To tell my friend her DS is becoming overweight?

[ICameOnTheJitney]

Well....am I? She's had a LOT on her plate lately...her DS is 4 and we've not seen them for a month. He wouldn't eat at all when he was smaller but has found his appetite recently and she's so happy about it that she's praising him for finishing a plate of chips or a packet of crisps and is also giving him loads of pizza, cheese, macdonalds and chocolate etc.

I don't think she realises that praising a child for eating all of a massive pizza plus a big chocolate pudding isnt the "thing" and I don't think she realises he's overweight...but he is. I'm not someone who interferes EVER in personal things like this....but I just don't know if it's ok to say something?

She has no family to tell her....only her DP who isn't well at the moment...should I keep quiet or say something and if so what??

Little children grow up then out then up then out, rather than smoothly.

There are two issues - his poor diet, if what you've seen is truly representative, and his shape/size separately. Which do you think needs addressing?

If you see him infrequently and his shape/size is alarming and you don't think she sees it, you could go for "my DC grow up then out ha ha ha - is he due a grow?"

If his diet is bad and you haven't seen him recently, can you ask if he's "eating better now, not just pizza and stuff?"

I think if you seem to be saying that what he's doing/how he looks is not unusual but not ideal either then it's less of an attack on her parenting and more of the "it takes a village" thing.

Having an ill husband is no excuse for purposely filling her kid with junk, encouraging him to overeat and make him fat. Presumably she has more than half a brain cell and access to the media and medical care, how on earth could she have missed the information about how bad crap food, overfeeding and obesity are? There's no excuse for that in this day and age.

Praising a young child for eating a massive pizza and pudding is disgusting, most adults (barring the very fat ones) wouldn't be able to get through that. No child should be given those portions, the harm feeding a child like that everyday will do is abusive, there will be severe health consequences.

He is a chubby four year old now and if everybody chooses to tiptoe around her feelings at the expense of his health, these habits will continue, in ten years the child will have a serious weight issue along with very serious health, social and emotional problems.

If she's a good friend you should be able to talk to her without her throwing tantrums. She either doesn't realise what she's doing wrong, in which case she'll appreciate friendly intervention before she causes permanent harm to her child or she does know what she's doing and doesn't care because it pleasures her in some warped way.

It's really sad that we live in a culture where the feelings of parents who are harming their child takes precedence over the child's health and well being. You'd intervene if she was hitting him, why not this? It's abusive.