7 yr old DS is morbidly obese, what to do?

[Aplone]

Mums and other carers of formerly obese kids, how did you get them to a healthy size??

A few days ago I put DS's height / weight measurements into the NHS child BMI calculator and it says he's on the 98th percentile and morbidly obese. Am ashamed and really upset. Feel incredibly guilty. I thought maybe he had some "puppy fat" but never thought he was that large. How the fuck do I get his weight down??? I don't (obviously) want to shame him or tell him he's on a diet but have made a few swaps / changes. Would really appreciate ideas. Have instigated a fruit and veg chart to get him to eat 5 a day. He has a tendancy to sneak foods so had already hidden chocolates, biscuits, etc. He always has tea at 5pm, then has a supper which always includes a glass of milk at bedtime which I have switched to skimmed (these timings are pretty non-negotiable, he is being tested for ASD and routines are v important to him). He always has breakfast which is a brioche bun or two.

His dad and I have split up and it is very acrimonious; I can't discuss this with him as he will blame me, report me to the social etc. I know that when he's at his dad's (which is 50% of the time) he does eat a lot of junk food and sweets / candy. Not trying to point fingers this is just for context for anyone reading.

For further context, he doesn't drink fizzy drinks and isn't that keen on juice, has mostly water to drink so can't do a switch here. He plays sport twice a week but cub scouts which is mostly running around so he is active.

Do I need to get a dietician involved? Will he grow out of it? More water? More exercise? I was a skinny child and I feel out of my depth. He has had one child tell him he's fat and I don't want him to be bullied.

Please be nice to me if you reply... I feel fucking terrible thank you in advance xx

That should read "sports twice a week AND cub scouts". Wish we could edit posts!

keep a food diary for a,week be honest about portions
See gp
Referral to community dietician

Could you put the meals he has? His snacks and drinks don’t seem out of control so I assume (really nicely and gently!) that it is his portion sizes and meals that are out of whack.
There are lots of ways of making small changes to meals and cutting calories almost in half, filling up a third of his plate with veg/salad is easy in theory but he will notice immediately and might get grumpy. Instead I would cut things like full fat cheese for lighter or half the amount of Parmesan etc, halve amount of mash or mix up with sweet potato/ carrot mash- swap chips for hand cut wedges, get veggie burgers instead of normal, do Sandwiches without butter on both sides, baked crisps instead of normal etc.

If you could write his food diary I could make specific suggestions, but well done you for being on his side and trying your best!!

For starters, it's good that you have now noticed. If you've been going through a difficult split, I can understand why you maybe let this get away from you or tried to convince yourself it was normal. Now that you've finally realised, you do need to take sensible action. The best way to do that is to go and speak with the GP and see what support you can get to do this the right way.

Once you've done that, your ex-husband threatening to report you will no longer be a concern so dont worry about that. You do need to involve him in this though, even if it is just giving him copies of any and all information/diet plans you get from professionals.

Ah OP it's good that you have realised and are prepared to do something.

It's tricky about what he eats at his dad's and there's not much you can do about that. So focus on what you can do.
Breakfast - something with protein or at least more filling than white carbs. Will he eat an omelette? Beans on toast? Or perhaps low sugar cereal (shredded wheat? weetabix?) with a banana.

Lunch - keep it to a sandwich on wholemeal bread and veg sticks/fruit. Does he have school lunch or packed lunch?

Dinner - think about smaller portions (smaller plate is a good idea). You don't say what kind of things he eats for dinner or supper. Can you scale supper down to just small glass of skimmed milk and some carrot sticks?

Offer him water if he says he is hungry. Try to make every day include activity. Do you walk to school? If not, can you? What sport does he do? Can you go to the park for a run about every evening after school?

You need to try to get into a routine and then it will not become a burden.

Try to cook everything from scratch and offer salad with main meals. Eggs are good for breakfast with a portion of spinach/tomatoes/mushrooms and some fruit. Aim for 7 a day, not 5! Switch to wholemeal pasta, bread etc.

I think you need to go into more detail about his diet. 2 brioche buns for breakfast every day is incredibly unhealthy, full of calories which do nothing for him. And if he’s having supper then I’m assuming he’s having 4 meals a day. Does he have snacks as well? It’s going to be hard to make enough changes to have an impact if his dad isn’t on board. Social services will not be against you when it’s him feeding him rubbish.

Btw, it's only 5 a day because when the government decided to come up with a recommended number, that was the most they realistically thought they could convince the British public to eat. If they went any higher, they thought people wouldnt bother with it at all. I think its 7 a day in France, and different numbers elsewhere.

So go for more if you can, and remember that veg is better than fruit if possible.

Look at the amount of ultra processed food he’s eating and swap it for home cooked fresh food. He needs healthy fats so don’t go for skimmed milk/lighter cheese etc. He needs to fill up on good traditional food, with no processed nasties like sunflower oil, and this will naturally curb his appetite.

I do think you should try to talk to his dad - the junk food he’s eating there will absolutely be the problem! I get that that’s difficult. Don’t worry about social services - they might actually manage to refer you to a dietician/speak to your ex for you/organise free exercise classes.

Porridge or eggs for breakfast. Sandwich, fruit for lunch
Healthy meal for tea with lots of veg.
Banana for snack.

Off the top of my head food diary would be for a week when he is with me

Mon - Fri
AM Brioche w choc chips (1 or 2)
Small glass water

School - snack - 2 plain biscuits, "Bear" dried fruit spiral thingys

School - school dinners

After school snack (this is quite painful to write tbh ) - pain au chocolate or 3 biscuits - glass water - more dried fruit snacks or sometimes apple chopped up - yoghurt (2 x petit filous or similar type)

Dinner - any combination of
2 x vegetarian sausage or vegetarian nuggets or 2 x fish fingers and veg (usually carrots and sweetcorn) and 2 x potato waffles or mashed potato
Or
Oven pizza and cucumber sticks
Or (occasionally) rice and vegetarian sausage chopped up with it

Pudding
Banana with honey and ice cream usually

Bedtime
Glass milk
Toast and jam (though am giving without jam now) or brioche

Saturday/Sunday
Breakfast - brioches or occasionally cereal ("kids" cereal e.g. crunchy nut / honey cheerios) or pancakes

Lunch - sandwiches or cheese toastie or scrambled egg on toast or dippy egg and banana and yoghurt for pudding

Snacks - biscuits / kit kat.
Maybe croissant or pain au chocolate if we go for a walk (we live near lots of Costa / Cafe Nero / Starbucks etc.

More snacks mid afternoon - fruit, crackers

Dinner - varies - either same sort of oven foods as in the week or Dominos

Bedtime - glass milk and toast if he says he is hungry.

I feel horrible typing this out

Well done for being so passionate about helping your son xx

I think you've seen for yourself that the majority of his food is white carbs and sugar. So there is tour problem.

A brioche is totally pointless for breakfast. Same with kids cereal. Totally pointless. And those dried fruit snacks also just totally a bad choice. All that needs to go.

I'd cut down on portion sizes at meals and add more fruit or veg to each meal. I wouldn't worry so much about the snacks as longs as they are small (2 finger kitkat not 4 etc).

can you do brown toast for breakfast instead of the brioche / croissants?

His diet is fairly horrible to be honest- though I am honestly not trying to kick you when you are down!!

You need to consider:

• smaller portion sizes- I am overweight and your son eats significantly more than I do

• less sugar, refined carbs, and empty calories

• more protein and healthy fats (eg peanut butter, raw nuts and seeds, lean meats, fish, etc) to keep him fuller longer

• whole grains and cereals without added sugar

• waaaaay less processed food

1 small brioche has 35% of the daily fat allowance for an adult, so on the face of it you can make some big progress pretty quickly by turning that into a once a week/occasional treat.

Don't panic, slow and steady wins the race. Hopefully others will come along with more meal plan ideas.

You're being honest and we can see you genuinely want to change it now. It's not too late

Stop buying the biscuits, brioche etc. He won't be able to sneak these treats if they aren't there

The dinner choices. Are those because that's all he will eat? Or because it's just all you offer him? It's all processed. Fish fingers are more crumb that fish.

Wouldnt he just eat fish? Just plain baked or steamed basa maybe?
Would he eat baked chicken legs? Done in a wee dish with carrots and peas? A little mini steel sort of.
What about soups? Really easy way to get veg into him. Butternut squash soup, sweet potato and coconut, lentil and tomato. All really easy to make and freeze and then heat up for him.

OK, first of all, I'm not judging you. My 9 y/o DD has always been slightly on the high end of normal, & was overweight last year but we've got her back into a more healthy weight for her height now. And she is awaiting ASD assessment as well. So I understand some of the challenges you may feel.

How wedded is he to the brioche for breakfast? It's really not great. Would he go for scrambled egg on toast? Or porridge with a small spoonful of honey or jam on, or a sliced banana or some berries? Both are much more nutritious choices, have more fibre, protein & will keep him full for longer. At the very least, if he won't give up the brioche, can you compromise on 1 piece only, with fruit & a glass of milk?

You need to cut right down on the snacks & in between meals stuff. So does his father. Humans aren't cows, we don't need to graze. Occasionally feeling a bit of hunger won't harm him, & it will probably encourage him to finish his meals when he's given them, hopefully including the vegetables. How is he with vegetables?

Get him into as much exercise as possible. Conscious & subconscious. Go to the park or on a walk, but also just walk sometimes instead of taking the car / public transport. Get him doing jobs for you to earn pocket money - vacuuming, wash the car, mop the kitchen floor, anything safe but a bit strenuous.

I wouldn't necessarily switch to skimmed milk. Cutting down/out the junk food & sweets, & increasing his exercise is much more likely to be beneficial to his health than reducing fat intake. Fat is needed for healthy growth & to satisfy his appetite. You need to massively reduce the refined carbs - all the pastries etc need to be cut out, they should be occasional treats, not daily staples. He's filling up on them but because they aren't filling he's hungry again really quickly. More protein, vegetables, unrefined carbs to replace the refined stuff - potato wedges, rice, even regular pasta.

Regarding reducing the sweets etc in your DS's diet, we did talk to our DD about it, but we framed it as being about all trying to get more healthy together, & eating less sugar because it's bad for our teeth. This is something they'd previously covered in school a few years ago, so it wasn't new to her.

Don't be ashamed. You're sorting it.

Firstly while it is great that you have noticed and want to help him adapt his diet, please do not beat yourself up about the BMI chart. Whilst it is a good guide it has it's flaws. You need to go by eye and judgement of what exercise he does and he eats.
My son from born was a big baby, and stayed on the higher centiles. Had a bit of a round face and an odd kinda pot belly (went to docs but was not a medical issue, just an odd shape). He from young did lots of sport and ate fine. Bit picky, had treats but plenty of good stuff too. And he came out as overweight when primary did his measurements. But it does not take into account food or exercise at all.
Dont worry about what his dad does for now. Just concentrate on how you can help him with you.
Don't be super strict, let him have some treats else he will crave them. All in moderation. If needs be say its healthy eating never a diet. Make little switches and it will make a difference. My son stayed the same and his sport training etc increased with the one he picked. When it came to the measurements again at the end of primary I withdrew him from it. I knew he would come out as overweight and I wrote my reason being that they do not request food info or exercise info and it is wrong. My son added up was 20+ hours of sport or activity a week. There was no way I was having them telling me he was unfit and unhealthy. He finally turned into a bean pole at 14. But all kids are different heights, weights and shapes. Be kind to yourself and him.

Yeah, I think the act of writing it down will have had you see how much is carbs. So need to start trying to shift the balance towards protein. Reduce quantities gradually rather than suddenly, as the protein goes up, so that he doesn't feel desperately hungry. If he's a food hoarder, you may need to not have items in the house.

A glimmer of good news: your aim isn't really for him to lose weight. He's young enough that if you can just stop him putting any more weight on, keep his weight static, then his BMI will naturally fall as he grows. The bad news is that if he's 50:50 with both you and dad, you really both need to be making changes, if this is going to work,

Two snacks and supper and pudding are all unnecessary , give him front for school snack and milk for supper that’s it. Not oven food or Dominoes ,proper hone cooked from scratch healthy meals , with plenty of protein and less refined carbs. Sugar maybe once a week. And cut down on the portion sizes , use child size plates. The character melamine ones are good for size.

My son was on 99th centile from the ages of 8 until 11. I was very very worried and it was a big struggle. He was obsessed with food and ate leftovers etc when my back was turned. Nothing really helped until when he started secondary school he suddenly just wanted to eat healthier (I don't think he was being bullied). I had never talked about his weight or eating as I didn't want to give him a complex but I did talk about healthy choices and kept encouraging veg, salads etc and tried to be sure that I bought smaller versions of treats (mini magnum instead of magnum for pudding for example and more veg for dinner). The biggest thing was puberty and him shooting up in height. He is now nearly 6ft at 14 and weighs less than he did when he was 10! He is actually very skinny. My advice is make small changes, don't put him on a diet as once you are in that vicious cycle of dieting it is hard to get off )as I'm sure many of us know!), make sure he is active but remember that won't change his weight much you need to bulk his food up with veg so he doesn't see he is having smaller portions suddenly. Self esteem is so important please don't make him feel his weight is a massive deal.

Thank you very much for your kind suggestions so far.

Unfortunately I absolutely cannot discuss with his father, I don't want to derail my own thread by going into it but it isn't feasible.

We do walk to school but we live very very near it so it doesn't really count as a proper workout if that makes sense?
The sport he plays is football and cubs is his other activity which seems to often include games.
He will eat pasta (tons and tons of it!) but only likes this if it is plain with cheese (no tomato sauce or pesto or vegetables). So I try to limit this. I think he may have sensory processing disorder as he is really fussy about texture which I believe is common in people who are on the autistic spectrumm.

be very careful with your weekends. things like domino's could undo all of the good changes you make throughout the week. if its a pizza its 1-2slices max needed with salad at his age. and no dips!