To think most people don't believe their diet will have an impact on their health

[Notcontent]

This is just something I have been thinking about recently. There has been so much in the news about the damage sugar is doing to us, the number of people with type 2 diabetes is rising at a huge rate, more and more kids are becoming fat and having their teeth pulled out, etc.

And yet - I get the feeling most people think it's "nanny state rubbish". On mumsnet threads people always say "children need treats". I was talking to a work colleague about sugary drinks and her view was that water is too boring so she was quite happy for her kids to have juice and cordial with every meal and snack.

I am not sure what the solution is - maybe proper food and health education at schools.

Annie, What ever for. Does anyone not understand that companies exist to make profits? Food companies, if producing mass marketed, high quantity, low production cost products need to make up for the intrinsic lack of flavour by additives in order to shift their product. I don't need a book to realise that!

Will reading the book suddenly make people want to cook from scratch more? Will it make them make better choices whilst doing their shopping because they have suddenly realised that the food products they have been purchasing are really just cheap, processed crap? Many such books exists and people have not massively changed their habits.

Is this thread about overweight adults
or overweight children?

children need treats

yes they do, the do need a biscuit when they come home from school.

i think it is the added sugar which is Hidden, in our diets.

i think the added sugar is the problem I meant to say

Digger you are right and it was all tongue in cheek (Not actually planning on being a dictator!)

I just think we have all got into habbits where people think drinking 8 cans of fizzy is normal. The hidden sugar in loads of stuff is unacceptable but I cannot see that changing as people are used to how things taste.

I'm not sure what the answer is really.

Cakey- Greek yogurt is naturally sugar free. It's all we eat here!

(When I say sugar free I am excluding the natural sugar in milk before anyone jumps on it)

there was an interesting article I read (think it was in the Times) recently that said the rise in obesity has been so sharp,steep and sudden that it cannot simply be attributed to lack of exercise but there is some evidence it is connected to processed food which became much more available in the early 90's.

The theory is that the more processed food is then it changes our gut flora and makes us much more likely to put on weight.

I have noticed, in the last 10 years, I have become more reliant on ready meals and I have put on weight. I carefully choose my ready meals, calorie controlled , good quality and still put on weight so it's food for thought and something I'm trying to change.

This is silly, you are talking about educating people about food and yet people are saying you should have an apple instead of a doughnut because of the sugar, you realize that apples have way more sugar in them then a doughnut, right?

Apple: 15.7g of sugar
Doughnut: 2.5g of sugar

ROUND OF APPlAUSE FOR BILLSYKESDOG

There was at top nutrition / diet science lady on one of Michael Moseley's programmes who has done a lit of important work on obesity. She said that the next phase of her research will be to try to understand why anyone is still slim.

It does seem to be a very complicated, emotion - laden topic. From what I see of my middle-aged friends and relatives there are three groups of people - people like me who have received and understood the messages about diet, exercise, alcohol etc and act upon them. People who understand the messages, sort of act upon them, recognise that they make their own choices and accept that those choices may have unpleasant consequences and people who are vociferously in denial that any of their health issues could be caused by or improved by changes to their diet and lifestyle. It is this third group that needs a different approach.

Personally, I think there's something around how attitudes to discomfort have changed. There are many, many people around who will not tolerate any form of discomfort, including the slight discomfort of feeling a bit hungry or the discomfort of exercise. Some even interpret these sensations as pain and find that a cause for worry. We need to understand this better and work with it, not bombard them with messages that they can't make sense of because they don't recognise themselves in the picture.

I'm a teacher and have been scarred by the amount of 5 year olds I know who have had to have teeth removed due to decay/silver teeth out in etc. I'm therefore extremely careful with what my child eats. She didn't eat any sugar until her first birthday when she had some birthday cake. However the amount of comments we got during that first year about how we were being mean, as if we were depriving her! She had no idea what sweets tasted like, how was she missing out?!
I also think school/nursery exacerbates the problem too in that all meals end with a pudding. It's teaching then that you can eat something sweet or some kind of treat food after every meal which is wrong, IMO.

BillSykesDog, I don't think there has been any poor bashing on this thread. Actually, I think that it is interesting that the healthy diets of today (lots of veg, little meat, brown bread) were the diets of the poor in the past. To have white bread, sugar, and fat were signs of wealth. Today, the reverse is true.

People definitely think you're only unhealthy if you are overweight.
Being skinny but still eating junk still means you are unhealthy. It'll catch up with them.
Weight is not the measurer for health but is seen as the only thing people care about. That's dangerous.

I dont think puddings can be to blame.
People always had puddings.
and children need the calories/fat etc,. to a certain extent. But not the sugar.

There is a lot of smuggery though "I rustle up a meal from scratch every day. People don't know that a healthy cooked meal can be made in under 30 minutes".

People usually do know that and sometimes. .shock horror..still can't be arsed.

I agree OP. And I can only say that now as someone who fairly recently had a lightbulb moment and realised I need to take better and proper care of myself. The DC diet is good but I failed to apply the same logic and sense to myself. I feel so much better, more energy, better sleep etc and feel pissed off with myself that I've ignored my body's needs for years.

I do believe in moderation but I think we need to learn what moderation means. It's not an excuse to eat rubbish and put it down to 'a little of what you fancy does you good'. It's not 50% good diet and 50% bad. I'm not suggesting this is the logic for others but it seemed to be mine.

Anyone whose children find water boring, stick ice in. Sounds stupid but it tastes so good when it's ice cold. Drinking it with ice means DC drink water almost solely. I have no objection to something fizzy if we go out for a meal somewhere but that's probably only once a month.

I think the issues are very complex, and as a country we are very ill informed about nutrition. The peddling of 'low fat' stuff as healthy drives me mad. We have full fat everything, what we have virtually none of is processed food. We are all slim. But I also think in a society where there is so much awful stuff for sale it's really hard to avoid it altogether. Especially in times of illness, limited time and stuff like that. Sugar is my downfall and once I started adding up ds sugar intake I was shocked. I completely cut out squash and juice and now it's about right. I now need to sort out my own sugar intake!
I think.part of the reason that people find healthier eating more expensive is attempting to maintain a similar diet with more expensive processed items which are marketed as healthier. We don't have much money but buy a few basic healthy foods and use in lots if different ways.

When I am dictator I'll ban all fizzy drinks, the amount that people pour down their throats is ridiculous and the lack of understanding that 0 calories with sweetener are fine. (I may allow prosecco to slip through though)

Actually here in lies a lot of the problem - your sin is bad and must be banned. My sin is just a little treat and I'm able to deal with it in moderation. (If we are banning things, all alcohol should go before sugar free fizzy drinks with unproven claims of 'serious damage' from sweeteners, compared to the very well proven and generally agreed damage caused by even the most expensive wine)

No amounts of diet changes will make us immortal. You will get old, ill and die of something. Some people don't think it's worth trading off a life without treats and joy for an extra decade. It's rather patronising to assume that it's stupidity that leads people to make different choices to you.

Go on the slimming threads on here, very very few people are losing weight because they are worried about their health, desire to look 'better' is a much bigger motivator.

For most people, cake, chocolate, sweet foods give pleasure to eat. Carby foods are lovely. (Warm tiger bread dipped in balsamic vinegar is delicious, add some fresh basil leaves and you have the food of the gods.) For many people, that's the only form of happiness they can ensure they will have. Some parents can't afford many treats or experiences for their DCs, but can give them a chocolate bar or a yummy cake to add a nice moment to an otherwise miserable day.

Salad and cake are only comparable for a someone who doesn't understand joy. In order to be thin I live my life in a state of slightly miserable self denial, I can completely understand that others decide it's not worth it and continue to eat the way I would love to if there was any way to do that and still have a small bottom.

This thread feels all terribly judgemental of those who are 'weaker' than some of you. If you are relatively rich, not stressed and relatively healthy, then it is a lot easier to decide to remove one of the many areas of joy from your life (sweet foods).

We can't do right for doing wrong now, though, can we? If we want our children to be healthy and fit, we need to be challenging the status quo. We're the ones buying into the homework and organised activities lifestyle. Why? Surely the last thing a parent needs at the end of a working day is more stress? So why do we buy into it? Why don't we just let our kids BE?

I grew up yonks ago, in poverty by today's standards. No-one had a car, there was no such thing as an organised activity, and no homework. There were sweets, and the concept of healthy eating was unheard of. A treat was a packet of crisps.

We were slim or skinny. We were out all the time. Boredom was filled with made-up games.

So what's changed? The culture of parenting? Fear of being a bad parent if you deny a child a treat, or if your child does not do a shedload of homework every night? Or if you are not permanently exhausting your child and yourself with a never-ending round of "activities" ? No wonder ppl don't have the inclination to prepare healthy, nutritious meals.

We are responsible for the kind of life we lead, and it is up to us, as thinking individuals, to create the conditions within which our children thrive. Yes, of course, it would be easier if sugar were banned, or taxed to the point where it was beyond reach. But I doubt that's going to happen any time soon, so meanwhile it's down to us.

There was at top nutrition / diet science lady on one of Michael Moseley's programmes who has done a lit of important work on obesity. She said that the next phase of her research will be to try to understand why anyone is still slim.

The university I work for has one of the top researchers into Type II Diabetes in the world. She and her team have just been given A LOT of money to do a long term study into the causes of obesity. It is NOT as simple as calories in vs. calories out.

Yes...people can be veritable saints on the eating front..good for them. .why should they judge others or ban what they like doing though? I assume it's from a financial viewpoint rather than really caring about the welfare of others. .very right wing.

Not directed at anyone just a general agreement with BillSykes' post.

And dinosaurs..top post

When I am dictator (be afraid) I will ban people who try to impose their will on others by banning things they enjoy

I think it's gone too far the other way here - my twins are in reception - they wouldn't eat toast for breakfast this morning because they were taught last week that bread isn't healthy last week.

Never mind that they get a stodge pudding every day in school.

My post wasn't intended to by smug. I genuinely did think it was more hassle to cook from fresh. Until I started to do it. We all have days when we can't be arsed. But surely if that becomes every day that is a problem. I guess for me, if it's a case of saying yep I could cook but I can't be arsed that's one thing. But blaming the food manufacturers for the problems isn't right, because ultimately we do have the choice.