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.

Put in a complaint about your HV?

My DD is 98th weight, 50th height - and my HV just laughed and said she was thriving. She was looking in her red book and saying she's spot on for where she should be and like you, you could track that back through pregnancy.

My DH is stocky, he's not a short guy but he's just shy of 6ft and thick - don't know how else to describe it except he's not buff! I'm 5'8 and also 'built'. Even at my slimmest in my 20s, I wasn't a lithe size 8, but nor was I a gym bunny buff. I just look 'built', like I can withstand a few knocks, lol. I am not a size 8 now but anyway, between us we weren't going to produce a delicate little fairy ballerina child and my HV commented as such - in a nice way. Although she did comment that given mine and DH's height - DD would likely be having a number of length spurts. My whole family is tall so I do agree.

Sounds like you have a HV/School problm so agree with pp a food diary with pics might come in useful if pushed.

To be honest, they're probably just following some stupid process and the letter is system generated based on an algo.

@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.

I understand you point but how does it work if she’s the same centile? She was too far in utero? At 3 months old fully breastfed? At 1 year when basically eating scraps of food and having milk? Her weight hasn’t shot up it’s been consistent.

*fat

You know by looking at her if she is overweight. You know if she is bigger than all her friends if she is overweight. You know if she is very heavy to life she is overweight. I don't buy into the big bones, solid, heavy set, bigger frame, puppy fat crap. You know yourself by looking at her unless you are in complete denial. Obesity in kids is so commonplace now though that people take it as normal.

She sounds really active (great) and using your muscles does increase bone density (fantastic).
Bmi is one indication of healthy weight but it is a blunt measure, should be considered with caution with due consideration to other measures /evidence.
If she fits clothes for her she she isn't very overweight if at all.

Yogurts, fruit, toast, ice cream every week, cake at parties most weekends, then Christmas, Easter, Hallowe’en for a bit extra… it could all add up to far too much sugar and a stressed out body trying to deal with it.

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.

I thought that until I had a newborn who had visible biceps. He was born muscly. It was deeply weird.

In babyhood, he and my niece were pretty much the same volume - around the same height and took up the same amount of space. But he was measurably denser. So I don't think it's invariably true that 'if the BMI says they're overweight, they're overweight.' Just like with sporty/muscular adults, there will be exceptions and outliers.

(DS2 is now 6, healthy weight, very sporty and still builds muscle incredibly easily.)

Have confidence in yourselves and your GP. A friend got one of these letters for one of her kids (big from birth), and shrugged and said she'd carry on feeding him the same healthy diet she fed the others. He slimmed down naturally as he got older.

On the flip side, I know of someone who was completely unaware that their child was overweight until they got one of these letters, and probably did need to know - so maybe they have their uses in a few cases.

Some kids really are just heavy for their size. My DD and her little friend were the same to look at when they were in reception but if you lifted them up, the friend was noticeably much, much heavier than DD - like a stone heavier. It was like her bones were more dense or something because neither of them had any extra fat on them, they looked incredibly similar sized.

The friend is now half a foot taller than my DD (in highschool), and still very slender and a hugely fit and active sports player.

Big bones. Heavy bones. These are all debunked myths which a quick Google will tell you. Bones more or less weigh the same - a bit more if you’re taller but that’s taken into account with BMI.

As a child, being tall for age and early puberty are both symptoms of being overweight so need to be taken into account.

Children shouldn’t have a ‘bit of a tummy’ beyond the toddler/ pre school age and they definitely don’t need ‘rolls of fat’ to be defined as overweight. Rolls in a child would be extreme obesity.

When dd started secondary she came home one day to tell us the nurse had pulled her out of class and grilled her about her diet and if we fed her properly.
Not because she was too big but she was apparently too thin!
So you can't win.
Dd is a tiny adult now who eats double what I can!
I agree that it's best to ignore the letter.

Perhaps it’s more helpful to think, “how many weeks of the year do we have zero junk sugar?”.

Children shouldn't be solid they should be slender

Do you seriously believe this? An endomorph is never going to be slender.

Incidentally, over fed young children often grow taller as well. So being taller doesn't mean she isn't over weight.

I can't believe how many people are saying to ignore it and are in denial about having fat children

@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.

You can be solid without being fat.

Before puberty children can’t particularly gain more or less muscle as this is connected to adult hormones. So being ‘muscly’ is again a symptom of being overweight not a reason for

The centile thing matters (not to me, but you know what I mean) because although she has stuck to the 98th the whole time, her height hasn't. It's the same as me saying - 'well John has been 15 stone for five years so he must be fine', but if John is 5 foot 3 then he is overweight. BMI is a bit of a nonsense though and personally I don't think it's appropriate to use for growing kids.

I have a 'chubby' child and am expecting the same sort of letter. The thing is, I also have two very beanpoley children (and am that build myself) too and they all eat the same stuff. So I know what you mean, it's not that I don't know how not to overfeed a child in general. The chubby one is a different build thought and just carries his weight differently, he's also a lot shorter. I am objective enough to be able to see he is a bit chunky though, and also can see that in comparison to his peers.

Does your DD look like her peers, in terms of size? Or does she appear bigger?

How old is she? I wouldn't worry, I wouldn't even contact anyone, just forget it. Just carry on making sure she has a balanced diet and exercise, you can't really do anymore. Some children are naturally sturdier than others.

I'm expecting the same for Ds. He's in year 6 and weighed recently. By my own calculations he would be deemed overweight too but I'm trying my best, he has asd and extremely limited what he eats too! He was also told he as overweight in reception but he had stayed on the same percentile so not like he's had a massive change in pattern with his weight, weight has been steady.

They use bmi which is outdated. Everyone is built differently and no 2 kids are the same!

My DS was the opposite very tall and thin from birth, got referred to a nutritionist and investigated by the GP. We were told to increase the fat content of what he ate, encourage snacks etc basically the opposite of healthy eating. It didn’t work he still managed his sports and activities but never bulked out. As a young adult he’s still tall and thin, can drop lbs in weight if he’s unwell it’s just the way he is. He really doesn’t get his metabolism from either me or his dad.

You throw the letter away.

If she’s potentially on the 50th centile for height (you said 50-75th) then that is a big mis match for her weight. I suggest you get her height measured accurately and then go from there. It’s kind of irrelevant if she’s always been on the top centile for weight if her height hasn’t kept track. I don’t doubt she’s very active and eats well - so do I - I ran 10km this morning - but my bmi is 26 and I’m overweight and I know it.

We had the same in y6. Looking back at pictures, DD was very chubby. She was so active though, did lots of sport and just loved to eat, especially sweets. Once she hit puberty she stretched out. She'll be 14 next week and she looks like a stick. I'm sure it'll even out later on once she's done growing but it really made me realise that as long as they're moving a lot and eating well, it'll be fine.
Some parents do kid themselves in regards to just how much their kids eat though. They don't need that much.

Ignore everything the HV says and stick with your gut and the Dr. I had this and found HV nothing but a pain in my arse instead of being supportive they were horrible. My son did have hearing issues and went straight through dr rather than HV. when they tried to get me to take time off work for his 2 year check i said no not losing 80.00 wages and 38.00 nursery fees as they wouldnt give a time. they tried to kick off but stuck to my guns saying they could speak to dr and they never contacted me again thank god!

@lanthanum

Have confidence in yourselves and your GP. A friend got one of these letters for one of her kids (big from birth), and shrugged and said she'd carry on feeding him the same healthy diet she fed the others. He slimmed down naturally as he got older.

On the flip side, I know of someone who was completely unaware that their child was overweight until they got one of these letters, and probably did need to know - so maybe they have their uses in a few cases.

According to the latest figures about 40% of year 6 children are overweight, and a significant number of them are obese. The percentage increase since the last measurements were calculated is 4%.

That must be an awful lot of parents not realising their children are fat.

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