My Kid Ate McDonald’s.

Somehow, despite my attempts to give my children the rest and respite that I knew they needed this summer, I found our daily schedule packed with activities. Great opportunities kept sneaking in and before I knew it I was driving all over God’s green earth so that my kids could experience music lessons, performing in an opera, nature camp, and swimming lessons, among other things.

One afternoon we rushed out of the house on our way to a Musical Theatre class and I realized that I hadn’t fed my kids. Before we got on the freeway I did the calculations and it occurred to me that if I didn’t go through a drive-thru my seven-year-old daughter, P, wouldn’t be able to eat lunch until 3:30 p.m. And this kid is the one that is always hungry. So I asked the two children of speaking age in my car which they would like for lunch, McDonald’s or Burger King. The four-year-old, M, said, “McDonald’s” while P said, “Do we have to eat either of those?”

Now, we’re not a fast food family. We don’t always get to eat healthy, real food at home, but we definitely stay away from fast food. We are blessed enough financially that when we eat on the go we can choose something a little bit healthier. But time was not allowing for any other options. Having to make a quick decision, I pulled into McDonald’s. M immediately told me what he wanted to eat. P. couldn’t fathom ordering off the menu of a place she had heard such terrible things about so I ordered for her so as not to hold up the line.

When we got our food I pulled over to distribute it to the little people in the back of the mini-van, muttering under my breath something about “every fry you drop is $1 out of your college fund,” not because my car is in any way clean, but because month old, stale fries are likely to get consumed by the toddler when he finds them on the floor. We drove off with M happily munching away. When we got on the freeway, however, I glanced in the mirror that is positioned to reflect the back of the car and saw that P was sitting with her food on her lap, pouting.

“What’s wrong?” I ask. “You need to eat before your class or you won’t get to eat for a long time.”

“Do I have to eat this?”

“Unless you want to starve.” (Okay, maybe that was a bit dramatic on my part.)

“But it doesn’t even look like chicken.”

“I know, honey, it’s not ideal. And it’s not what we would normally pick to eat, but that’s what we’re eating today.”

Then she went off on a bunch of arguments against McDonald’s that I’m certain she learned from me. “It’s going to make me sick… Isn’t this really bad for you?… The apples taste funny.”

My responses started out empathetic. “I know you don’t like it, but just eat what you can to get something in your belly.” And then they quickly got annoyed with her entitled attitude toward her meal. “ Just eat it, it’s food. Lots of kids don’t even have food.” Still she picked at her food and made faces while her little brother was done with his meal and playing with some plastic piece of junk that was included in the bag.

I couldn’t take it anymore. Finally, I raised my voice a bit and sternly said, “Look! I’m doing the best I can and this is all I can offer you today. If you don’t want to eat it — don’t! But this is the only lunch that I can manage in our busy day. I’m tired. I can’t miraculously make healthy food appear so this is the best you’ve got. Eat it or don’t eat it. I don’t care.” I wanted to add something about how chauffeurs don’t usually also have to double as personal chefs, but I cut off my snarky remarks there.

And you know what happened? She ate it. She ate her fast food and nothing bad happened. Her stomach didn’t hurt. She didn’t all of a sudden develop juvenile diabetes from eating one fast food meal. She didn’t have mystery meat stuck in her intestines for a decade. Okay, we don’t know that for sure, as I haven’t figured out time travel yet.

But she did learn to roll with the punches and to be flexible. She learned that her mom has a breaking point. We had a brief conversation about her attitude and she learned to be grateful that she has food to eat and that her parents have money to purchase this food, even when it’s not what we would like to be eating right then. She learned that she is not the center of everyone’s universe at all times. And she learned that sometimes her mom just needs her to be on her side, to cut her some slack and to have her kids give her some grace, because she will be the last one to give it to herself.

So, added to the list of summer experiences that day was “Eating McDonald’s Against Her Will.” I like to think that she internalized all of those life lessons along with her unhappily-eaten Happy Meal. She probably didn’t. But we all learned to loosen up a little and the next time I have to save-my-sanity with a trip to McDonald’s we’ll all get through it a little easier, I’m sure.