is needed so this is perfect for those days you are running late. Just place in a Tupperware and the kids can munch on it on the way to school. (0.5 to 0.6 tsp sugar)

2. “Healthified” Shake: This can be made the night before and frozen. Take it out right away in the morning, as it thaws, it reminds us as an ice cream treat! (1.8 tsp sugar)

3. “Healthified” Waffles: Instead of buying Eggo Waffles, make a triple batch of my waffles and store in the freezer. All you have to do is pop them in the toaster and top with my homemade syrup or Nature’s Hollow Syrup. (0.5 tsp sugar)

4. “Healthified” Muffins: I make a variety of muffins (the Chocolate Muffin is a favorite) and store in the freezer for easy breakfasts and snacks. (0.5 tsp sugar)

5. “Healthified” Pizza Quiche: Top with marina and it is pizza for breakfast! (0.5 tsp sugar)

1. “Healthified” Tortilla Wraps: Use to make Sunflower butter (or peanut if allowed) and berry sushi (recipe in KIDS cookbook). (0.65 tsp sugar)

2. “Healthified” Granola or NutriGrain Less Bars: No refrigeration required if made with coconut oil (0.5 to 0.6 tsp sugar)

3. Thousand Hill Farms or Applegate Farms grass-fed Hot Dogs or Beef Sticks (0 tsp sugar)

4. “Healthified” Fruit Roll Ups (1 tsp sugar)

5. “Healthified Cake Pops

Back to School AFTERSCHOOL SNACK MAKEOVER