Coping?

As Devine talked about the coping strategies that families described when tied up by the demands of family and work, I couldn't help but to imagine a snowball effect.  If getting your hands on the fast, cheap, and yummy food at the end of the work day to bring home to the kids who have been waiting for dinner, there is going to be a continuous problem.  If the "treating" of the family to these types of food happens a couple times a week and starts to become more of the norm, which it seemed like with these families, when the effort is finally made to prepare a more healthy meal on a day when there's time or something there will most likely be backlash from the kids who are used to eating the fast, yummy things.  Then the parent will feel pressured and unsatisfied with their efforts because the kids showed dissatisfaction towards the change in meals.  I thought it was interesting when it was brought up that it also devalues the family meal time and promotes individual eating instead, since the meal is not accompanied by a process.  This snowball effect also obviously promotes overweightness and a predisposition to crave unhealthier foods for the kids later in life.  So is this coping strategy really a coping strategy?  Or is it just a very temporary one...