Childhood Obesity - Some Tough Stuff

My goal in writing these articles is to have us face the realities of our dysfunctional eating in this country so we can start to take responsibility for how our society and our own behavior influence our kids. Of all the developed nations, the US has the most prevalence of obesity. That’s right, major league messed up eating in this country. There I said it. Most of us may not want to hear this, or face it, or deal with it for ourselves. But I'm guessing we all want better for your kids. So, let's get to it.

Childhood obesity. Not a fun topic. Not an easy topic. Not a topic any of us want to talk about. This is a topic that has stigma for us as parents and stigma for the children who are overweight. Regardless, it's still a big problem. But it's one we can take control of and most of the time it's avoidable or fixable.

What's the story here? Bottom line — we're eating too much and too much of the wrong stuff. In addition, we're not moving our bodies enough. That's it. That's really all it comes down to. It's not brain surgery. We have bad eating habits and we're not moving our bodies enough. Of course there is a percentage of people who have a genetic predisposition to obesity, which is just horrible. It stinks. It does, it stinks. But it is what it is and giving into it is not OK. I'm not eliminating that crowd from this conversation. If someone has a predisposition to obesity, that means they need to watch what they eat and move their body even more than the rest of the fat people who just got that way all on their own. Here are the stats:

•    1 in 5 American four-year olds is obese, with higher rates among some minorities including American Indian, blacks and Hispanics. That’s more than half a million four year olds.
•    Only 5% of children two-five were considered overweight in a 1971-1974 survey, in 2003-2004 that number grew to 13.9%
•    Only 4% of children six-eleven were considered overweight in a 1971 survey, in 2003-2004 that number grew to 18.8%
•    Only 6.1% of children twelve-nineteen were considered overweight in a 1971-1974 survey, in 2003-2004 that number grew to 17.4%.
•    Overweight adolescents have a 70% chance of becoming overweight or obese adults.  This number increases to 80% if one or more parent is overweight or obese.

As moms, right after we count our baby’s fingers and toes and breathe a sigh of relief that they’re all there, the next thing we think is, “He/she must be hungry”.  And so the cycle begins — we worry about the eating habits of our kids pretty much until we die. I’m 41 years old and every time I go visit my mother, I no sooner set foot in her door than she is serving me up something to eat. I have three kids who and I am constantly worrying if they got enough to eat. And on and on it goes. So for all of us moms, it seems to be back in our laps. We all need to take responsibility for what we’re feeding our kids.

I can hear you all screaming at me through your computer — "But no matter what I do, my kids won’t eat vegetables!",  "Lady, who do you think you are? I don't have time to cook three meals a day!", "I've given up, I just give them whatever they'll eat because I'm tired of fighting with them about every meal." Fair enough, we’ve all been there. But that doesn’t mean we have to feed them fast food three meals a day. Sadly, this is what some children are eating, or the nutritional equivalent of fast food three meals a day and it’s simply not OK.

Americans love our food. Americans love our food big. Americans love our food fast. Americans love our food fried (this one I particularly like! who doesn’t love a good piece of fried chicken or mozzarella stick or anything you can dunk in a vat of hot oil?). Americans love our soft drinks. Americans love our all you can eat meals. You get the idea. We are obsessed with food. Food makes us feel good and food makes us feel bad. But we need to try to not pass this obsession along to our kids. We need to try to equip them with the skills to make good eating choices. Not because we want them to be size two supermodels. This has nothing to do with being the svelt prom queen or the super hot guy in school with the six-pack abs. This has to do with their health. The emotional component of overweight children is clearly an extremely valid concern, but first, let’s focus on the most important thing — their health.

Overweight kids are more likely to have or develop in their lifetime the following: type II diabetes, hypertension, high blood pressure, heart disease, cancer, obstructive sleep apnea, fatty liver, insulin resistance and adult obesity. If we didn't know our kids might develop these things from being overweight, we do now. Information is power. We should empower ourselves to change our kids' lives.

I'm not a nutritionist so I can’t begin to tell you how many calories and fat a child should be eating each day. But I’m sure it varies depending on any number of things including how active they are, their age and sex and rate of growth. You can look up your child’s BMI (body mass index – height/weight ratio) to see what is the right weight for your child. Then there are programs on the internet that can tell you how many calories they should be eating for their growth stage. Or better yet, we can all make sure to ask our pediatricians.

What I can tell you is 3,500 calories equals a pound.  So every time our children — or for that matter, any of us — eat 3,500 calories without the equivalent in exercise, we will gain a pound. Let me show you how easy it is to rack up that many calories without even thinking about it.

•    9 - Hershey’s chocolate kisses = 200 calories
•    1 - Twix Bar = 280 calories
•    1 – 5 oz. serving of Cold Stone Cake Batter flavored Ice Cream = 347 calories
•    4 Thin Mint cookies = 140 calories
•    1 – 10 oz. bottle of Snapple Orangeade = 240 calories
•    1 – Auntie Anne’s Cinnamon Sugar pretzel = 470 calories
•    1 – Chocolate Frosted Dunkin’ Donut = 300 calories
•    1 - Starbuck’s Hot chocolate, 1 pint serving size, whole milk and whipped cream = 450 calories
•    1 – slice of lemon meringue pie = 330 calories
•    1 – small order of McDonald’s French Fries = 231 calories
•    1 oz serving of Dorito’s nacho cheese flavored chips = 140 calories
•    1 – 10 oz. bottle of Mott’s apple juice – 133 calories
•    1 – bottle of Coca Cola = 239 calories

Grand Total = 3,500 calories.

Wasn't very hard, was it. Everything listed here is a snack. And none of it has any nutritional value. The reason I listed these types of foods is to give us an idea of how fast and how easy and how unconsciously we give our kids empty calories. These are extra things that we have in between meals as snacks! How many times have we been shopping in the mall and grabbed a pretzel at one of the pretzel stands? That quickly, we feed our kids an extra 470 calories. I listed several different drinks because they are a major culprit in weight gain. If your child drinks 1 bottle of Coke a day, seven days a week, that equals 1,673 calories. That’s almost a half a pound a week in beverages alone. Think about that: absolutely no nutritional value, not to mention the caffeine. 

Snacks are clearly a problem, but the other meals we’re eating are as well. We eat too much fast food. A McDonald’s Kids Meal, six chicken nuggets, small fries and an apple juice box = 600 calories. Don’t misunderstand, I have driven through many a McDonald’s and Wendy’s and Burger King drive thru window and thrown my kids fries over my shoulder and kept on driving. But, we need to stop and think about how many times a month we do it and what that equates to in nutrition and calories. Especially if you have a child who is overweight already, fast food needs to be seriously limited.

Portion size is another issue. We eat way too much at each sitting. Restaurants serve huge portions and we're obsessed with "cleaning our plates." How many times did your parents say, "clean your plate"? I swore when I had kids I would never say "clean your plate" and guess what, I hear it coming right over my lips and I try my best to stop it. It's hard, it's something we have just been conditioned to say. We say it for the right reasons. We want our kids to be full and not ask us for something to eat in an hour after a meal and we don’t want them to waste food. The problem with this is, they're stuffing themselves when they really are full. They're eating more calories than they need to or should eat. It's almost better to have them eat small meals during the day, when they are naturally hungry, than stretch their stomachs and over eat. 

This one is a tough one to balance. I'm not saying it's OK to take two bites and say "I'm full" and they're off the hook. Maybe we can just pay attention to our kids eating habits. Watch how much food they eat and let that be a gauge of what is reasonable for them to be expected to eat. On top of that, we should watch what size portions we dish out.

We all know the food pyramid and that should eat our fruits and vegetables and limit our fat intake. We've been told how to eat since we were in grade school. In a perfect world we would all eat 12 portions of fruit and vegetables a day and wash it down with water or skim milk only, but it’s not a perfect world. Knowing something and doing it are two different things.

What we need to do is be more aware of what we are feeding our kids, how many calories are in their meals and how many calories they burn. I'm not saying deny them all the fun things to eat that this fantastically gluttonous country has to offer. I'm just saying let's be smart about how much and how often we do. And more importantly, from the time they are little, try, I emphasize try, to sneak good things onto their plates. My three-year-old is my toughest customer. At seven months I put a green bean on his plate and he literally threw it at the wall without even knowing what it was. He's still a really bad eater, but this week he asked me for an apple and I actually witnessed him eat it. It's a start.

I refer to moving our bodies around instead of the word "exercise." I know, I know, you’re not stupid, I'm not tricking you with my clever little use of language. But the reason I say move our bodies is because there are plenty of ways to burn calories besides putting on running shoes and jogging five miles in ten degree weather.  We can do things that we actually like and involve our kids. If you like running in ten degree weather, great, buy parkas and long johns for everyone, but that’s not the only choice. Go to the mall as a family early on Saturday mornings when it's not crowded and speed walk for a ½ an hour. Let the kids race each other to make it more interesting (but while you’re there, don't have a pretzel!).

If you have a Wii, get Wii fitness, you’ll definitely burn some calories. Or for that matter, just play Wii tennis against your eight-year-old and burn some calories. Play catch in the backyard with your kids. Get one of those mini trampolines and have a jump-a-thon. Get them involved in sports in your town or in their schools…soccer, basketball, tennis, softball. It's there for all of us to find if we do the research. We can get them involved when they’re young and they won't know the difference. There are plenty of ways to get off the couch or out from in front of the computer, many things costs little or no money and don't involve a treadmill.

We can all strive to make it a priority in our homes. We can set the example for our kids so they grow up seeing us place a value on exercise (OK, there I said the exercise word) and they won’t realize that it's not fun. They will just do it as a part of their routine. It’s really important, as important as brushing our teeth or any other daily ritual that we teach our kids.

We are the most important role models to our kids. Mom (and dad for that matter) is the number one influence in our kids’ lives. So if we eat right, if we exercise, if we show them that we value ourselves, they are going to be much more likely to value themselves. If you are 40 lbs. overweight and your husband is 40 lbs. overweight, your kids are most likely going to be overweight too. None of us wants to hear this and not many people actually say it, but I just did. Let's stop living in denial and do something about our own bodies, if not for ourselves, for our kids. It's not easy, but it needs to be something that every family in this country takes really seriously so we don’t keep producing generations of overweight kids who turn into overweight adults.

If your child is already overweight or obese, you may want to consult your pediatrician or a nutritionist about a diet and exercise plan. I don't pretend to know how to advise on the best approach. But I will say, none of us should keep living in denial about it. You know if your child is overweight and it’s not going to get better until you take the first step. This can be done with great love and understanding. If our kids are overweight, we had a great deal to do with it. This is not the time for blame or guilt on either side. It's just time to lighten things up. Hold his or her hand, wrap your arms around them and do it together with as much fun and happiness as you can muster up. That's part of the job description we all signed up for when we decided to be moms.

Author: Shari Dabby

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