To be upset with NHS over DDs weight?

[Fudgefudgefudge]

DD is 4 and is in reception. Recently she had her vision, hearing, weight etc measured at school and yesterday I received a letter from the NHS saying that they are referring her to Morelife. Having googled it I'm mortified, I had no idea my child was that overweight! I checked the NHS site which measures their BMI and using the measurements they provided it shows DD being obese and on the 99th percentile

Now I breastfed DD up until her 1st birthday and she was a big baby back then but over the years she's slimmed up if you know what I mean and to me she just doesn't look overweight. She has a healthy appetite and I am well aware of how to eat a healthy balanced diet etc but I do allow a treat for good behaviour. And DD is a very active, she would rather run than walk and I don't drive so she's used to walking places.

AIBU to be upset about this? What do I do? Ask the GP their opinion? It's made me doubt my abilities as a mother as I never even considered she could be obese.

YAB a wee bit U. Thank goodness your daughter's obesity has been picked up at such an early age and you can change bad habits to get back on track without her being any the wiser. Parents rarely see their own children's imperfections.

There is definitely a cultural context to be considered here. I live in France and here children are so skinny that in Britain they would probably be taken to the doctor/considered severely underweight. However, they tend to grow up into slim, healthy adults and obesity is far rarer. British kids are allowed to get much bigger at an earlier age and it definitely persists into adulthood. I know I was bigger than I should have been when I was a child (even though I reached my adult height by age 12 - 5'6" - there's no denying that weighing 10st at age 15 is probably not great and I was definitely always a chunky kid in primary too) despite the fact that I swam, played hockey and netball, had dance classes etc. Parents should be grateful when they are given this wakeup call as now as an adult I feel like it is a constant battle to remain the reasonable size that I am now (size 10, height still 5'6").

Meh. All children are different. My kids have always been on the 'chubby' side, but eat healthily and get plenty of exercise. That's what I focus on. I think weight is a poor indicator of health, to be honest. Am fully expecting to get a letter about my daughter being 'overweight', but she fits easily into her age group clothes and is very active. People have different body types. Not all children are skinny. I was a very chubby child and teenager, but am now very slim. Ditto my sister. It's so easy to encourage eating disorders, due to the insane media pressure, so I prefer to try and give them good quality food, and encourage them to exercise, rather than worry about some highly misleading metric.

I noticed this with DS. Was very round when breastfed despite barely eating. Once stopped BF he slimmed down and both height and weight were at top of centiles so came out high BMI but was visibly slim. Once weight started to slide down below height centile he looked very thin and people commented. Visible ribs. But still BMI was never low. DH is same- very tall and slim build but overweight BMI.

I on other hand can have fat tummy within healthy BMI range and have to be at the very bottom of healthy range to look slim and manage PCOS.

There's a couple of pounds difference between normal and overweight.
Keep an eye on it but don't stress too much if she eats healthy and is active

Angelil: I agree - the number of snacks given to kids in France is less at nursery. Although France is going down the obesity route too.
The issue is once weight is gained it is tough to lose and it very much is a health issue. Not just diabetes, but bad knees, high blood pressure leading to strokes and also cancer. Obviously none of this is going to be a problem in a child! The NHS aren't having a go for the sake of it.
My kid is at the upper normal range and she would eat sugar and crap all day, given the choice. I can see her ribs but she certainly isn't thin and it could become a problem over time.

Why do you give a 'treat' for good behaviour? Surely there are better rewards than food. What is that teaching her?

Ds1's paed was THRILLED that he was on the 95th centile for weight when he had double pneumonia. She knew he had a much better chance of fighting it off than normal or underweight babies, as he had plenty of built in reserves. She called him fatso and said how much easier it made her job to keep him alive.

I agree re French kids. If you buy clothes from a French brand or clothes shop they are so much smaller than UK high street kids clothes.

Kennington: it's true that there are other (arguably even more serious) health issues in France, with smoking being the biggie. I was horrified to recently see a (FWIW already overweight) 14-year-old from our school coming out of the tabac having just bought a packet of cigarettes. That is far less likely to happen in the UK as sanctions for establishments found to be selling to underage smokers are far more strictly enforced. So France is not perfect, but food-wise they are much more routine-based and kids are definitely not allowed to eat just whenever they like.

I once went on holiday with my sister (obese kids) and my best friend (very slim, probably slightly underweight kids). They both did nothing but bitch to me about how the other person's kids were too fat/too thin and theirs were perfect. Absolutely did my head in of course mine were somewhere in the middle and are perfect

The "treat" for good behaviour thing is an interesting one for me as it seems to associate people approving of you with sugary or fatty foods.
There was a woman the other day with a 3 year old and she gave him some brownie because "he'd been good and eaten well and so he was having the treat because he'd made mummy happy"

My son was born 10lb10. He's always been in the 95th-99th percentile even now at 3 and can wear age 5-6 clothes. Bf for 6 months and I didn't have diabetes.

I guess I should be prepared to get a letter when he starts school.

OP, have you tried putting the weight the NHS stated into their own online calculator?

I did this, and it said that DD was a healthy weight, despite them sending out a later saying she was overweight. When I questioned them, they said anyone over one of their marked centiles had to be recorded as the next centile - so if you are on the 76th, and they only measure 75 and 85, you get recorded as on the 85th. In other words, it is a load of bollocks.

BMI is a horrible one-size-fits-all method, because one size does NOT fit all when it comes to BMI. Take her to your pediatrician for an assessment that does NOT use BMI, but rather uses common sense and experience. He'll then let you know if you need to adjust her diet or if you shouldn't worry.

You think being fat is 'the end of the world'? Most fat people here would beg to differ.

This fat girl would like to offer you a bucket to go soak your head in.

Crap! I totally misread you! I thought you said 'wasn't,' and you were on MY side. Please, don't soak your head--get a lovely professional spa-delivered scalp massage with shampoo and conditioner!! With and !!!

A treat for good behaviour may be some squares of chocolate, or a cake etc. Or it may be a magazine!!!! Usually it's a sticker on her chart or an extra 20p in her hand. Pretty standard Msjudgemental

Day one of properly looking at how she eats: a lot of it is fruit. She prefers grazing rather than set meals. She's also more than happy with a mile and half walk round the village catching Pokemon after a long day so I'm not worried about her fitness levels.

Angelii - obesity in French children is increasing at an alarming rate and 25% of French adults are obese, overtaking Germany and the Netherlands in the porky stakes so please let's stop the myth that the French eat brilliantly and are all slim.

And as I and another poster said, our children were on the underweight BMI scale (albeit not massively) and do you know what happened? Fuck all.

Hyperbole is hugely unhelpful in these discussions. There is a real child at the centre of this discussion, with a real parent posting. Some helpful tips and advice from parents of children with normal BMIs and healthy appetites (I'm not one of them) would probably be very welcome.

Fudge - I would really ditch the food as reward thing if you can. Associations laid down now may persist forever so if you can break the biscuit=reward habit, it would be a good thing

Ooh, I do feel for you. I had a similar experience with my middle dd a few years ago. I was aghast at her weight assessment but looking back at pics around that time, maybe it wasn't quite as crackers as it seemed then.

Try not to feel outraged. Remember it's a blunt instrument but also that it's sadly true that parents aren't always the most acute judges of their own children. Just keep an eye on things.

I don't think it's a bad thing to get it flagged at an early age. Dd is nearly 5 and in 5 to 6 clothes and has become more stocky recently and has a bit of a tummy. According to the scales she's OK but I think school will weigh and measure her properly. Gp and other professionals have said she looks fine - but I do wonder if they are just used to seeing larger children and don't notice. I'm obese so I am aware I might not find it easy to judge.

Fudge, a mile and a half is not the massive trek you seem to think it is, it's probably not far enough if that's her daily exercise. Don't hand out any more food as a reward, or as soon as your hand is off the reins she will 'reward' herself whenever she feels like it. Sugar is it's own reward, the last thing you need to do is tie it in to her behaviour and self esteem.

Three meals. 5 fruit or veg a day, at least three of those vegetables. Peas, sweet corn, avocado, baked beans and banana are very calorific so spare them in favour of other vegetables like carrots, cucumber, green beans and cauliflower.

Lean protein, low fat dairy and good quality carbs, no white bread because it just doesn't fill a tummy up properly.

I'd switch her reward system to something like time playing board games with you or something, and get her a trampoline.

I wish they had this when i was at school. I was a very chubby toddler, got very food fussy so was very skinny for a year or so when i was 6, and since then was overweight/obese. I look back at photos and i look awful, and i wish so so much my parents had done something to stop it. My mum was a size 14/16 and my dad has a very large stomach, and me and my older sister were always fat. The lifelong bullying, and the struggle i have with food now, makes me angry at my parents that they let this happen from when i was a toddler. It also makes me wonder if it contributed to my being insulin resistant and my hormone imbalances that make weightloss very difficult.

Agree the first pic the child definitely looks overweight/chubby, sorry! Woodlanders pic is what I would say is normal and healthy. That's not to say we don't all have different frames, but kids should generally be pretty lean

It's never too early for weight issues to be flagged.

We have a little one in our family who was born 9lb, was a chubby baby and toddler etc. We thought it was fine, and that she'd just grow taller and slim out. Didn't happen. At 10, she's substantially overweight (the rest of the family is slim/some underweight), and her habits are ingrained. Combine that with total uselessness denial from her mother, and the poor kid has got no chance of losing the weight anytime soon, if ever.