to ask why would you overfeed your child?

[ineedtoknowwhy]

I'm sure this question has been asked before but, please, can someone explain to me why would a parent overfeed an already obese child?

Every day when I drop my daughter off at nursery I see the same little girl being dropped off too. She is always on her buggy which suggest they live nearby so could potentially walk but never ever do. At pick ups is the same, straight from nursery into buggy. Her face is always covered in chocolate (at 8 in the morning!) and she is always holding some sort of biscuit or chocolate belly so big her shirts don't come below her belly button. I am not talking about a bit chubby, or with a bit of a belly.

I cannot help to think poor child whose mum is happy to keep feeding her biscuits, chocolates, etc. when the child is clearly not in a healthy weight.

I can't help but silently judge her in my head so please can someone explain reasons for this. If you are a mum with an overweight child, why would you do this?

That doesn’t mean she can’t make her walk part of the journey or in fact a lot of it if she’s say 3+, I wasn’t driving til I had my second, oldest walked with me from the age of 2.5 to most places and never used a buggy at all once he turned 3. There’s sadly seriously obese kids all over the world with parents who just aren’t bothered about their kids weight and won’t even attempt to make them walk for exercise and give them chocolate morning noon and night and it’s nothing to do with medical reasons. Genes of course pay a huge part in some cases but these people still know their kids are obese and yet continue to enable it with allowing history to repeat itself by instilling their own bad habits into their kids 🥺

However you are being totally judgemental! You’ve no idea about the child’s circumstances. Just maybe the child has to take a medication and she’s given something sweet to get her to take it! There are many medical conditions which cause obesity in children! Why not make friends with the mother and they you can be nosy and find all this out, as after all you are itching to know!

You cannot educate idiots!

There's been a massive rise in obese kids for the same reason there's been a massive rise in obese adults - because giant food corporations (there's about 10 companies which produce 90% of all food products available in the UK) have been allowed to control the food environment - what's available, accessible, affordable and appealing. Obesity and diabetes have shot up across the world since the late 70s. It's not like willpower and parenting skills suddenly disappeared in every demographic globally at the same time. What changed wasn't the people, it was their food environments. Giant food companies took over the world's food supply and have poured a lot of money and research into making their products addictive with long shelf life as cheaply as possible. Diet related disease now kills more people than smoking. And the companies have used the same tactics. The tobacco companies used to say in the 80s and 90s that it was all about individual choice, nothing to do with their marketing or specially designed products. Just like the food companies say now.

Kids are hooked on sugar as babies now with pouches - they just did a Panorama on it - and breakfast cereal and sugary yogurts with cartoon characters all over them. Even innocent smoothies have almost as much free sugar as a can of coke!

Sorry if it has already been mentioned, I haven't read the whole thread, but as well as food and health illiteracy, economics and fat blindness, there is also love. My granny was a feeder and food was used to show love, to comfort, to celebrate with, just about a way to fill or enhance every emotional need. As an adult, I struggle not to eat when I am down or to rush out and buy a ton of sweet food to celebrate the fact that it is Friday! When myself and DH got together I put on a stone overnight because we wallowed in sex and food in the honeymoon stage. We loved having a place of our own to cook in and we loved treating each other to takeaways and chocolate cake, making roasts on a Sunday, then lounging around reading the papers all day. I've done it with my own kids. They have never been overweight but do they do see food as an emotional crutch, a pattern of thought we are all trying to break.

When you don’t know the circumstances you cannot comment! How about like OP you wind your neck in! I work with children with additional needs and there are many conditions/medications that cause weight gain! So unless you know the circumstances I suggest you keep quiet like the OP!

Because the parent is too lazy to parent so just feeds her to shut her up

My son is overweight and on the 99th centile. He looks absolutely fine with his clothes on but not so much without. He is obese so I do look afresh at 8 year olds waddling around in men's clothes.

They are all obese. It's scary.

Ds has severe SEN and his stomach doesn't talk to his brain. It's a real issue but I want him alive still at 30 so he isn't going to mens clothes at 13. He's being monitored.

Mention diet and people around us get very upset so I can see how it is totally fine to let your 8 year old weigh ten stone

Some people have reference potential SEN as a reason for being morbidly obese with the connection being they may only eat certain foods.

Genuine question, how does this issue arise? I was never allowed “beige” food as a child. I never knew what I was missing out on because it was just never an option. Similarly, I know parents who do not allow their children any sugary drinks/ chocolates or sweets to save their teeth. Again, they won’t know what they are missing out on.

So how do some children with SEN end up only eating beige/ convenience foods?

Who goes to a petrol station for fresh fruit and veg and meat or is it very rural where you are?

YANBU

It feels as if you want to bitch about this child and the family and this is the way to do it, with faux wide-eyed naïveté.

Sounds like defence of completely anonymous people disguised under "be kind". Although of course, not kind to OP who you're accusing of bitching.

The child isn't necessarily being "overfed". Even chubby kids need to eat. But it certainly sounds as if she's being given the wrong foods. That might be a lack of education in why the right nutrition is so important for young children - it might be a case of replicating what they were always given and what they eat now.

You accuse me of selectively choosing a couple of sentences out of context but apparently you ignoring what OP has said about this person; Her face is always covered in chocolate (at 8 in the morning!) and she is always holding some sort of biscuit or chocolate, is ok? "Sounds as if" and "isn't necessarily 'overfed'" also sounds a bit different from "clearly being fed the wrong things".

As PP said, it might be a misplaced way of showing love - that's really common.
As she gets older, the buggy won't be an option so presumably she'll be more active which might help

Yeah it might be, but the end result is the same - the child is overweight and unhealthy. Not to mention - "presumably" she'll be more active? Yeah maybe, who knows? Not really relevant is it, the conversation is about this child now and why her parent allows her to stuff her face with chocolate every morning.

As she's wearing clothing that is visibly too tight/too small, are there issues around money? Crap food is unfortunately often cheaper than nutritious options.

Ditto my comment above.

I'm going to ignore the obvious questions about SEN, but it is worth considering whether this may be a factor.

Why? You've pulled out every other possible reason this kid is fat and covered in chocolate everyday, why not offer up that one as well?

Better? I didn't address every single point in your previous post because I couldn't be arsed, but it's annoyed me that you've come back to your carefully crafted post that IMO hits every single reason for why this couldn't possibly be anyone's fault. At the end of the day, the parents have eyes, they can see their child is fat even if it's only in comparison with other children. And to not change habits like chocolate at breakfast time is obscene. IMO of course.

Once, years ago, I was living in my great-grandparent’s house out at our ranch when they hired a new man to help my dad. His family moved into the little house not far from the back of mine.
I wanted to be a good neighbour, so I bought a lovely fresh strawberry pie that was heaped high and beautifully glazed and walked back to say welcome to the neighborhood.
An older woman answered the door and invited me inside and there at the kitchen table sat an obese little girl - maybe 4 or 5, but terribly overweight. Grandma was fixing her afternoon snack - a tray full of chicken nuggets.
It was 4:30pm.
That little girl weighed as much as a girl twice her age, I’m sure of it. Even her forehead was fat, I’ll never forget it.
And I’ll bet grandma fed her out of love.
From that day on I took flowers as gifts everywhere I went.

It's abuse plain and simple, lazy parenting as adults we are the ones that decide what our children eat we buy it we feed them it's completely on us and I would be judging aswell .
The child may have a medical issue but feeding junk is just irresponsible when your child is already obese

Because they live in the real world as opposed to being kept in some artificially sealed bubble with no nursery, school, busy working parents, older siblings, relatives doing childcare, meals out, playdates, parties etc. to disturb their perfect ignorance?

I'm sure nursery would have something to say if she was going in every morning with a face full of chocolate and clothes that don't fit!!

Largely (no pun intended), 99% of the time , if a child is overweight, it's ultimately neglect which amounts to abuse. Sorry. If your kid is fat, it's normally your fault.

SEN children are morbidly obese and live off convenience foods because “they live in the real world as opposed to being kept in some artificially sealed bubble with no nursery, school, busy working parents, older siblings, relatives doing childcare, meals out, playdates, parties etc. to disturb their perfect ignorance”?

I went to nursery, school, play dates, had parents with their own businesses, had no other childcare support, siblings, meals out and most certainly attended parties, wedding, etc.

I was not obese. Neither were my siblings! In fact, one of my siblings has ADHD and is not and never has been obese. My cousin has autism, again, not obese. Every child is different, and I’m sure everyone with autism/ ADHD/ SEN has different needs etc but it cannot be used as an excuse for dangerous morbid obesity?

It was a genuine question. Call it ignorance if you want to but that achieves nothing. I just simply cannot understand how any parent, regardless of SEN or not, can feed their child chocolate for breakfast.

I genuinely had puppy fat aged 8_12 but soon slimmed off. I wasn't huge. I went dancing and horseriding and played outside actively. I was also only really chubby and wasn't over fed. We had healthy, home cooked meals. At school I can remember 2/3 girls in secondary who were significantly overweight. A couple a bit chubby. No boys were overweight as i remember . I went to a huge comprehensive in the leafy suburbs.

You asked how they knew what they were missing out on. Well, that's how.

Any sensible strategy for healthy eating cannot in most cases be based on keeping children entirely ignorant of the existence of sugary or highly processed foods. It's just not practical in the majority of cases. And no, that doesn't necessitate feeding anyone chocolate for breakfast 🙄.

I’m 44 and learned absolutely nothing of use or relevance for cooking at school (which was a very good comprehensive). We did have some classes, but they were few and far between, and were things like “design a meal for a diabetic”, or making cakes. I didn’t learn any relevant food skills that have stayed with me. All my cooking skills have come from my mum and self-interest, and now - with kids - a desire to ensure they eat a well balanced and healthy diet.

My mother enjoyed feeding me. She was seriously weird about it. Even when I was an adult, she would watch me eating, as if she was eating every mouthful with me. She didn’t eat much herself but she was always forcing food on other people.

I agree OP, it's not fair on the poor child.

At a soft play recently, my DM pointed out an obese boy of about 9, who was eating the biggest plate of chips. He then proceeded to drink a huge cup of Coke, and some crisps. 😖😳 OK, his food was probably a treat during the half term at the soft play, but it does make me really worry about the fact that theree are some children whose parents are very much feeding them junk almost every meal time.

The dad just sat on his phone most of the time, and the poor boy looked quite red in the face and out of breath running around after.😪

I work in a preschool that operates for 3 hours only. We have a snack half way through and children bring their own lunchbox. We have a healthy food policy so no sweets biscuits chocolate etc. It always shocks me how much food the children are given. Some have a piece of fruit, crackers, a yoghurt and some cheese, for example. I'd say that's about average. Some have a full sandwich/ bagel/wrap, plus yoghurt or a smoothie. These are 3 and 4 yr olds who have already had breakfast and are going home for lunch and are eating almost an adults lunch portion for a mid morning snack. The parents often show concern that a child isnt eating all their snack and query this with us, like they have a fear something terrible would happen if the child ate less. The parents are mostly slim and healthy weights and for some kids the food is healthy with lots of home made stuff or chopped up veg and protein etc, but the quantities are totally disproportionate.

This is exactly what I meant, you put it better than me.