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)

It's very hard in our society, they are just bombarded with advertising. I don't think you should tell her she is overweight at all. It will hurt too deep. Tell her she is gorgeous repeatedly.

Explore small changes, and play the long game. Swap white pasta for brown, maybe porridge for breakfast (fills you for longer). I wouldn't ban foods, because it makes them too appealing. Use teeth as a reason to cut down on sugar, that's a much more neutral area.

Things like fun swimming are really good for strength and fitness. It doesn't all have to be organised sport.

You can get 'lighter' butter and mayo. Stop buying the crap. If its not there to eat she won't eat it.

As sweet stuff seems to be her downfall (as it is for many of us!!) could you re-frame it as sugar being really bad for her teeth?

Wise words. Thank you!

Yes she’s almost certainly dyspraxic too. Could never really use a scooter. Struggled with climbing. (Plus has vertigo). Still struggles getting on and off escalators!

But some food in excess will make our bodies store fat, this is a scientific fact, why create such a taboo?

Next time she comments on her stomach (or clothes being tight etc) why not be factual: the body is a machine, it will store fat if it receives too many calories compared to what it consumes or too many of a certain type of nutrients.

Then illustrate with examples: on average a girl your age needs x calories a day.
Some food such as cucumber sticks are so low in calories that you can have as many as you like without making a difference. Mars bar however has x calories: doesn’t mean we don’t eat those, just not every day, just that we need to be conscious that it has an impact.

I think she’s understanding more as she gets older. We’re talking about ADHD and sugar (the dopamine hit and also how it exacerbates ADHD symptoms). She is a very selective listener though. It’s hard to explain, but it’s like she doesn’t hear a lot of what you say to her (very frustrating for us!).

we’ve also talked about sugar being ‘addictive’, UPF not being real food and not nourishing you.

But even though she knows these things it doesn’t actually help her attitude towards certain types of food

You don't talk about the diet - but you don't let her take more from the fridge or cupboards - so what if she gets upset and cross - that's what parenting is about - keeping firm when they kick off

I don't know how to change what she eats without essentially sending her the message that she's fat and or that certain foods are 'bad' (both things that lead to longer term issues)

Don’t mention her weight in relation to her appearance. Talk about feeding our bodies the foods they need in the right amounts. Tell her that bodies that get those foods are happy and healthy bodies. If she mentions her weight, don’t agree with her that she’s fat, simply say that bodies that are given the right amounts of the right foods will be at the right weight.

Then move on to the food industry. Explain how our bodies naturally crave sugar and salt and briefly talk about why (ie from thousands of years ago). Then explain how the food industry uses those natural cravings to trick us into eating foods that aren’t so good, or are over-processed, or tricks us into eating more of those foods than our bodies needs. Pringles is the obvious example for this but you could pick others. This will help her look at her food craving objectively. Help her think of ways to thwart the food industry, eg not buying such foods in the first place.

Then talk about all the foods our bodies need, like veg, etc. If you focus on healthy and happy bodies, and explain why we’re driven to overeat certain foods, you’re helping her take charge. Make it easier for her by not buying the really tempting foods in the first place.

Some of this seems quite extreme. There is absolutely nothing wrong with eating potatoes eg baked potato with beans, some cheese and salad is a perfectly healthy meal. Mashed potato and things like wedges or oven chips are fine if they're home made. Agree about treats being occasional eg once a week, but it is fine to eat crisps, chocolate etc as a treat, don't need to be banned. It would also be fine to eat a plain biscuit every day for example.

Hi there OP - feeling all your pain. I was a slightly overweight child of a mother with food issues and her handling of it all triggered an eating disorder, and wrecked my mental health and relationship with food for years - so applause for trying to navigate this in a way that is sensitive and positive. It’s all very tricky to navigate.

I just had one suggestion re exercise - I was similarly unkeen/inactive. But a teacher at school started a yoga club and I bloody loved it. No stressy coordination required, or competition. I got really into it, and still keen 20 years on. I found good for focus and mental health also (tho not ND myself so not sure if beneficial in that sense for those that are). Good luck with it all.

I’m laughing at the mayo obsession on this thread - ‘where did she get the idea for mayo being an extra on the table’ 🤣🤣🤣🤣

OP I’d let it play out, focus on what foods make us feel good - what food is good for our muscles, what’s good for our brain power, for our eye sight, for our skin?

Are there any local charity 5ks or walks to get involved in? We did these growing up and my dad would make a thing of ‘training like athletes’ - going on practice walks and seeing if you can speed run for 60 seconds, who can do some pushups in the living room before collapsing in a heap? I always found it funny but looking back it was definitely aimed at helping me be less of a porker 😆 I was still allowed a slice of garlic bread with my spag Bol, and a bag of chips (with mayo!!!) on a Saturday.

Our DS is 12 and his food issues are entirely different but he does have ADHD and to combat portion size we measure it out - he will put about half a jar of mayonnaise (this is not an exaggeration, I wish!) on anything he can so we have told him there are mayonnaise foods and non-mayonnaise foods and yes we are mean parents. We would usually measure him out a portion when we're having chips (and it's the lighter stuff).
Both DCs went through bottles and bottles of milk and blackcurrant so DH bought some cheap fruit shoots from Aldi and now refills them all every couple of days, and we get milk from the milkman (we do also have some smaller milk bottle style glass bottles - I think for wedding place settings - which we used when they were younger, but now they are a bit older we feel half a regular pint is OK on cereal, half a two litre bottle is obviously not!).

I divide up any snack bags that come in to the house e.g. when I get mixed nuts and raisins I have them as my snack but I divide the whole thing into pots.

oh..... you really do not want to do this. ED can be so easily triggered. This would be so difficult for a child with slightly controlling tendencies. 11 year old who has a bit of extra weight does not ned to diet.
Growth spurt around the corner, wait for it.

Hmm. What sort of genetics does she have? I only ask as one side of my family was slim as children and struggled to keep the weight off as adults and are mainly overweight, and the other side is just sort of well built, sturdy but not fat or overweight, but were regarded as chubby as kids. Might it be that she’ll be fine in the long run and not making a massive thing of it now is an ok policy?

This is such a minefield and so difficult to navigate. I was overweight as a child and remember saying similar things to your daughter.

I think there's been some good advice here re what to say when she says am I fat. I think if you come it from an angle of do you feel uncomfortable in your body? And let the conversation go from there. Then you can talk on a practical honest way about nutrition rather than weight. You don't want to say yes and trigger an ED but equally saying no will confuse her and I felt like I never had an honest or true image of my body.

You could definitely swap the mayo which really tots up the calories to a low fat option and things like chocolate get a freddo or a Cadbury's little bar so that even if she has 2, the calories are low. I'd make as many swaps as possible that she wouldn't know about - fry light for example rather than cooking with lots of oil and butter, low carb noodles, cous cous etc

Very very difficult to navigate though so can appreciate why you are unsure how to approach and want to tread carefully

People get issues over weight if they are told/nagged about weight not aren't successful in losing it.

I suspect your mum told you were overweight but didn't really stick properly to a change in diet/exercise to ensure you returned to being a healthy weight. So then it became a constant issue, you're fat, you know you're fat but feel can't lose weight.

Make sure she does. Just don't buy unhealthy things. Send a healthy packed lunch. Crisps are really unhealthy and bad for your teeth - never mind splitting bags into two portions just dont eat them at all. Lead by example and eat healthily yourself.

At 11 I was already aware of what my body looked like and was critical of it. I don’t think you do your DD any favours by pretending she’s not overweight. I like your approach of focusing on how she feels about her body rather than shaming it.
If your DD opens up and says that she’s unhappy with her weight then I would offer to take her to a dietician to come up with an eating plan.

OP I get you. I don't think many of the posters understand what it's like to have a child that is so persistent in their drive for sweets / carbs / dopamine food.

I have a child same age who sounds very similar, also ND. Craves carbs and sugar and only picks at meat / protein. Left to his own devices he'd pour half a bottle of syrup onto his porridge and eat bread for every meal. For him to eat perfectly I'd have to make sure there was nothing in the house with any sugar or fat in whatsoever. He will eat peanut butter by the ladleful, and even the other day ate fruit chutney on toast (we don't buy jam or honey as it all disappears). He expects pudding daily. The school food he chooses at secondary is not healthy and portions are much larger than at primary too which doesn't help. He likes sport, but trying to get a child into a regular and frequent sports club if they aren't good enough to make the team is basically impossible at his age, and the sports put on by his school are massively oversubscribed.

My philosophy is that I try not to sweat it - he's not dangerously overweight so we try to do healthy, balanced meals most days, and then we do allow treats, sauces etc but they aren't an everyday thing. I'd say his diet is better than his peers' in many ways. We encourage physical activity when we can, but equally if he's knackered we don't force it.

I would have to become so unbelievably controlling and hypervigilant to have him eat the ideal diet and portion sizes that I have to pick my battles. I don't want food to become a fight. I want him to enjoy food, have a healthy relationship with it and learn how to prepare and cook decent meals. And just give him some autonomy. This is a long game and one day we won't be there to control their every move.

I don't know why people tiptoe around this so much.
I talk to my dc in factual terms and tell them that certain foods are unhealthy and they'll put on extra weight or rot their teeth if they're not careful about what they eat.
I never make them feel bad about their weight (and they do go up and down but are generally a good weight) but they know if they're not careful with bread, oily and sugary foods, then they'll put on weight.
It's just a fact.
Just like if they eat haribos freely, they'll damage their teeth.
In order to stay healthy, they know to limit snacking, fill up on healthy food and it's fine to feel hungry before meals.

My daughter was a bit overweight at 11 when starting senior school. She shot up really quickly and by year 10 I was buying her school skirts 2 or 3 sizes smaller than in year 7. She’s 19 nearly now and a size 6/8.

if she started to put on a lot of weight I would tell her. I’ve never tip tied around this though. When she was bigger I chatted to her about unhealthy foods and how certain foods make you fat.

Focus on being strong and healthy as a family.

Obviously her calorie intake is too much and she’s not moving enough so workout how you can give smaller portions (more veg?) and move more.

Show her the way. Do things to distract from food focus and 'food as a problem'. Find things that interest her and get her involved in them. What does she have a leaning towards, besides food? Is she artistic? Nature and astronomy? Plants, flowers, gardening? Animals? Does she like making things or fixing things? Would she like to learn to sew or knit or embroider or crochet? Sing or play an instrument? Play games, which could be anything from chess to cards, jigsaws to crosswords or number games? Anything that's absorbing and requires concentration and gives a sense of satisfaction or achievement takes up the space in one's head that might otherwise be spent worrying about weight or body or craving sweet food.

Active pursuits? Could you go to a yoga class and take her with you? Or if there isn't a class nearby, could you start doing yoga at home with her? The stretching and bending should have some positive benefits for body condition and shape and perhaps help with the body problem. Is there a gym? Might she take up kickboxing or some physical training in the line of body conditioning at the gym?

Unpopular opinion but I think you should tell her the truth and take her to a nutritionist so that they can explain the relationship between food and weight. If we don’t want to get burned we should be careful around fire and if we don’t want to be overweight we should be careful with what we eat. These are just some realities of life.

A difficult one. Has she gone through puberty? This will of course change her shape. I am caterer and advise on diet and health. All I would suggest for now is to make meals heavy in vegetables and legumes and avoid ultra processed food.