So I had my very own Supersize moment this weekend.
You see, growing up my dear, sweet Mother would not allow us to eat fast food. In fact, if we ever went out to eat it was a special occasion indeed. But fast food, never.
Yes my Mother was a bit of a health food junkie in a kind of cute, hippy kind of way. She did allow certain things in the house, but fast food was OFF LIMITS, except for one time of year.
Shamrock Shake time at McDondald's.
For whatever reason, and I'll take a stab at it and say because she's Irish, we were allowed to have a Shamrock Shake once a year. If she was in a really good mood we might even get to have Mikey D's fries.
Oh they were just heaven. Yes, I had fast food when I went with my friend's parents, which of course my Mom wouldn't know about, but this was our special treat every year.
Fast forward to when I turned 16 and could drive. My chubby ass went to fast food places whenever I could. I worked and went to high school, and a lot of kids went to Burger King after school. My work schedule gave me about a half hour to kill after school, and my expanding tank ass could be found there most of the time.
So when I had to lose weight in my late teens/early twenties I swore off fast food. I swear I can track when I really started ballooning up in weight to the day I could drive. Sure, some of that could be because I walked and rode my bike before that, but a huge portion of that was my freedom of food choices.
Over the years except for the occasional drunken White Castle drive thru I have stayed away from fast food. No more of that for me.
The one time of year that I do is what? You guessed it, Shamrock Shake time.
Even then all I get is the Shamrock Shake. One time deal.
So I remembered Friday that I hadn't had my Shamrock Shake yet. I was running late to work, hadn't prepared very well, and was starving.
I know I used to love those Whoppers, and I proceeded to try and order one. "You are at McDonald's, that's Burger King," the voice boomed from the drive thru microphone.
Whoops. Hell they have all these numbers and junk where you can order value meals. I ordered a #2, Quarter pounder/w cheese, fries, and my Shamrock Shake.
It was almost like a heroine addict getting a fix after many years of being off the wagon. I drove to work savoring every bite of that quarter pounder, scarfing french fries and drinking that delicious Shamrock Shake.
It wasn't until about an hour later that I realized that was a BIG mistake. It felt like the pits of hell had took up residence in my stomach. I won't go into details, but I'm assuming that what happened next is a lot like what those Gastric Bypass people refer to as "dumping", and it was happening from every orifice of my body, or so it seemed. Sorry for the TMI.
It was so not pretty. I can't ever remember being so sick. Needless to say I wasn't very value added at work that night.
So it really got me thinking. I remember when I saw Super Size Me with a friend she talked about the scene where he is throwing up in the parking lot. She kept saying that had to be staged, that no one would have a violent reaction like that.
Like hell I say. I kind of thought that too, that it was something put in there for dramatic effect. But maybe, just maybe we are all so used to eating that crap that our bodies are just used to accepting it.
Kind makes you wonder what it is doing to our insides if it causes a reaction that strong, eh?
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