13YO DD is overweight. Need advice on how to handle it.

[needadvicereweight]

My DD has just been weighed. She's very tall for her age, at 5 foot 9, and well made, strong and stocky, but she's 14 stone.

I'm devastated. I've been trying to deal with this for a year years, to no avail.

She won't eat meals that we eat. She must be eating in secret. I never see her eat any rubbish food. She doesn't go out. She has loads of friends, but we are quite rural so not close to them.

I have two other DDs who are a normal weight. With DD I think it's a lot of factors, as she has had some anxiety issues (CAMHS helped).

I need advice on how to handle it, from someone who has been there. I feel like a failure. She is so headstrong and I give in so easily.

I don't know if it's best to be honest and say you're overweight, or is this dangerous to say to an almost 14 yo?

Amy advice?

Are you absolutely sure her weight gain is due to secret eating? Can you take a while to double check she's not just slipped into the habit of larger and larger portion sizes, and too many small-but-cumulatively-significant poor food choices?

If it is secret eating, though, she may be bingeing, and that's a very specific and dangerous problem to address. She's probably not even enjoying what she eats; typical binge food is sugary overprocessed junk or empty carbs. You crave it, then hate yourself for bingeing, then punish yourself by bingeing more.

Developing a more positive relationship with food would really help more than concentrating on reducing input or doing anything that seems punitive (like removing money or Xbox). Binges are often triggered by a sense of deprivation, loneliness, humilation or self-hatred. Food is a treat and a punishment. Bingeing is the opposite of enjoying food, and the cure for bingeing isn't to work on reducing input. This can actually make the problem worse, since it just reinforces the bingeing mindset, where food is a source of shame, guilt and anxiety, rather than nourishment or pleasure or necessity.

Taking time to plan and prepare meals which are eaten in a relaxed but sociable setting is often a crucial part of rewriting this mindset. No food should be banned. No locks on cupboard doors. No food diaries. I know those work for different weight issues, but they're the opposite of helpful for compulsive or secret eating.

HairyHands and 2Cold are spot-on.I know it's hard, because the default teenage defense mechanism is to reject your efforts to interest them in something, but can she be in charge of cooking one or two nights a week? And it shouldn't seem like you're teaching her: make yourself available for questions, but make no comment. You could buy a bunch of interesting, appealing cookbooks (nothing old-fashioned or diet-related: something young or exotic) and tell her to pick a recipe and you'll provide the ingredients. Any recipe: no limits. Or subscribe to a meal service like Gousto, where you can select recipes and they'll deliver the exact quantity of ingredients with step-by-step instructions.

Feeling in control of and genuinely interested in food is vital if you have tendencies to binge; during a binge, food is really just tasteless bulk. People always mock the idea that Monica from Friends was an overweight teenager who became a slim food professional, but it actually makes perfect sense if she was a compulsive eater: she regained control by learning to care about food itself, not just its consumption. Again, though, I know it's hard. Early teens isn't a natural time to be particularly interested in cooking.

Thanks Tsundoku. I think it is a mixture of both, but perhaps more binge eating.

Of course, I don't know for sure that she is binge eating. But, the weight she is doesn't correspond with what I see her eating, so binge eating would explain it.

I am going to try very, very hard to involve her in cooking. I've just got all my cookbooks out. I've found a burger recipe in an old 'innocent' cookbook (from a product test I done on Mumsnet!) She likes burgers, more Mac Donald's to be fair, but maybe it's a start!

Does she have pcos?

Friedgreen. Not that I'm aware of?

Get her tested. I became severely overweight practically within a year of starting my periods and remained that way. Was diagnosed with pcos a year ago due to infertility and they actually said unexplained weight gain as a teen is a sign. If she has pcos then GPs can probably suggest various diets and treatments.

This absolutely sounds like my daughter. She's now 15. Is same height. It weighs more. She is very bright, has high anxiety and aspergers.
She plays Xbox all the time and can't eat in front of people so has her meals in her room.

I have 3 more younger DC's. Their weight is fine.

I have to hide any crops or cereal bars.

She refuses to exercise because she can't stand the sensation of sweating. She also hates washing. . She won't go out the house unless to school or counselling. I limit screen time and switch wifi off etc. Visual timetables.

I'm at a loss as to what to do.

I know this doesn't help OP but I sympathise xx

IS she getting any help for the anxiety and depression? That is the most important thing to tackle. DONT get rid of the x box, it may be her mental health lifeline. However, if poss I would tell her you are worried about her eyes and see if you can get her to do a 30 min walk before x box time (a dog would be v helpful!).

Then I would just try and get a bit more protein into her in case she is on a carb high/low rollercoaster- very common when depressed as carbs are sedating. So cheese or peanut butter on the toast- yummy things, don’t worry about the calories as her weight is less important than her health. Also, if properly full she may be less likely to eat rubbish.

Lastly, try and make sure she is getting plenty of age appropriate attention- it is easy to slightly infantilise ones eldest child! Buy her some teenage clothes, a 15 cert game, anything her sisters aren’t allowed yet! And always offer to taxi her anywhere. It is baby baby steps with depression.

If your daughter was to choose a takeaway / treat meal at a restaurant, what cuisine would it be?

I would then buy some nice glossy recipe books and try cooking that cuisine with her, learn together?

I make this suggestion as I didn't like eating family meals when I was a teen as I just didn't enjoy the food my mum made which was really bland meat and two veg gravy type meals and I just don't enjoy that food. When I was a kid everyone said I was picky but I'm really not, I just like Indian, Thai, Mexican, Italian food so that's what I cook myself now and really enjoy it.

I didn't get into cooking until I was an adult but I think it's the easiest way of staying healthy with food, if you're in control of what you eat.

Genever,you missed my point ...I'm saying it's better than being 18 stone at age 18.... often with teens the more you push in one direction,the more they go in another..at some point as an adult she will either chose to lose weight or choose to live with it...it's a bit like under age sex ,we don't want them partaking ,but you can't keep them under lock and key..the op can not control what her daughter eats out of the house.but she can control the food that comes in the house.and she can increase her daughters self esteem..I firmly believe the best bet is the whole family to be healthy,to treat everyone the same and to increase her self esteem..

Definitely don't get rid of the Xbox. People don't play for long periods unless they are really unhappy and it is a lifeline.

Don't reduce her sending money. The less she has, the more likely she will spend it on junk. Let's say she gets £2 per week. That's not enough to go out anywhere, meet friends, buy a new top or even a sandwich. She could buy 4 packets of biscuits with it which starts to seem the sensible answer when you have little to no cash or independence.

You do need to find out why she is so unhappy. If you don't, then the over eating won't stop.

When I was a kid I could eat anything I wanted without gaining weight, junk, fizzy pop - you name it. I hit age 13-14 and puberty caught up with my metabolism and suddenly I was heavy, it seemed to happen out of nowhere.

I was very insecure about it and quite embarrassed, especially as my mates at school were all very skinny. My mum was quite good and approached it as ‘are you feeling happy in yourself? If you are, great. But if not, I can help.’ I said yes i wanted to lose the weight but didn’t know how. We worked together to come up with low cal meals and she would gently bring up if I was eating too much junk, but never in a mean or pushy way.

The softly softly approach really worked for me as it felt like she was supportive, rather than judgemental, and that’s exactly what already ‘hormonal and sensitive’ me needed. As I grew into my teens and ate better the weight dropped off.

Sounds like you are trying really hard not to upset DD and I think that’s a great approach, teens are having a tough enough time as it is without feeling like their Mum is being cruel about their body.

I was overweight at at school, not as heavy as your DD but thick set and chunky. Podgy. A size 14 at age 16.

I used to spend my dinner money and pocket money on chocolate bars and sweets.

At home we had proper cooked meals but they were enormous portions, looking back.

We didn't have squash to drink, which would have helped keep the calories down. My mum didn't buy it. Or suggest/buy water. We drank pure orange juice (cheap, from concentrate, in a carton).

Parents always had pudding. Sometimes I wasn't that hungry and just wanted toast/crackers but they insisted on a proper full plate of dinner plus pudding every night or I'd be "making myself anorexic". (far from it). It was frowned upon to not have heavy dinners even if they were home-made and fairly healthy ingredients etc. There was just too much of it.

Not vast amounts of rubbish in the house, (some crisps, some biscuits but maybe one 6 pack of crisps at a time in the house for example) and we didn't eat takeaways but I ate bowls and bowls of cereal with 3-4 dessert spoons of sugar on top for example, between meals. Also a "salad" was pretty much a plate of (full fat) coleslaw, potato salad, a whole slab of cheese cut into chunks and maybe some cucumber on the side .

As a family we didn't do any activities together as my parents were always working. It might have helped if we'd been more active/gone more places.

I suspect your DD is spending whatever money she has on rubbish/sweets/crisps. Also check portion sizes are not too big.

My mum took me clothes shopping and a size 14 top was too tight so a 16 was suggested. My mum was shocked and said "You're never a 16 are you?" in front of the shop assistant. I remember feeling humiliated.

However I would have welcomed her suggesting more activities together (I was very lonely looking back), not making me eat large portions of dinner every day (well meaning though it was) and buying in squash or water instead of hydrating on pure orange juice and nothing else. Ugh. I can't imagine the sugar/calories in that.

I could be completely on the wrong track as I don't know your DD. However have you thought about diagnosis like adhd or asd.

My DD who is a similar age was diagnosed with adhd last year. She had suffered from anxiety and depression for a number of years. She has mainly inattentive adhd however she has some symptoms of hyperactivity and impulsivity, mainly verbal impulsiveness.

She presented very much like your DD. Refusing to do things with the rest of the family and having meltdowns when pushed. Something like cooking with me would have resulted in a complete meltdown as there is too many steps to most recipes and too much organisation required.

She managed ok in primary school however really struggled in high school. She went from being top of her class to close to the bottom. She was just not able to manage the extra demands of high school.

My DD,like a lot of people with adhd, craves carbs and would over eat junk but would still eat meals. It was a miracle that she was not overweight.

The ability to hyper focus is another symptom of adhd and a lot of teens with adhd hyper focus on video games as it gives them the dopamine surge they crave as do the high calorie foods..

This is a very simplified version of my daughter's symptoms and I would never have thought of adhd if a paed she was seeing for something else hadn't brought it up. Since diagnosis she has worked with a psychologist and is medicated. The psychologist has been very helpful one of the outcomes being that she will stop and think before she eats a heap of junk food and will say am I bored or hungry.

Google Patrica Quinn, an expert on girls with adhd. Also look at sites like additude and chadd which are good resources. I maybe completely wrong but you can at least rule it out as a reason and move on.

You are blaming yourself a lot and that’s not helping OP . I think it’s maybe clouding things . You are not the first or the last to have this .

Some really good advice here and insights

Take it one step at a time with maybe the first step being to have a universal focus and in healthy eating and a chat with her about her anxiety . I think her mental health is the best place to start personally .

Good luck

Also use the Xbox as an example

Say I don’t want to stop the Xbox but I am concerned you are not getting enough fresh air and exercise . See if she can agree a ratio of Xbox to exercise time

It’s hard and some solutions will work and some won’t !!

Thanks everyone. On my phone so sorry can't mention names.

The Aspergers idea is something I've thought for a long time. She has had intervention from CAMHS which was great, and she responded well to that. School have been good too and have some tactics in place to help her deal with her anxiety. I don't think we need anything more at this time. I will beat it in mind though. She integrates well with friends, and will go to parties etc.

I blaming myself too much, I can see that now. I trying to move forward positively and stop blaming, as I know this doesn't help.

We have had a casual chat, without mentioning weight or diet etc. I've told her I want to limit the Xbox as I think she needs to spend more time with us, as we miss her company, and live her very much. I've mentioned the fresh air and being out and socialising. I've had a mini positive response. It's very early days but she had an hour on it last night, then we watched a movie. But all great, as she moshed was boring, and kept going on her phone! But, she was here and not in her room!

I can't thank you all enough for all your help and advice. It was such a shock to find out her weight, and this has helped me process it and deal with it a lot better.

Sorry fir spelling mistakes!

OK one thing to remember.... you can't out train a shit diet. It is about 80% what you eat and 20 % about activity. So really pick your battles on what gets put into your mouth not how many family bike rides you do....

you can't out train a shit diet. It is about 80% what you eat and 20 % about activity
I think that varies a lot by person and situation.the more obese you are the more significant exercise is. It has been found that in people of moderate activity , a mechanism exists to regulate energy intake to energy burned.Once you fall below a certain activity level that mechanism breaks down
Also very heavy people take a lot of effort to move themselves which not only burns a lot more calories but also speeds up the metabolism

I think you have made some perfect first steps.

Yes, she sounds overweight and that can't just be ignored. But, I don't think it is the primary things to address here. These are her formative years in terms of developing her self esteem and image of herself and it's an insanely fragile time. Women who get that totally screwed up have a way more miserable existence in later life than those who only have weight issues. Obviously they can go hand in hand, but there are plenty of happy overweight people. There are not plenty of happy miserable people!

Try stopping all fizzy drinks and getting sugar out of her diet (and yours) completely. After that:

8 to 9 hours sleep every night
A good long walk in the fresh air every day
Not too much carbohydrate
Eat the five-a-day vegetables and fruit

I am also on a healthy eating kick (not january related ) and taking a long hard look at my diet has shocked me actually

So I am 12.5 stone and should be 11.5 and facing the
Sugar / it’s in bloody everything !!!
Carbs / ditto . Even lentils have carbs 😩
Caffeine
Portion control - we eat like big MEN here

Is daunting to say the least .

OP you sound bolstered and I am pleased this hasn’t helped process things a bit xx and you sound like you have y Ur head screwed on too

Try stopping all fizzy drinks and getting sugar out of her diet (and yours) completely.

How will that not just make her hide the forbidden food in her bedroom and binge on it in secret? The less she is allowed something, the more she will do it in secret.

I bought a lockable box into which we put all treats/ stuff ds will binge on ie ketchup, so he can't access it without our knowledge. It's helped massively with ds. Although he is still eating crap at school , he's not at home.