Childhood obesity

[Unopenedpackofmenssocks]

New report lists 9 areas of England where the majority of children will be overweight or obese by 2035.

It’s got me thinking about what causes childhood obesity. I have an 8 year-old who doesn’t like football, can’t ride a bike, never took to his scooter. spends a lot of time on a screen at home. Has does run about at school playtime and PE lessons and he likes climbing so goes to a class once a week for an hour.

He has an incredibly sweet tooth. I don’t allow unlimited desserts/sweets but I know for a fact we are much more liberal than many of his friends’ parents. The only things we are strict on are no fizzy drinks, Haribo type sweets maybe once a week, and no sugary cereal.

But he has something chocolate after every dinner and also when he gets in from school. Breakfast is a toasted fruit tea cake dripping in butter. He steals honey and Nutella from the cupboard when he thinks we aren’t looking.

We drive to school. We don’t go on family walks and our favourite joint family activity is watching Saturday night TV together. Our garden only has a small patch of lawn 2mx 4m and he has no siblings so doesn’t naturally run about playing at home.

He eats limited vegetables and his favourite foods are nuggets and pizza. He eats pasta with tomato sauce and cheese every single day at school lunch, won’t touch anything else. He has never eaten large portions though. We have no issue with McDonalds/fast food in general but he’s not a huge fan, maybe eat it once a month. Subway usually.

He is very slim and his teeth have no decay (was last at dentist 2 weeks ago).

My husband and I are both overweight BMI, on the brink of obese, but we were both naturally slim as kids too. I imagine it will catch up with our son when he is an adult, or maybe even sooner. (We all need to make changes and will work on that).

What we most definitely are is financially and socially privileged.

My question is this - these areas where obesity is running rampant are low-income and socially deprived. So what are the other factors caused by social/economic deprivation that mean these kids are obese but mine is not? Or are we literally just a very lucky exception?

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2025/jun/23/majority-children-overweight-obese-nine-areas-england-by-2035-study?CMP=ShareiOSAppOther

Kids don't need chocolate twice a day or even everyday.
Nuggets and pizza can be so easily avoided.

When I pass the local primary school, despite the majority of families living within a 5-10 min walk away, the street lines up with cars.

I get the time-poor argument, I've had phases where I struggled... but that loses its edge when it's the cars parked up 30 mins in advance. And there is abundant car parking across the road within a 2 minute walk.

While I don't miss loitering on the playground, I do miss those bursts of functional walking.

I calculated in lockdown that I lost 5 miles a week of functional walking here and there (often at a brisk pace). That was a contribution to my lockdown weight gains as that was a 400-500 calorie burn reduction through the week, and it's not as simple as adding in an extra 5 mile run/ walk to the existing exercise load. Also frequent bursts of movement are more valuable to the body's metabolism for general health than intentional blocks of movement/ exercise to catch up.

To eat well you need to know how
you need money for a decent freezer for frozen veg and the like
I even so calorie for calorie it cost more to eat well
mince the junk diet has started weight gain seems inevitable

when you are poor you are more likely to be very stressed meaning you have less brain power to spend on cooking or saying no - people only have so much they can give . It’s not a moral failing on their part , it’s a moral failing of society that people can’t make enough money form a decent job to enable them to focus on healthy living

Disagree with this, mostly. As I said, poor immigrants have none of these. They arent even eligible for benefits for the first five years. They eat better than many wealthy British people. Because they don't eat processed food.

His breakfast is rubbish. You say you are far more liberal with sweets than other parents you know. Stop buying Nutella so there isn’t any in the house to munch on secretly. Stop giving him junk, you introduced it early on in his life and now he thinks it is a normal part of one’s diet. Why does he need a chocolatey treat every day? He will eat what you give him.

I live just over the border from one of the deprived areas mentioned in the Guardian article where obese children are expected to be the majority. My guess is it’s very much poverty driven as it’s one of the poorest boroughs in the country. It’s also a majority South Asian population with poor health outcomes relative to the wider population. Easy access to fast food, less good access to fresh food, less income for clubs, activities etc.

There is a lot of views being expressed that nuggets and pizza can be avoided - and this would have been me until I had a very fussy child. I did everything ‘right’ and yet have really struggled with one of my children having a hugely selective diet. We don’t do squash or fizzy drinks, we chose to avoid ultra processed food as much as possible, if we’re having pizza we opt for home made etc but it’s been hard. Alongside I insist on eating fresh fruit and veg - but that’s limited to apples, cucumber, sweet corn and carrots for the fussy kid. My other child eats such a range in comparison! I have tried so hard!

I accidentally hid this thread yesterday, so have come back to a very large number of responses, of which about 5 or so understood what I was asking. It’s interesting though, as many of you have in fact exemplified the middle-class hysteria around the evils of “bad diet” while completely missing the point that those of us lucky enough to be middle class have very little idea quite how extreme the habits are around food and exercise in communities with high rates of childhood obesity. It’s not just putting butter on your morning toast guys.

Cultural acceptability of fizzy drinks, high proportion of UPF, normalisation of large portions, takeaways and constant snacking. Massive vats of popcorn and buckets of pick and mix on every outing.

My son’s getting the Taste the Difference goujons and the extra special sourdough pizza, not Birdseye and Dr Oetker. And I said that pizza and nuggets were his favourite foods, not that he eats them every day. His chocolate treats are a single chocolate digestive or a couple of segments of chocolate orange, not a Krispy Kreme and a double caramel billionaire adult-sized ice cream washed down with a coke. Our bread is always wholemeal and his posh school feeds him fresh fruit and vegetables at lunch (along with his pasta with cheese). He also has multiple structured PE lessons a week.

(Oh and to the person who recommended a book about French kids’ diets, they all have hot chocolate for breakfast and Nutella on white baguette after school, I know, I was an au pair in a very posh Parisian family.)

I genuinely don’t think most of us have a clue when we bang on about how easy it is to stay slim just by “cutting out the junk”. Tackling cultural causes is a delicate and complex thing, with extremely high propensity to offend and meet with hostility, especially when “tips” are offered by well meaning middle classes. You try speaking to the people in these low income communities the way you spoke to me…it’s not going to end well.

Well, if you are happy with your son's diet, carry on. Not sure what you want from this thread.

I literally just explained.

Your currently slim 8 year won't be pretty soon, no matter what your social and financial situation.

Feels like you're trying to make this a snooty thread, your kid is probably slim just because he has a fast metabolism not because of how much money you have.
I was completely broke till very recently and me and my kids lived in one room in a house share until recently none of them are fat. In fact the street I lived on was 90% house shares there was no "normalisation" of huge buckets of popcorn or any of the other stuff you describe.

The fattest kid I knew growing up (2000s not the dinosaur ages when only wealthy people could afford to eat enough to be fat) was from the rich side of town

If anything not being able to afford a car keeps one slim from having to walk absolutely everywhere and carry bags of shopping home

That’s anecdotal. The report I linked in the first post is based on statistics.

Id assume because they grew up eating and learning how to cook cheap nutritional meals by their wider family/community. Having a community there where is normally someone around to keep an eye on the kids and getting them to help with basic daily chores, helps them learn basic everyday life skills.

If you have always been fed quick and easy shove in an oven/microwave food by parents who are rarely around due to having work all the time to keep a roof over your head and they cannot afford to make something different because you may not eat it. That doesn't really give you a good basis for learning how to cook or any other life skill.

Maybe it's anecdotal but it's real life, you said you're rich and your child is at private school forgive me for assuming you probably don't mix much with broke people or even average people?

That's an assumption on my part so sorry if I'm wrong I do most of my socialising with people that live around me or other parents at my children's school so assuming you're similar.

But you can't just be pulling some statistics out the guardians ass to imply your child is magically safe from being fat because you have a lot in your bank account. Or implying the peasantry have a normalised culture of vats of popcorn and hostiley beating anyone who trys to give them healthy eating tips.

Idk maybe you mean well but it just feels a little insulting like poor people are too stupid to know eating a mound of sweets and gallons of cola will make them fat. Like I said I lived in a a house share basically a homeless shelter for families you don't get broker than that and everyone there knew eating too much junk food makes you fat. What people choose to do with that information is on them.
Your child is young I ate mounds of sweets at that age and was still scrawny some kids have really fast metabolisms and he is not protected from filling out in a couple of years just because of your bank account

Such an odd thread. OP, your child will be unhealthy at least on that diet in a few years. Being slim as a child is easy.

As is your “I was an au pair for a posh French family so know what they “all” eat”

I agree with you. I think OP wants to feel like her son’s diet is ok because any concerns around it are “middle class hysteria” and it’s not as bad as what some people with low incomes eat.

Parents over feeding kids portions they believe are correct. I have encountered this a couple of times. Just recently a morbidly obese women turned up to eat with her child who was so overweight she could barely walk. She piled the child’s plate with food from the carvery that would have fed 2 adults. The child was forced to eat the lot while looking like she wanted to throw up. She then proceeded to ask her if she wanted an ice cream. The child said so no. She went ahead and got the kid an ice cream and insisted she finish it. The mum had no idea on portion size. She seemed genuinely concerned she had not eaten enough.

This is a good point, I overlooked that part of the comment, as if an entire nation of 68 million people are all drinking hot chocolate for breakfast.😂 It's like when people say all Brits drink tea (I hate tea!!)

There is something really weirdly judgmental around this post. Like I feed my child expensive crap food so at least I’m not as bad as the proletariat.

I mean, well done. If your bar is comparing yourself to people who are surviving on less money, have less options and are living under stress.

Too many snacks amongst other things. Kids do not need as many snacks as they are given nowadays. Frankly, it’s important that kids learn and understand what hunger actually feels like. It’s an important part of health maintenance and helps to avoid developing a mindless eating habit or eating when its not actually needed by the body.

(Oh and to the person who recommended a book about French kids’ diets, they all have hot chocolate for breakfast and Nutella on white baguette after school, I know, I was an au pair in a very posh Parisian family.)

Healthy eating isn’t about one meal or one ingredient. The food culture in France is healthier. They appreciate quality ingredients and tend to eat less processed foods overall. They tend to snack less. They have smaller portion sizes. They value slow eating around a table, you can see this even in their crèche’s and schools. So despite the Nutella and the chocolate, they have healthier diets overall.

That was my point!

i.e. that “don’t buy Nutella” is a very simplistic answer.

So why are there so many fat children in the 9 areas listed in the article?