To think we’ve lost sight of what a healthy child’s weight should be?

[Winniethepoohandtiggertoo]

Walking through town today as kids were leaving school and I was quite shocked by the size of them (primary kids). But then I noticed that so many of them were overweight that in a way it isn’t surprising that maybe their parents haven’t noticed or realised there is a problem? When I was little kids were skinny things, now it seems the norm for them to be built like shot-putters! I know a few parents with overweight children but they insist they’re ‘strong’ or ‘solid’, or ‘they run around so much they just burn it off’. When so many kids look like theirs it probably isn’t surprising they think that?

One mum I know thinks her 9 year old being 11.5 stone (she is not tall, just average height) is a totally normal weight. That’s surely not right.

Grapes are technically berries and the more berries you eat, the lower the negative impact from refined sugar is on the body. Put simply, if you eat a brownie with berries, that is much better for you than eating that same brownie by itself. Pineapple is full of bromelain, a substance which has strong anti-inflammatory effects, may combat cancer and when combined with N-acetyl cysteine appears to destroy the spike protein on sars-cov viruses. Satsumas aren't just vitamin c powerhouses, but they are high in vitamin e, B12, iron and copper and potassium. Eating satsumas promotes the breakdown of fat and proteins in the body.

Anyone worrying about the sugar and carbs in in fruit is honestly just off on a crazy tangent. They are extremely healthy and the sugar present in whole fruit is utterly incomparable to processed sugar, incuding fructose syrup. The effects they have on the body are almost the opposite.

This. As long as you teach kids the right habits that’s what matters. Plenty of kids with fast metabolisms find they’re skinny in youth and that catches up with them later.

Me and my brother were the opposite, both were “overweight” as pre teens and found that changed as we grew up. My brother still has a “rugby” type build but he’s perfectly healthy.

i think this thread has a lot of panicking, Pearl clutching, competitive under eating. Thin kids aren’t always healthy kids. Fat children aren’t unhealthy and being set up for lifetimes of obesity and heart disease.

as long as you feed your children a healthy diet and teach them the right habits, there’s no need to worry.

My DC have had more than one letter back from school saying they are underweight and that I should seek medical attention for them. One got this letter at the reception check and two got it at the year 6 check.

At first I did as suggested and sought medical help thinking it would reflect badly on us as parents if I did not.

The doctor looked at me like I was mad and said if I was really worried give them more milk to drink. it was a waste of time. I know my 9 year old weighs a smidge over 20kg as they had a pre assessment for surgery last week and they told us not to use the age guideline on the calpol box as due to weight it would be too much. So I reckon they will get the same letter in year 6 and we’ll get back to worrying if the school thinks we don’t feed them.

i dont see many solid, overweight or obese kids at the school mine go to - maybe 1 in 20? when i go to nearest large city, the amount of overweight people and obese is not surprising - it's become the norm!!

Also, so many parents give their kids crap to eat on the way home from school. Chocolate, sweets etc. why not just give them an apple? They get pudding every day at school anyway so they don’t need more crap.

Firmness about diet did a lot more than encourage an ED. It completely skewed my relationship with food and body image. It's taken me a decade to even half fix it.

I have it the other way, my dd is underweight, clinically underweight and under investigation with a pediatrician as it is unexplained (she does exercise and eats well and a varied diet but has 0 fat on her body and looks emaciated). She gets SO many comments praising her for being slim, it's horrible.

Fat children aren’t unhealthy and being set up for lifetimes of obesity and heart disease

What a crock of shit.

I suppose the flip side is though that people seem happy enough to pass on unhealthy and damging attitudes and habits toward food which are arguably just as damaging, if not more and that's not an issue in our society, but setting good examples and promoting a balanced diet is seen as harmful?! Doesn't make sense.

I agree that it's neglect but it's so widespread that demonising parents really doesn't help. We need a different approach.

We had a problem when DS was younger about British clothes being to big on the waist, particularly supermarket brands. We took to buying European brands, particularly Scandinavian. It solved the problem. He was in the right size for his age. He wears skinny school trousers either from Asda or MandS now. Slim fit aren't slim enough for him.

DS is a weirdly picky eater (but it looks like we may actually have a medical explanation for that now - an allergy and ADHD - and he's naturally been avoiding certain foods high on the list of things that are suspect). School telling him that there were bad foods didn't help and caused even more issues for us.

There's no such thing as bad foods. This lulls people into this weird sense of security. There's such a thing as foods in moderation and too much food but little if anything is taught at school about portion control even if directed at parents via the kids. It does my head in and I think causes other problems.

BOOM!!! Spot-on, a perfect in-a-nutshell summary IMHO. And perfectly explains why this is a problem more frequently seen in lower income families / areas.

Main thing is that ultra-processed foods are soo much cheaper and 'easier' than fresh, less processed options. Parents/carers having to work longer hours to make ends meet, leaving even less time for meal planning and preparation. It's now a multigenerationala problem.

It's also a policy choice on the part of the government.

I would also add to this the ability to order takeaway food by pressing a few buttons on your phone without even having to get off the sofa. My local Macdonalds has so many delivery drivers that they have set aside a room for them to wait in.

I'm a size 8 in most high street shops.

I was helping DM sort her wardrobe the other day. Lots of lovely clothes she bought in the 90s, labelled size 12. I couldn't fit into any of them. Vanity sizing really is a thing.

My DS is easy to buy uniform for - I buy him skinny fit extra long. But clothes for wearing outside school all fall down. He doesn't look at all skinny to me. He's pure muscle. Buying clothes for healthy sized children is almost impossible.

“Bf- toast, fruit, milk
Snack- yoghurt
Lunch- cheese sandwich, carrot sticks, apple
Snack- fruit and biscuit
Dinner- homemade chilli, rice, few tortilla chips
Suoper- milk and banana”

This is not a healthy diet. Five a day is very misleading , it does not mean 5 fruit a day. Fruit is usually very high in fructose which is a sugar metabolised in the liver which is bad. Five vegetables and one fruit a day it’s what it should be.
What kind of yogurt do you give him? If it’s a flavoured one it’s probably full of sugar. 4g is equal to one tsp of sugar. Flavour your own yogurt with berries or vanilla extract.

No healthy fats whatsoever in this example, try something like avocado.. Too many fast carbs. He’s having bread for both breakfast and lunch. Replace the breakfast with for example porridge oats that you make from scratch, not the ready made ones.

if he get gets a nice home cooked dinner he shouldn’t need supper.

MIL’s diet is appalling, not much to say about that other than good luck getting him another nursery day.

You can get 6 apples for 89p at Aldi.

You can get a packet of biscuits for half that but generally they retail at closer to 89p for the majority of items at Aldi. A sixth of a packet of borbons versus an apple is going to dent your appetite differently. The apple may well be better value for money but realising this isn't that simple.

That's why we wanted the GP involved. She was EBF and then weaned on proper food. I was vegan at the time and my DD weight trains. She's had no access to junk. She does have a milk protein allergy though and has had bowel issues needing minor surgery. Nice bit of stereotyping though.

The one that gets me is the endless 'snacktime' at school and nursery.

Normalising snacking is a massive part of the issue.

Schools seem to use it as a way to (badly) manage behavioural issues too. Meanwhile my son who refuses to eat at school got phobed off for years until we started to go down the ADHD route and now they are paying some attention...

Hmm. I still have clothes I bought in the 90s. Size 8. I still fit them.

Odd.

Nope. Fructose from whole fruit is not metabolised in the same was as fructose syrup. As for healthy fats, if the milk, yogurt and cheese is all from whole milk, then that's all very health fat. As for carbs, well the best carb is potato, very significantly. Followed by oats. But wheat is fine and there is little wrong with a growing child eating bread and cereal in the same day as long as they aren't overly processed and sugary.

Also the factor that all children today are angels, whose parents can't say no to anymore.

I think there are many issues contributing, as PPs have outlined, but another is artificial sweeteners and low fat products. There's accumulating evidence that they confuse the body's hormonal systems, you don't feel full or you don't get the nutrients your body is expecting, and you end up craving more sweet and fatty food and your body may also store more fat (as it's responding to a perceived unreliability of nutrients). Unfortunately millions of parents, schools and authorities are wedded to the idea of "no added sugar" and reducing sugar - OK in itself but not helpful when it means loads of artificial sweeteners instead.

I am 100% sure this will all hit the fan eventually and we'll move away from them, but right now they're everywhere. I avoid for myself and my kids as much as possible.

When DC1 started state primary school in 2013 in SW London, I remember thinking it was a myth about growing childhood obesity because there was probably one overweight child in each class which pretty much mirrored my time at school in the 1980s.

Roll on to 2022 and DC2 is about to leave Y6 from the same school. The increase is shocking. Really shocking. I've seen a real jump for the children in Ys 3 -5 particularly the girls.

DC2 is underweight and we are challenged regularly (which is fine, I understand why). But I think DC2 stands out more now than in earlier years because a fair few around at the school appears to be growing disproportionately large.

I feel so sorry for those overweight children. Yes, for some of them it'll slip off naturally in their teenage years and perhaps for some it doesn't stop them leading a healthy life. But for many it impacts on health, ability to be properly active and self esteem.

I agree with some of the earlier posters as to the multiple reasons we got there.

Hmm, there are only 2 children in DDs year (5) who are overweight and non in DS (year 3) - the others are all slim and normal sized. Although, I work in secondary schools and I would say that there are a noticeable number of overweight teenagers these days.