Floored by Broccoli, Tricked by a Kid

 Humorous Healthy Eating for multiple sclerosis

 ice cream cone

  My dear friend Samantha and her daughter Lexi were in town for their annual summer visit. It is always a blast to spend time with them and to see how much Lexi has grown during the year. Lexi and I bond in many ways, but especially over our shared sweet tooth.

“Samantha, is it ok if I take Lexi out for a little ice cream?”

“Is she asking for ice cream?”

“Oh, yes. Lexi, you want to go out for ice cream, don’t you? Yes, she is asking for ice cream.”

On one night of the visit, Samantha wanted to make dinner. She made a delicious chicken dish, with brown rice and a huge bag of broccoli because, “it’s Lexi’s favorite.”

This is where my beloved five year old friend betrayed me. Seems, sweet tooth aside, Lexi actually likes vegetables. It was very confusing. Broccoli was the veggiest of the veggies and at the top of my most hated vegetable list. But Lexi did not seem to cringe at the site of the disgusting green stuff.

broccoli

I asked her advice on how to eat it, how to swallow it without gagging. She showed me how she pulled apart little spears at a time and munched away. Sometimes she would dip a bit of broccoli in the sauce that came with the chicken dish but mostly, she ate it straight up. Not wanting to be upstaged by my young friend, and remembering that we had just seen the movie Brave together so brave I needed to be, I ate the whole serving of broccoli that Samantha had given me. Princess Merida has got nothing on me!

I didn’t throw up but it wasn’t fun either. On the list of things that suck, having an MRI, doing shots three times a week, and paying bills were worse than eating broccoli. But broccoli did suck more than reading up on the latest treatments, constant trips to the pharmacy and medication-induced dry mouth.

As we were cleaning up the kitchen and Lexi had ventured into another room to watch the Disney channel, Samantha and I found broccoli spears under Lexi’s chair. Actually, we found a lot of broccoli spears on the floor. So, it wasn’t that Lexi loved broccoli, she had just learned well how to fake eating it by ‘accidentally’ allowing most of it to fall on the floor.

Samantha’s comment was, “she is usually pretty good when eating dinner but sometimes she gets messy.” I didn’t point out that there was no ice cream on the floor on our sweet tooth adventure.

I had been had! Lexi tricked me into eating my broccoli while she scammed to make hers go away. I was pretty impressed with the brilliance of her plan if not hurt by her lack of willingness to share it with me. Ahhhh, the best vegetable pretend eaters know what secrets to keep!

That visit aside, I did need to start taking my ‘getting healthy plan’ more seriously. Earlier in the month some other friends had come to visit and we had all gone out for ice cream then too. The place we went had several servers and it turns out that we each had our own person serving our various requests- flavors, toppings, cup or cone. All of us asked for smalls but when we gathered with our individually chosen treats, I realized that my small was actually the only kiddie sized small.

Was my server new at the job and didn’t have her sizes down? Or, was she an ice cream server expert who was really saying to me, “honey, you do not need ice cream. I will give you just a little taste to be polite but that is all. And you should probably walk it off right away.”

Fate seemed to be conspiring to get me on the get fit program. The WiiFit gaming system and I had made up in anticipation of Lexi’s visit. She loved the penguin game and I didn’t want her young brain traumatized by the nasty things the WiiFit would say when I turned it on for the first time after several months, so I had turned it on way before her arrival. I had even used it a few times to really butter it up for Lexi.

Then there was the surprise email from the “take control of your MS health” world. Seems that one of Montel Williams public relations peeps (really, I googled the guy to make sure he wasn’t making his identity up), saw my No Moves like Jagger but Smooth like Montel blog post. He wrote to me that he found it funny but he and Montel were worried about my health. They wanted to send me Montel’s Healthmaster Elite system to improve my diet and get me healthier with more energy.

So, the WiiFit and I were friends again, Lexi had tricked me into eating my veggies and a friend of Montel’s was so worried about me that he gave me an expensive gift to try to help. There is no way out now- vegetable smoothies here I come!

Join me on my get fit journey by following my posts to see how I do. Starting with today’s blog, I will now post new blogs every Friday!

 

Image: FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Image: FreeDigitalPhotos.net

 

 

12 thoughts on “Floored by Broccoli, Tricked by a Kid”

  1. Way cool! Getting fit can’t be that bad, right??? Maybe we could walk together sometime. But, I am real busy now. No, I am not just making excuses while saying all of the right things. I really do want to get fit. And, walking is my speed. Right after I get back from NJ and my Grandson’s graduation party, I will get in touch with you. Probably shouldn’t eat any graduation cake. Well, maybe just a bite. There is always tomorrow to get started. LOL

    Reply
    • Floran, life is short-eat graduation cake! Just have your veggies first. One carrot stick should cover you for the week. And call me about walking, walking I should be able to handle.

      Reply
  2. Very entertaining post, Yvonne!
    As I was reading, before I got to the HealthMaster part, I was thinking, “I’ve got to tell her about vegetable smoothies.”
    Recently we were given a very expensive blender gift too. K’s reaction was “but we HAVE a blender”. I told him our blender compared to this one was like comparing a tricycle to a Mercedes Benz”. He was also worried that owning this machine might turn me into a vegan. But, he’s been pleasantly surprised by what it can do, and yes even green smoothies can taste great.

    Reply
    • Too funny Marti! And what a coincidence. Like K, I would be terrified of the vegan idea too but I love how you compared the blending devices. I am committed so we’ll see how it goes. Thank you so much for following my blog!

      Reply
  3. I love it! This cracked me up and made me smile. The cleverness about the girl sloppiness eating her broccoli and yet not a drop of ice cream hit the floor, her mom’s failure to make the same observation and conclusion are great! Now get off your watermelon, take your punches from the Wii Fit Bitch and slurp down a veggie smoothie with a toast to Montel and his peeps when you are done.

    Reply
    • LOVE it when a post makes someone laugh and their comments make me laugh even harder! Alright- I’ll hit the Wii. I was going to swim the lbs away but I heard there are sharks at the beach!

      Reply
  4. Broccoli is one of the best vegetables. I don’t understand how you can’t enjoy it. Maybe you’re overcooking it. Try just blanching is and having it with lemon juice, salt, and pepper.

    Reply
    • Yuck! But I will try it. I am getting better. Next up is broccoli soup. Hopefully if you grind up the broccoli into miniscule pieces it won’t taste as bad! Thank you for checking out my blog!

      Reply

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