When the kids are wailing, the boss wasn’t happy with your presentation, and the kitchen is anything but pristine, what mom hasn’t thrown up her hands and given in to demands for chicken nuggets? Like, three times a week?

Maybe Mom should tell the kids: Be careful what you wish for.

Read about celebrities who dealt with eating disorders.

This week 17-year-old British factory worker Stacey Irvine was rushed to the hospital when she collapsed, struggling to breathe. During the exam, doctors were stunned to learn that Ms. Irvine had never in her life eaten fruit or vegetables; instead she had eaten almost nothing but fast-food chicken nuggets since she was two years old.

Her mother, Evonne Irvine, told reporters she had gone to great lengths to try to feed her daughter more nutritious food, at one point even trying to starve the girl, but it hadn’t worked. Stacey responded that, once she started eating nuggets, she “loved them so much they were all I would eat.”

Learn to grow your own fruits and vegetables.

What’s so bad about nuggets?

They would be bad enough if they were merely chunks of chicken that had been breaded and deep-fried in oil. One documentary describes McDonald's nuggets as chickens “stripped down to the bone, and then 'ground up’ into a chicken mash, then combined with a variety of stabilizers and preservatives, pressed into familiar shapes, breaded and deep fried, freeze dried, and then shipped to a McDonald’s near you.”

Aside from chicken and oil, those “stabilizers and preservatives” are said to include dimethylpolysiloxane, a form of silicone also used in cosmetics. Another additive is tertiary butylhydroquinone (TBHQ), a form of butane. According to one report, chicken is only about 50 percent of a McNugget; the remainder is a mixture of corn-derived ingredients, sugars and synthetic substances.

If a four-piece serving of Chicken McNuggets carried a nutrition label, at first glance it wouldn’t seem too scary: 190 calories, 12 grams of carbs and 12 grams of fat. But consider that more than half of those calories (56 percent) are from fat—and protein accounts for a mere four percent. Add a whopping 360 mg sodium, and its image as “the more nutritious fast-food snack” fades.

Read about 15 surprisingly healthy fast food picks.

What’s the worst that can happen?

Aside from collapsing and gasping for air, as Stacey Irvine did? Doctors also discovered that the veins in Ms. Irvine’s tongue were swollen and she was diagnosed with anemia. Further, such a high salt intake can increase a person’s blood pressure (which ultimately can put them at risk for a stroke or heart attack).

McNuggets are low in nutrients everyone needs, such as calcium, fiber, vitamins, antioxidants and healthy fats, so a steady diet of nuggets means missing out on the health benefits of those ingredients.

Find out which vitamins you really need.

So what’s a parent to do?

If your kids are hooked on nuggets, experts offer these suggestions for steering them towards healthier eating:

Serve a variety of healthy foods at home to prevent “picky eater” habits from forming. Taking them grocery shopping, teaching them to find and choose foods, and involving them in meal planning tells them you want to prepare meals they will enjoy.
Set realistic goals. If the child bristles at eating a side portion of veggies, make a game to get him to take one bite of the new-tasting food.
Make your own chicken snacks at home, using healthy dipping sauces like marinara sauce, yogurt or mustard. If you must bread the nuggets, dip them in an egg, roll them in cornflake crumbs and bake, don’t fry.
If you’re eating out, cut out half of the trans and saturated fat by ordering a grilled chicken sandwich instead of nuggets. Order for your child from the adult menu, or share your sandwich with her, so the nuggets issue doesn’t come up.
Be consistent and firm, but encourage and praise the child every time she tries a new, healthier food. And be a good role model—don’t expect children to eat healthy when one or both parents snack on salty chips or fatty, processed foods.
Keep healthy foods in the meal, even when you give in and allow your child to order nuggets. Serve it with a side salad, fruit, or a slice of whole-grain bread.

I like my fast food about once a month or so but wow. oO
I used to have a friend in high school whose mother let her eat whatever she wanted, very picky eater so my mom hated to invite her to dinner. She's still incredibly healthy though

Oh thats just nasty...
if mcd has caused so many issues and is so insanely bad for you, why are they still in business

>>3 Because, let's face it, it's fucking delicious lol.

i hate mcdolands its yucky i liek fruit better and yourgut thats what i eat

>>3 >>4 And because they don't try to deceive people into thinking it's healthy, nor a good idea to eat every day, nor nutritious.. If they claimed that they'd have their asses sued all over the place

>>6 Also true.

I'm surprised that she didn't collapse sooner. You would think she would've gotten tired of eating the same thing for 15 years.

>>8 Lol... I know right? I remember eating ramen noodles for like... three weeks straight and when I ate it for the last time it tasted yucky... >:P

I'm simply dumbfounded by the stupidity of some people.

That's one retarded kid. SHE'S MISSING OUT ON ALL THE GOOD FOOD!

The heck?! CHICKEN FREAKING NUGGETS? Wow... The stupidity of humans astounds me, even today. It's funny, really. Well, I hope the girl is okay...

>>4
Please don't eat my gut.

Morgan Spurlock to the rescue.
Ditch McDonalds, my friends.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lkj2hNUBmzk

Ok I get that Chicken nuggets are tasty but, COME ON! O.o

I can't eat anything at McDonalds. That shit is disgusting, makes me sick. I'm quite frankly surprised she even made it to 17 years old.

Man! THat shit gon' kill u!

She should stop eatin micdawwnalds this instant~!!

>>16 I'm with'ya!

Dollars! Unite! Let us never taste the devil's food they call McDonalds!

..Unless we need something really fast and cheap...

I love McDonalds. That is only because I eat other things too. Variety is important. Although, that story seems far-fetched. I doubt she has made it anywhere close to that long without dying.

A friend actually showed me this a few days before this thread was made, it's about none other than our friend McNugget.

http://docakilah.wordpress.com/2011/05/11/can-you-guess-what-mcdonald%E2%80%99s-food-item-this-is/

The article itself is a bit crude, but the picture at the beginning definitely threw me off. I thought it was some chunky pink ice cream at first.

>>20
God, it felt like someone was fucking scream his head off at me, like it was me who made those nuggets.

>>20 This has been being spammed on my facebook for the last few days, and it's simply not true anymore. It used to be made like that, apparently, but stopped doing it years ago.

On a related note to this thread, I think of eating McDonalds with an analogy to smoking: if you don't do it/eat it, it's disgusting and trying it makes you want to throw up. If you've been eating/smoking for a long time, it's hard to stop.

Okay, a bit of counterpoint then.
McDonalds supplier page:
http://www.mcdonalds.com/us/en/food/food_quality/see_what_we_are_made_of/meet_our_suppliers/keystone_foods.html

Of course to be expected the company utilizes a lot of farm images, clean photos, and limited information about their process. The truth is that no one can really blame them for that, it's just advertising strategy.

This one is a recent article (two days ago) about the removal of Ammonium Hydroxide from their hamburger meat in the US.
http://news.nationalpost.com/2012/01/26/mcdonalds-drops-use-of-pink-slime-in-u-s-meat/

Discussion of McDonalds' chicken processing is rather scarce, aside from a few food critics bashing new "Chicken McBites" so I'd take >>22's word for it over the ranting wordpress "Doctor."

Anyway, the truth is that the girl's condition had little to do with the quality of McDonalds foods at all. If she ate nothing but farm-fresh apples, and absolutely nothing else a similar incident would have occurred. The human system requires all different forms of materials to survive, therefore different kinds of food must be eaten.

Chicken mcbites... look like they wouldnt be tasty. Theyd probably be more crunchy outer layer then chicken ness

My cousin is kind of like this unfortunately. My aunt has no idea how to parent, so he practically lives on chicken nuggets, I don't even think he's tasted many vegetables in his life and he's like six or something...

>>24 They're surprisingly good. There's actual chicken there, and a good amount too. It's real meat, as far as I can tell.

so now we have a chicken nugget version of a girl ramen addicted naruto.and no giant furry ass fabbit (fox rabbit) to extract every possible nutrient.poor girl.

Fox rabbit.... what?
and at least the ramen had some nutrients