The letter finally came. I’m really upset

[Hell0G00dbye]

Long story short DD has followed the 98th centile for weight since my 37 week growth scan. She has followed it perfectly and consistently which was applauded for the 6 months I breastfed and since then has been a big issue with the HV team. She’s at school and I’ve just received the letter saying she’s very overweight.

What can I do? She eats good, home cooked food, has the odd treat but generally healthy and normal child portions. She’s very active both structured (does dance, swimming and gymnastics) every week and unstructured (walks the 40 minute round trip to school daily, parks and long walks on a weekend, runs around the garden. She doesn’t look fat (to me) but she is solid and does feel heavy to pick up.

The letter says contact the doctor or HV but I’ve taken her before. GP says she’s absolutely fine and will grow into her weight and had no concerns. HV just weighed and said she’s still overweight and to watch portions. Day to day I don’t worry about it as she looks fine and is super active but the letter has taken me right back to her 2 year check and being made to go monthly to the HV for weight checks and their disapproving looks when she continued along her centile.

NB: she has followed the 98th centile but I think the issue is she isn’t 98th for height so her BMI puts her at very overweight.

Have you double checked the measurements? At DS's reception weigh /height check they got his height wrong by over 5cm. It happened to be done in a week in which he had a GPs appointment and two different hospital appointments and was weighed measured at all three of those so I knew exactly how tall he was at the time. Rattling through a class of children they obvious missed the fact that he wasn't standing up straight or jotted down the wrong number.
If the height/weight are correct then it is worth following up rather than ignoring though.

I don't think it's possible for anyone who hasn't met OP's child to say anything very definitive about this.

There are plenty of kids out there who are obese, and whose parents have failed them terribly, I see them all the time.

Equally, there are plenty of very healthy kids who wrongly get sent these letters. My nephew was one of them, a very mildly stocky [but very active and capable in terms of sports etc] boy, his mother quite rightly threw the letter straight in the bin when it arrived.

@Iusedtoliveinsanfrancisco

Take 100 girls and yours is fatter than 98 of them. And you think that’s ok?

No, she's heavier than 98 of them. Which is fine if she was taller than 98 of them, but she isn't.

My eldest is off the charts in height and the same in weight. This is fine as he's in proportion

I personally would ignore it OP. I had the opposite problem for years - DS is very skinny but eats like a horse and is liable to meltdowns if hungry. We got dreadful advice and there was lots of hand-wringing about something that actually has become a non-issue as he's got older.

I think weight, healthy eating and exercise are all much more nuanced than we are led to believe, and that you are only getting a snapshot of the situation at a particular point in time - your DD could grow 2cm and the ratio would change. I would monitor and trust your instincts on this and disengage from any further discussion

a very mildly stocky [but very active and capable in terms of sports etc

I say this kindly, but your nephew probably is overweight. Being active and healthy, doesn't mean you aren't necessarily overweight. And I speak as someone who has already detailed at length that her DS was overweight.

I have a "stocky" DD. People tell me all the time she's fine. She's not fine. She is overweight. She's also strong, extraordinarily healthy, and fit.

There's a limit to what I can do right now because she's still v young and unlike with DS, her problem is NOT that she's eating too much of everything. She's a fussy eater and that brings additional challenges. What I can do, and am doing, is working hard on expanding her food options to make them more balanced. She does lots of activities and we're now also trying to expand the way these work so that activities are a bit more focused on constant movement - eg she's working on being able to swim two lengths without stopping currently vs just hanging about in the pool with lots of time spent hanging onto the wall/me. We've managed to encourage her to do some active holiday camps which is something she point blank refused to do before.

As she gets older, we will figure out more solutions, or these ones will work and she'll continue to gain height but slow down on the width! But I'm not kidding myself - stocky in a 6 year old is overweight.

I have just had the same thing. My son is head and shoulders above his classmates and is in size 7 adult shoes. He turned 11 just 3 weeks ago. Both my family and his paternal family are all very tall. He is a fit and healthy young man, very active including the 20 mile a week of walking we do just for the school run. If anything he undereats as he has a very restricted diet due to his autism.

I've torn it up. I've torn it up because the last time this happened to me with my adult DD, she saw the letter and it tipped her into a serious eating disorder. She's now a very healthy, slim adult. I am absolutely not going down that road again. My advice to you is continue on as you are, decent food, lots of exercise. She will be fine.

Throwing the letter away and “going by what you see” is terrible advice. Please ignore this, especially the latter. Please do not feel sad or guilty but please don’t brush this under the carpet. You sound very sensible, so I am sure you’ll take away the sensible options.

One thing I struggled with my DS was portion sizes. I believed I was giving him appropriate portions but I was over feeding him. He wasn’t overweight but I was anxious about it. I could easily have seen how he gently gained more weight even on chicken, veg and wholewheat pasta. Reviewing portion sizes and weighing portions was really helpful. Eyeballing it and saying “this seems about X size” did not work. Weighing food did help for my sake.

From this thread it feels like if they should just change their wording to ‘your child is too broad’ 😂

25% of children who start school are overweight. And BMI is not ‘weight people and their mystical charts’ it’s regulated by NHS doctors same as everything else. It will identify overweight children in most cases. The sheer number of parents on this thread declaring it didn’t work for them and their child is just ‘broad’ or ‘stocky’ or like their (probably overweight dad) shows just why this is the case - because so many parents are in denial. Their children are fat for their age and will likely grow up fat.

And by the way I’m about 3 stone overweight so not a pious thin person!

Meh. File it in the bin.

I'm a pipsqueak but my Daughter is 99th centile for both and was prem.

My Grandad was 6 4 my hubby 6 2. I'm nearly a wee hobbit.

Chill... take them out for plenty of exercise.

My first DD was always short and fat ie: 9th centile height, 98th weight. Thank goodness it was back in the day when they didn't monitor them so closely, so no letters for me. She was the classic Michelin baby, which the HV's cooed over, and was chubby right up to say year 6/7. She never really grew much, still only 5ft 2", but now only weighs 8 and bit stone. She is actually pretty thin, still eats huge amounts of food, and doesn't do any exercise at all. People are different, they grow at different rates, they end up at different points. As long as your DC is eating well, and balanced, and is healthy and happy, then trust your instincts and bin the letter.

@BlingLoving

a very mildly stocky [but very active and capable in terms of sports etc

I say this kindly, but your nephew probably is overweight. Being active and healthy, doesn't mean you aren't necessarily overweight. And I speak as someone who has already detailed at length that her DS was overweight.

I have a "stocky" DD. People tell me all the time she's fine. She's not fine. She is overweight. She's also strong, extraordinarily healthy, and fit.

There's a limit to what I can do right now because she's still v young and unlike with DS, her problem is NOT that she's eating too much of everything. She's a fussy eater and that brings additional challenges. What I can do, and am doing, is working hard on expanding her food options to make them more balanced. She does lots of activities and we're now also trying to expand the way these work so that activities are a bit more focused on constant movement - eg she's working on being able to swim two lengths without stopping currently vs just hanging about in the pool with lots of time spent hanging onto the wall/me. We've managed to encourage her to do some active holiday camps which is something she point blank refused to do before.

As she gets older, we will figure out more solutions, or these ones will work and she'll continue to gain height but slow down on the width! But I'm not kidding myself - stocky in a 6 year old is overweight.

"I say this kindly, but your nephew probably is overweight. "

he really wasn't [he's a slim young adult now].

These calculations are a bit harder with pre-pubescent boys, but with adult men it's totally straightforward - in the higher range, BMI type calculations tell you almost nothing about whether an adult man is fat or not. Probably any member of the current England rugby team would have a 'dangerously' high BMI. But waist size tells you a great deal about whether a man is fat or not. Unless his skeleton is of elephantine proportions [and he's e.g. 6'10" or higher], any man with a 40" inch waist or more is fat. almost all men with 38" waists could do with losing a bit of weight. You can apply similar standards to boys, look at them objectively & say what you see. Not alwyays easy with your own kids, but sensible friends who'll be straight with you can help.

OP, I really sympathise. One of my children was similar. Controlling portion size has worked for us.

So so many people in denial that there kids are fat. And it’s the same with adults - I see it all the time in my work. Women who are 5’5 and weigh 13 stone & think that’s ok - it really isn’t, if you want to avoid all the associated health issues that will arise as you get older.
This is why half of all kids (& adults) are fat. Stop pussyfooting about it & making excuses (not you specifically OP, just generally!) - doing kids’ gymnastics & half an hour of swimming a week isn’t going to make you muscly, what a load of mis-information. Sizes have gone up, portions have gone up - the ‘fat’kid at my school in the 90s looks positively skinny compared to kids I see nowadays.
They don’t send those letters out for shits & giggles. I’d take a good honest look at what she’s eating & sort it out now before it gets worse & she ends up battling with her weight when she’s older.

Chuck the letter in the bin OP. In future decline the weigh ins at school.

So so many people in denial that there kids are fat.

🙄

@Brieandcamembert

I'm sorry but of she is measuring as overweight she's overweight. People are always in denial about it. Children shouldn't be solid they should be slender. Most children of normal weight will be described by parents as thin/ scrawny.

If she's solid and heavy she's too fat.

Lol. You've never seen the child but you're desperate to call her a FAT kid. I really hope you don't have children because your reliance on BMI as a true indicator of obesity is very misguided.

BMI is inaccurate and bullshit: www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=106268439

I actually don't think BMI is a fantastic tool for people who are smaller or taller than average.

Running that’s a very good point to check height. Easy for mistake to be made or for child to have a spurt.

It's no wonder that so many kids and adults are overweight and obese when so many people are in denial and offer advice such as throwing the letter on the bin. Even though they have never set eyes upon ops child.

We've definitely lost all sense of reality when it comes to what a healthy weight person looks like

The trouble is that the overweight kids whose parents refuse to accept that they need to make some changes will likely grow into overweight adults.

My daughter was on the 2nd centile for height and below the 0.4th for weight until she hit puberty.

We also got The Letter.

The HV just rolled her eyes and said the most important thing was that she was following a trajectory and not losing or gaining weight exponentially. I had them trying to stop me from breast feeding too because of it. Luckily, I had a pro bf midwife ego said it was only ever an issue because the growth charts were based on ff babies.

Point being, you know your daughter's diet and exercise levels. You know her build. You know whether she is actually unhealthy or not. BMI is nonsense.

I have just had the same thing. My son is head and shoulders above his classmates and is in size 7 adult shoes. He turned 11 just 3 weeks ago. Both my family and his paternal family are all very tall. He is a fit and healthy young man, very active including the 20 mile a week of walking we do just for the school run. If anything he undereats as he has a very restricted diet due to his autism.

This does irritate me as the letters should have a way to automatically generate an alternative message for people whose children are unusually tall (or, for that matter, short).

I bet if you took his height and figured out at what age that height is 50th percentile, then put his height and weight into the NHS calculator and increased his age as per his height, you've have the same experience as my DS - totally normal BMI.

If they're going to use these tools AND admit that they're not that useful in specific situations, they should do the admitting part a little more clearly!!!

@Loubylooooo and everyone saying prepubescent children don’t build muscle/have heavy muscle.

My son (year 3) is tall and thin (healthy bmi), but very very noticeably muscley. He has been doing gymnastics and dancing multiple times a week since he was 3, practicing at home on top for exams etc and IS really muscular. He has very strong defined muscles in his legs especially but also his stomach- it isn’t child like flat, you can see the muscles. Even his feet are strong and muscular looking. So in my experience it is perfectly possible for young athletes to have bodies that reflect that.

We've definitely lost all sense of reality when it comes to what a healthy weight person looks like

No we haven't