To not know how to talk to DD(11) about her weight?

[HippyKayYay]

Sorry this is a bit long.

The TLDR is: HELP - how do I handle an 11yo girl being a bit overweight and calling herself fat without giving her issues while at the same time making sure she doesn't gain more weight?

DD(11) is a bit overweight. I don't know what she weighs, but she carries a fair bit of weight on her tummy and clothes that fit in all other ways will be too tight on her waist. Periods haven't started yet, but she is pretty developed. She's always had a bit of a tummy, but it's become increasingly noticeable in the last 12 months.

We never talk about weight at home. I never talk about my body negatively, or about dieting or about food being 'fattening' or anything like that. However, DD is increasingly calling herself 'fat' or pointing out her 'big tummy' and I don't know what to say. If I say she's not, she calls me a liar. I try to talk about positive body image, but then she says 'so I am fat?!?' All her friends are very slim, so she also compares herself to them.

I really don't know how to approach it. My mum pointed out my 'puppy fat' at this age and said various other self-image-damaging things that took me a long time to get over. Is it ok to point out to her the relationship between nutrition and weight? How do I do it without implying she's overweight? I don't want to create food issues, but I'm not sure how much she's really aware of the cause-and-effect (despite it being covered loads in school).

Gentle/ covert changes at home in terms of diet and exercise haven't seemed to make any difference.

She doesn't do a lot of exercise (two after-school sports clubs + stuff in school) and isn't a naturally sporty or active person. Neither was I at her age. We've tried encouraging additional exercise, but she is very very resistant and told me the other night that every time we tell her she needs to get more exercise it makes her feel bad about herself and that's she's fat (we've never talked about exercise being related to weight loss and I know that weight loss is 99% diet anyway. We always associate it with positive mental health and just 'being healthy'). Family exercise (e.g. a walk or bike ride) on weekends is tricky because her younger brother does tons of sport (and is very slim) and he, reasonably I think, doesn't want to come home from 3hrs of sport on a Saturday morning to go on a walk.

Her diet is ok in terms of range, but she loves inherently 'fattening' things (butter, mayonaise, sweet food of any description, garlic bread, etc) and I feel like I'm always telling her to put less butter on her bread, etc. But she doesn't eat secretly or anything like that. I think they have a normal amount of treats/ junky food - she's not scarfing family packs of pringles or anything like that. I don't want to completely ban all sweet treats as then they become 'a thing'. The rest of the family is slim/ healthy weight.

So as not to drip feed. She is neurodivergent (we're going through the assessment process at the moment, but likely ADHD and possibly ASD too)

if she uses a lot of mayo, have you thought about substituting yoghurt or creme fraiche?
Lidl do a lovely potato salad with yoghurt instead, and I massively prefer it, so it's probably worth a try

I also prefer salad cream to mayo, but I don't know what the difference is health wise.

I don’t know if this would work but I always found with my NT daughter that if she asked something that could be contentious i.e. “do you think I’m fat”? I would pause and look at her and say the truth “no you look the same to me” or “maybe you have put some weight on”. Then follow it up with “why? Do your clothes feel uncomfortable or do you feel unhealthy?” And see how she responds. If you don’t panic and seem to be considering the answer then she would feel less like it’s a criticism or a big problem. Hopefully this would follow on to a conversation about what she would like to do about it and if you (and/or the whole family) can help support her in that. If your daughter is ND do you think this would work or be too literal?

I genuinely had no interest in food and was thin as a youth. I didn’t think about food, it wasn’t important. Now as someone who is overweight it occupies much of my waking time. It’s terrible, you can’t escape needing food and if you get physical and emotional pleasure from eating sweet, fattening etc food it can be a real torment. Way harder to avoid than cigarettes and alcohol.

good luck x

You can try no snacks after the evening meal and maybe bring that forward. As a kid we had tea at 6pm then didn't eat again until 7.30am. We were all quite skinny and I've been sedentary all my life. Now I'm older and no longer skinny, I've returned to eating at 6.30pm and no snacks afterwards. It has a fancy name now - intermittent fasting, but I didn't feel hungry as a kid. It was just tea time.

White carbs (bread, pasta, rice, potatoes) turn into sugar in the body, so I'd be saying less bread rather than less butter.

As someone who is overweight myself (but admittedly my own DC is too young to have to worry about this for him yet), maybe just focus on the “sugar is not good for you” health message. That she might feel more alert or energised etc with less sugar in her diet. The focus on aesthetics societally, especially for young women is so tough

Explain that white carbs also turn quickly to sugar, so any sweet treats or white carbs should only be eaten in very small amounts (and try not to regularly eat any in front of the children if you can yourselves - have them while they are at school if you/your husband really need to).

If possible focus on healthier, very protein dense (rather than high in carbs) family breakfasts and dinners for all of you (like scrambled eggs on wholemeal toast, fish/meat and brown rice with veg stir fry’s etc) to help stop her feeling hungry - that way she will be hopefully be doing minimal damage overall with whatever lunch she chooses at school.

Family puddings should be fat dense to help with hunger (rather than just very sugary)- ice cream with some added nuts for instance, would be better than any sweets, or good quality dark choc over the milk or white stuff. Maybe if she likes cooking, you could make some healthier home made puddings with her on a weekend? (Nutty flapjacks? dark choc and beetroot muffins?).

Just some ideas, but I appreciate that her being ND might make some of this more difficult.

Edited to add: No, of course you don’t need to get rid of the butter and mayo! Low sugar fats fill her up (and contain lots of nutritional benefits to boot). The issue would be if she was having the mayo regularly on white bread or chips, rather than a big tuna salad or a small baked potato/2 med slices of wholemeal bread etc

Haven't rtft but my son has came to me a couple of times saying he's fat. When he has, I don't have an opinion but always ask him 'are you wanting to do something about it, if so, have you got an idea of what you want to try.'
This has opened up conversations of what he thinks is a healthy way to lose it, and he has both times. Usually from just going out with his friends more or having a kick about for an hour after school. He still has half a pack of biscuits every now and again.

I did briefly see your daughter does martial arts, I'm a black belt so can relate! I found karate was quiet slow, Thai boxing was too much but Taekwondo was perfect. She could practice technique, punching and kicking pads if someone is going to be willing to hold them? Maybe direct the conversation to putting muscle on via the training as opposed to the weight loss? Then be sure to notice when her body starts to change, lots of positivity. Maybe that's easier with boys, they love to flex and compare their biceps to mine 🤣😭

Sorry if this has been a load of useless info, again I didn't rtft and I'm half asleep already 🙈 in which case, ignore me 🤗

This is the best idea I think.

I can see this coming up in my future as DD 7 is underweight and always has been, with multiple allergies, so we are constantly trying to eat more and don't worry at all about anything high calorie or high fat if it's getting eaten. But DD 4 is a naturally chunkier build and isn't shedding toddler weight as fast. Her diet probably isn't as healthy as it could be due to us being encouraging to eat as much as possible to the eldest

Lots of good advice on here.
i would add make sure you understand how much food she should be eating a day and what it looks like in terms of portion sizes for a healthy 11 yo girl of her height and weight.
(look at NHS guidelines/ visuals - often it’s less than you think). Try and stick to these and manage what you have in the house. If she has an ice cream in the park - say that’s fine, but it’s fruit for dessert that evening. constantly and consistently do this not as a diet but as a way of ensuring she’s eating right amount for her height and age and not too much sugar.
at the same time increase her movement - walk to school, shops, go to park , off screens until physical fun has been had, hide and seek, play barns, trampolines, dancing routines, play dates, bike riding.
Doing both the above will result in small gradual weight loss and as she shoots up and grows the weight will also come off.
i hope you can get it under control whilst she’s young and only 11 so it doesn’t get worse. I’m not sure how much you have to talk about it with her … main thing is just to do it I reckon! Good luck x

I think you could have a discussion about nutrition and frame this as a matter of balance, particularly energy balance.

For example,
"You've got enough butter on your food already, another spoonful of butter or mayonnaise, would put too much energy into your meal compared to fibre, protein and vitamins. Let's see how you feel once you've had some more to eat, and if you are still hungry you could have some more chicken/rice/broccoli/whatever".

Or

"You can't have extra butter/mayonnaise - I don't want your tummy to fill up on mayonnaise and miss out on the fibre and protein your body needs".

Or

"We've got some great energy on your plate from that buttery mashed potato. Let's balance that with some fibre and vitamins from broccoli and carrots. The more natural colours on the plate, the more vitamins we're getting"

The idea being, butter and mayonnaise, and other things such as sweet puddings aren't bad foods, but we have a set amount of energy from fat and sugars in our meal/diet, and we must balance this against other things such as fibre, protein and vitamins which we mostly get from fresh vegetables.

The great thing about overweight children, is that unless they are extremely overweight, they don't need to lose weight. They grow upwards into their weight, so it's simply a case of gaining relatively less weight going forward.

So if she asks do I need to lose weight? You can honestly say no. The approach is, this is an important time for your body with lots of changes coming soon (puberty). We need to make sure you have a balanced diet so that you can grow taller and stronger and have a healthy happy tummy/gut and immune system.

It's interesting how you emphasise that your dh and son are both thin. If they're eating the same food as your daughter you need to do a whole family drive at improving everyone's diet.If you eat poorly but are also slim that's not necessarily good.

I think you are overthinking this. I don't think you need to do much at all. At her age the difference between eating too many calories or the right amount can be very small. It might be if you can just reduce her calorie intake by a small amount she will either slowly grow into her weight or very slowly loose her weight.

I'd secretly work out how many calories she eats over the course of a few days and see what areas are the problems. I'd put everything into myfitnesspal or a similar app so you can have a check of how much protein/sugars/fats and carbs she is eating. There is no need for her to know you are doing it.

I don't think you need to talk to her. She will already know about healthy diets.

I'd also make it harder for her to access problem foods.

You mentioned she likes swimming but has gone as far as she can with lessons but that wouldn't rule out going swimming for fun. I think a lot of pools do family sessions.

I would say with exercise, don't make it about weight, because actually unless exercise is extremely energy demanding, it has very little to do with weight.

Instead you could speak about how being sedentary is just not good for us, and not how our bodies are made to be. Exercise helps us to have strong, healthy muscles, bones, heart, lungs and is actually necessary for our immune system and mood regulatory systems to function well.

There's something called advocacy inquiry which is a really useful approach to being honest and direct, but also gentle / non-confronting and open to the other's perspective.

So this might be

"I've noticed you don't really enjoy doing active things outside / didn't want to come for a walk with me when I offered / don't like to do sport XYZ / whatever it is. Why is that?"

Then once you've heard her out, you can explain your perspective. "I'm concerned you don't get enough exercise, because I know that our bodies need exercise to be healthy lifelong. It's my job to try and teach you healthy habits..." Etc etc whatever your agenda is.

Then you can work together on a problem solving approach. You could perhaps write down your ideas and her ideas, and she could choose what works for her. You make a plan together and then stick to it.

Broadly speaking, I find this is a great fallback / easy approach to resolving basically any matter of concern/difficulty with basically anyone, child or adult.

I think you’re handling this badly as she is no doubt confused. You think you’re protecting her feelings but she already feels fat and feels you scrutinise her food choices. Sometimes as a parent you need to have the hard conversations and do what’s best now, instead of putting it off.

Talk to your husband and tell him to stop buying sweets etc, this requires a household commitment. Neither of you know what the extent of the issue is. Visit the GP for advice - they can weigh your daughter. It could be she’s a normal weight, it could be she’s overweight and some intervention is required. The GP can advise on next steps, including if there’s nothing to do.

Just because she’s slightly big now, it doesn’t mean she won’t continue to get bigger, as she doesn’t know good habits yet. You only have to spend a few minutes on the weight loss threads here to see many obese adults struggled with their weight in childhood too.

I don’t think you need to give her a military style diet, but just tweak what she is eating especially considering she isn’t very active. In isolation having mayonnaise or butter isn’t a big deal, but maybe her overall portion size for that meal is too big. Your son can consume the same things without issue because he’s more active.

Maybe try only buying the low fat version of mayo, I think there is yogurt based one. Maybe lower fat butter and other spreads?

As she’s probably neurodivergent do you think there could be an element of sensory seeking in this and/or poor interoception effecting her hunger cues? We introduced more texture to she gets sensory feedback through her jaw and chewing gum and it’s helped us

Also another thing is to not insult her intelligence…you keep saying things like you’re surprised she thinks a certain way or says a certain thing as you don’t give her that impression at home.

She is at the age where she is completely absorbed in her peer group, pop culture, social media etc. The things you don’t teach her about directly, she will just pick up from other people, online, the media etc. She’s going to find out about common concepts like body shape and exercise so there’s no point skirting around it. She may as well learn it the right way from you.

She will learn from her environment eg when I was her age, I hated being active too. School was the only time I was active, so I was terrible at everything. I was slow when I ran and had poor hand-eye coordination. It’s lack of experience, not size. But at her age, she probably blames her size, seeing her slim friends and slim brother excel at sports. That’s possibly why you’re seeing hesitancy from her.

She buys her lunch at school

What does she buy? would it be possible to make a packed lunch (low fat yogurt, fruit/vege sticks etc), Cheaper for you too so win-win!

My autistic DD is a little older than yours but similar issues began at the same age. Stupidly, her dad made some 'helpful' remarks about healthy eating which brought home to her that she was gaining weight. It's been a hard slog since. Younger sibling, like your DD's, is also sporty and slim (and NT, which is a whole other layer).
I think DD food-stims, and definitely regulates using food ‐it's a sensory seeking behaviour, in DD's case very strong, hot, savoury foods. We eventually stopped having things which she'd help herself to in the house: if we had mayo, she'd be making ridiculously spicy chilli and garlic mayo on toast etc. So we don't keep mayo, and rarely buy bread, and if we do, I put it sliced in the freezer. We've dropped lots of carby meals as a family and don't have any savoury snacks, dips or sauces around, unless we make a small quantity for a meal. We just realised that she was so focused on her favourite flavours that it would be unfair to expect her to abstain, so we just removed that temptation. She still has treats, but it felt like the right thing, removing the choice essentially.
Best of luck!

It would be crazy to think its fine to allow a child to carry on putting on weight to just because they haven't reached adult height yet.

Exactly this. Fat children become fat adults, this is one of the problems this country is facing. She won't magically become thinner as she gets taller, she's likely just to stay overweight as she grows in height.
One thing that stood out to me was that she appears to have free range over what's in the fridge. My children are adults in their 30s but I have a ten year old grandchild. My children were never allowed to take anything at all from the fridge or cupboards without asking until they were around sixth form age and now I have the same rule for my grandchild when she's here. The fruit bowl was always full and they could take from that whenever they wanted.
So if you had the same rule that would stop her helping herself to all the mayo and butter.
You say she buys lunch at school. That could have a serious effect on her weight if she is eg having chips every day. Is she in primary or secondary school?
Re your husband buying sweets, that's fine, it's not fair to stop him, but if he buys things like that he has to eat them when she's in bed or not in front of her.
If she asks if she's fat don't lie and say her weight is fine, because it clearly isn't. You could talk about how people come in different shapes and sizes and that some lucky people can eat all sorts of food and not put on weight, but others are made in a different way so need to eat a bit more healthily and not have so many treats to stay a normal weight.
I wouldn't cut out crisps, sweets etc entirely because she'll only buy them behind your back. Just have them at weekends and do the same for all your children so she doesn't feel left out.
It must be hard for her and you because you don't want to start her off on an obsession with weight that so many women have. But it's good you've recognised that she is overweight so that you can make changes now to help her before she grows into a fat adult.

Sorry very late and wrong thread. I asked for my comment to be removed

But certain foods are “bad”. I think it’s ok to acknowledge that.

You can tell her that a lot of it is puppy fat. That she is laying down fat to get through puberty and that her body will change quite dramatically over the next couple of years. And during that time it is important to be healthy and conscious of what you eat. Try to pack as much goodness into your body to help with these changes as possible etc etc.

I talk a lot about nutrition with my teen DD. She knows that doughnuts are bad, and chicken breast with broccoli is good. She’ll still eat the occasional doughnut if she craves one but would never eat one a day. She knows that if she eats a lot of crap that her skin will look awful and she’ll feel sluggish. When she eats well her skin glows and she has more energy.

It is your job to teach your DD about food and the effects it has on our bodies. Not just in terms of weight but also our skin, teeth, brain function, gut health. Puberty is a terribly confusing time, arm her with knowledge.

I wouldn’t talk about it at all. She doesn’t seem receptive - she’s obviously aware she’s overweight and unhappy about it. I’d change the food available to her - at home at least - and make sure you serve up her meals so there’s a good mix of protein and healthy fats to keep her full and small serve of carbs. Whatever you know she’s eating that is calorific and unnecessary can go. Bring in more healthy options. And I’d encourage some exercise. Everyone should do at least 30 mins a day, Talking around healthy options and skin and teeth are all hiding the fact poorly. She knows and you know the conversation is about weight. It’s not going to ruin her self esteem to be told she’s not at a healthy weight right now.

I know you probably don't like the phrase 'puppy fat' but that's likely what your daughter has.

Many pre pubescent boys and girls pack on a few pounds. As she grows, she'll look slimmer.

She needs to develop an exercise habit though. Could the two of you go for a walk together every evening?

I agree with PP’s that she might be due a growth spurt but also girls put on weight during puberty before their periods start. I would take a wait and see approach until her periods start - if she’s well developed that could be soon.

In the meantime, when she comments on her weight, ask leading questions about what she could change in her diet to help maintain a healthy weight. I wouldn’t put her on a diet though but perhaps she needs to cut out crisps for a while and look at healthy quantities of butter and mayo and whatever else you think is contributing (I’m totally with you on not using processed margarine and low fat mayo’s).

This. DD loves making things like chilli oil and curries. The heat is the dopamine/sensory hit she needs. ADHD girls especially need careful handling around food. They want the hit but feel the rejection if you criticise. It's a delicate balance.

There's a LOT of 'what is your body telling you?' here.

On exercise, martial arts are good. ADHD girl in this house loves risky, individual sports. No team and/or boring ones. So skating, climbing, martial arts. Risk makes it interesting.