Princess Versus Sugar

Princess has always had an issue with sugar.  She loves it, but quite honestly, she gets really revved up after she eats sugar.  Or should I say after the "sugar high" wears off, she because a bear.  This has been an on-going battle.

The first time I recognized the role that sugar would play in our lives was at a birthday party  for one of Princess's friends.  She was about a year and a half old at the time.  Princess has always been a good listener.  Even at a year and a half, she would stay beside me, and come back if I called her.

On this particular Saturday we went to a birthday party.  They of course served cake, ice cream, and the kid-standard juice box.  Princess ate every bite of her cake and ice cream and loved her very first juice box.

A few minutes later, my sweet, good listener broke away from me.  The birthday party was at the Children's museum down here.  I remember having to chase her through a throng of people while she laughed and ran away.  Ugh!

Also about that time, we noticed something else about juice.  This was plain old ordinary orange juice and not juice boxes.  Princess would ask for a little juice before she went to bed and we usually gave in because she didn't have any sort of weight problem and we were new parents.  We started noticing that on nights when we gave her juice, she would wake up with night terrors. 

Night terrors are scary things to deal with.  Your child wakes up screaming bloody murder, but when  you get up to her, she looks right through you.  She is not really awake yet.  We delt with this by pulling her on my lap and speaking soothingly to her.  Eventually she would settle down and go back to sleep.

The funny thing is that when we took the juice away at night, the night terrors stopped.

Hmmm...

My kids have been blessed with a daddy who has a really high metabolism and a mommy who swore her kids would not have to suffer through being the "fat kid in school" like she did.  We eat healthy food at home most nights, and go out only occasionally.  When we do go out, we usually make good food choices - no McDonald's, etc.  So far our kids have not had to battle any weight issues and for that I am very thankful. 

But I don't want food to become a fight for later either.  I am quite aware that I have a very bright daughter who likes to be in charge of anything she can get her busy little hands on. I am also aware that these are the key ingredients for developing an eating disorder later in life.  Food cannot become a control issue.

That being said, we have had horrible after school times for the last 6 months.  DadOf4 and I have talked extensively about what is causing our very-well-behaved-in-school daughter to come home a snarling, snippy little girl.

Did she use up all of her good behavior in school?

Is she just hungary?

Is what she ate for lunch affecting her after school behavior?

We have been focusing on the latter.  She eats lunch right around noon.  We have noticed in the past that when she eats sugary things, her behavior erodes about three hours afterward. 

She gets home at 3:00.

I have scheduled a doctor's appointment to discuss this further.  I have read up on diabetes.  It does not appear to be that.  She does not drink water and go to the bathroom all the time. 

DadOf4 and I have come up with the theory that when her blood sugar plummets (as in 3 hours after eating a sugary snack) her behavior plummets as well.  DadOf3 is very much like that.  If he has had to skip a meal because of work issues, he comes home very crabby.  We always have cheese sticks on hand for him.  Princess does not like cheese sticks and she has caught on to the fact that when she is ultra crabby I ask her to drink a glass of orange juice.  She now refuses.

This issue will not be solved today.  We need to get some doctor input and luckily we have wonderful pediatritians down here.

This is my issue of the day!