Thursday, December 11, 2014

Fake Sugar Part 2

Ayden Jane is doing great trying to remove the artificial sweeteners from her drinking habits.  The only trouble I'm having is that she will just skip drinking all together as the answer.  Arrrrggghhhh.

I held out as best as I could for 4 days. I am trying hard not to fall back on a lot of coconut water or "spiked" water (spiked with juice) as I just do not want to trade one problem for another. (artificial sweeteners for carby drinks) At the end of the fourth day, I told Ayden Jane she could trade her fruit at supper for some apple juice in her water to make it taste good.  She went for it and sucked down about 20 ounces in 3 seconds flat...

So what's a mom to do when the choice is becoming carbs, artificial sweeteners or dehydration?

I knew that Ayden Jane had been coming home from school thirsty and downing an entire green tea or vitamin water or whatever. Now she would come home and grab a Hint water and say she liked it but ... a sip or two is all she'd drink. When I asked her about it she said she liked it but she just couldn't drink a lot of it at one time. So, that meant she needed to sip water all day long at school so that she was not already behind the game by the time she got home.

I designed  a reward system - okay, I resorted to bribery.  I sent a water bottle to school with Ayden Jane and the plan is that if she finishes the bottle of water throughout the day she is rewarded. Her teacher set a great start with giving her a penny (token reward system in her class) for drinking the whole thing and staying healthy. She drank it the next couple days and I told her that Dr. M is so proud of her for giving up the fake sugars and drinking her water each day at school she is sending her a prize! Dr. M was thrilled to find out that she was getting to be the good guy for once and was sending AJ a prize. haha.

I found a really cute kids camelback water bottle on sale and ordered a variety pack of Hint waters. AJ thinks that I report to Dr. M each day whether or not she drinks the whole water bottle and if she finishes out through Christmas the prize will arrive! I think "Dr. M" might even write AJ a note telling her how proud of her she is.

Hey, I figure Dr. M is the fall guy for me a lot. I guess she deserves to be the good guy once in a while.


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