to think these children ARE overweight?

[OkMaybeNot]

The schools in my area have just sent out the results of the National Child Measurement Programme.

There are a number of acquaintances/friends on my social media who have posted their child's result online, along with a picture of their child and an angry rant about how their child is as skinny as a rake, not an ounce of fat on them, 'stocky' not 'fat', perfectly healthy etc etc.

But they are. Some of them are very overweight and plainly so. Others may be a little bit chubby and due for a growth spurt or something, but clearly not slim, either.

There are streams of comments underneath these posts agreeing and expressing their disgust and anger. And I'm wondering if everyone's lying, or they genuinely believe that these children are slim?

I know BMI is notoriously squiffy when it comes to kids, and I have seen genuine cases of it being so totally wrong it's laughable, especially when it comes to strong, athletic children. But that isn't the case for these children, at all.

AIBU to think that you owe it to your child to at least consider the results before going on the defensive?

I withdrew my permission for my child to be measured, due to inconsistencies. They did record him as overweight, and we know he isn't, because he is under services for been underweight and struggling to eat very well, but when his results came through they had recorded him as 3 stone 10 and 115cm, so I realised the height was wrong as he had been measured at hospital the week before they measured him and he was already 119cm and nearly 5lb lighter, we asked them to remeasure them and got a snotty nurse who had a right go at us and said she definitely right, she did eventually remeasure him and then phoned us to tell us he was now 118cm as recorded by the hospital but had put on weight dramatically in weeks and was now classified d as obese. We went to doctors and was told to stop any correspondence and not to go by the advice she was giving because he was underweight and had we listened and made him diet it would have caused further issues

I’m more worried about the fact the parents are posting pictures of their child online openly discussing and inviting everyone to discus their child’s weight ! I don’t think it’s very fair on the child no matter wether they are aware or not and regardless of age and wether or not they are actually obese

YANBU

Facts are facts.

Truth hurts and people don’t like to admit that their culinary skills, shopping habits and lifestyle could be to blame.

Yeah, people really do this in real life

YANBU

They don't used their bmi for this test, they use their centile position. My ds 1 came back as overweight but according to the figures on the sheet he has a bmi of 18. He isn't the beanpole shape of the boys his height, a very different body shape and different proportions compared to his brother. Doesn't have a six pack but no tummy either. He is very active, so I've decided not to worry about it.

@Tringley
200ml of whole fat milk has 7.2g of fat and 9.4g of sugar. If you remove half that fat (to make it semi-skimmed), then you will have 9.4g of sugar in 196.4g of milk - which is the same as 9.6g of sugar in 200g of milk - the proportion you find in semi-skimmed milk. It doesn't mean that sugar is being added.

Children's bmi isn't the same as an adult though. A bmi of 18 is overweight for a 5 year old (assuming that's the age) but underweight for an adult so you can't base it on the same range.

He's 11, and 5ft tall.

These are the same kids who have to wear plus sized uniform, three ages too big and it's still straining at the seams when my healthy 50 percentile dd had regular uniform hanging off her and needed adjustable waists just to be able to stop it falling down?

Yeah, people really do this in real life

What do you mean? Post the pictures online?

I can assure you they definitely do!

If he's 11 it shouldn't have come up as overweight and I would be querying that as it's within the healthy range on the centiles

I live abroad and sports lessons are compulsory. You can't get a school leavers certificate until you pass the final sports exam, which is really tough - lots of push-ups, sit-ups, a fast run, skipping etc. The schools and kids take it seriously and there are very few obese teenagers. One girl i know couldn't get into university until she retook this exam and got her leavers' certificate. Something to consider?

I really don’t think it’s any of tour business.

*your

Why are they posting pics of their children online to discuss their weight? How embarrassing for the poor kids.

I have a weight problem so I'm a bit paranoid about DS.
However my line is a double chin. He's never had one so I figure he's ok.
His height and weight have tracked the same lines since birth - top end of the scale.
I can't see how anyone can think that a clearly fat child isn't so!

I know it's not the same, but having read slimming magazines for most of my adult life, I am very ,uch aware that the 'success stories' tend to be at a much higher target weifght than say, 20 years ago. Our perception of a healthy weight/size has definitely changed.

I think a lot of parents are defensive. And I'm going to sound like one of them. But my oldest was the tallest in his year and a strong build, but definitely not overweight. When the letter came home saying he was obese the school confirmed that height had not been taken into consideration (WTF!). He was above 99 on both height and weight centiles and GP confirmed he was completely healthy. More education needed. So much more.

My friends daughter at age 7 was seriously obese and still is actually. At that age she had pimples and sweated profusely, she was unable to walk far at all and it was sad to see.
She is still a larger girl at 9 and she now does a little more exercise but her parents ignored the results and still feed her a diet of deep friend foods and let her eat continually out of boredom so I doubt it will ever change which is sad really.

I think is not difficult to see if someone has excess fat. Children should be quite trim and muscular and not have

extra fat around hips on breast region before puberty. Also a bulging tummy only in very young kids that have yet to develop their muscles. If you have a child that has visible fat they are overweight. They are constantly growing and active so should be using up their consumed energy and not accumulating it around their waste. If you can pinch their fat they probably are a bit over.

YANBU there is a lot of denial/defensiveness which stops parents taking action to prevent/treat childhood obesity

YANBU. People no longer have the concept that it’s normal to be hungry between meals. We are not meant to feel full all the time. It’s the constant snacking (primary aged children do not need a snack at 3:30 when they’ve had lunch at 12/12:30) and also coffee shops! I see children being given an adult sized drink e.g. milkshake and then a muffin as a snack! Do parents not understand that the drink will contain at least 400 calories and the muffin at least 500? That’s 900 calories which is approximately HALF of their daily allowance - and then they will go and eat three meals and possibly other snacks on top of that. And do less exercise than children did 30/40 years ago. That is why so many kids are overweight and obese.

We don’t have biscuits at home and DS has a packet of sweets once a week. We walk to school and back every day (20 mins each way), he goes to the local athletic club once a week and does a 30 min run once a week. He is a healthy weight and you can see his ribs (Dr Christian Jessen suggested you should be able to see a child’s ribs as a rough indicator of healthy weight). I am constantly amazed that he is not underweight given the lack of treat food and the amount of exercise he does but he isn’t, just shows that you really can’t feed a child all that stuff and not expect them to be overweight.

Children should be quite trim and muscular

Muscular? I think that's a bit of a stretch.

The sporty kids my kids age (under 10) are slim-to-thin. Categorically not muscular!

Fit children are usually quite muscular- not in a bulky, body building way, but in a stringy, wiry kind of way.