To feel depressed that exW took DSSs to Miami

[Bonsoir]

for a fortnight at Christmas and for them to have come back having gained a huge new Abercrombie & Fitch wardrobe and 4kgs apiece?

You know what Bonsoir

First of all, there is a growing rate of obesity among French children.
Second, the majority is, indeed, slim, but that, IMO, is down to the fact that they are fed healthy food in schools and that there is a proper mealtime at home where they sit down, have dinner and dessert etc. instead of munching on crisps in-between meals.
So there doesn't really seem to be a need to make your kid obsess about their weight, generally speaking, of course.

Touched a nerve, did I, macdoodle?

But Bonsoir you have barely mentioned health in relation to weight until now - you haven't said that he is unhealthily overweight, and since you refuse to say how tall he is we can't tell.

Do you consider BMI to be a good indicator of an 'appropriate weight' (within its limits, of course)?

And, Bonsoir, your DSs will have an eating disorder if you and your DP will make them obsess about their weight.
Not because they gained 4 kg, which they will most probably loose naturally over few weeks(oh, wait, they won't, because they will have to have weekly weigh-ins and will be subjected to a diet of haricots verts and salade).
Bonkers.

"the big difference between France and the UK is that in France teaching your children to eat reasonably and healthily and to maintain an appropriate weight is generally viewed as a mainstream parenting responsibility, along with teeth brushing, washing, saying Bonjour and Au Revoir whereas in the UK parents are supposed to do a sort of unconcious crossing of fingers and hoping for the best when it comes to nutritional education and maintaining a health weight"

Eh? Really? You're making it up!

It's pretty mainstream to ensure your kids eat healthily, brush their teeth and do the Ps and Qs thing here too. Don't know where you get the crossing fingers thing from, a quick read of MN threads ought to have disabused you of that notion,.

I don't feel the need to post all the details, and it doesn't matter what weight you are to start with - unless you are very underweight, which was not either DSSs' case - 4kg in 2 weeks implies eating far too much junk. DSS2 is a very unhealthy weight right now, and very sad about that. DSS1 self-regulates more easily (and does more sport) than DSS1, but that doesn't change the fact that he has gorged on Dunkin Donuts and other crap for a fortnight which is just bad for him.

Bonsoir - "I think the big difference between France and the UK is that in France teaching your children to eat reasonably and healthily and to maintain an appropriate weight is generally viewed as a mainstream parenting responsibility"

But isn't your DP's ex-W French?? And wasn't it she who plied your DSS's with all this bad food?

I agree that it IS a parental responsibility to teach your children healthy eating habits, but to basically punish and humiliate them for enjoying themselves with their mother for 2 weeks seems wrong to me.

Has it crossed your mind that they were simply enjoying the fact that every mouthful they ate was not being monitored and assessed? Perhaps a less controlling environment in your house would help them make better choices and not go overboard once away from the controlling influence?

How would you react if this was your teenage daughter, and your DP insited on weighing her weekly? Do you think your daughter will be comfortable with that?

We are not remotely controlling in this household over food - DP exW provides a régime of restaurants alternated with extreme dieting which is much tougher for the DSSs to manage than our normal, regular, balanced meals.

I could right a thesis on unravelling the British taboos on food and weight. And a thesis on the French taboo about academic selection - but that's another thread!

write

So what counts as unhealthy? BMI over 25 is the medically-approved definition...

Children and teens have a different healthy BMI scale to adults. Not the same at all.

Has a doctor said he is clinically overweight?

We obviously haven't had time to go to the doctor but without a shadow of doubt the doctor would stick him on a diet pronto.

AFAUK Bonsoir lives in Paris and is therefore culturally conditioned to view any weight-gain as SINFUL

We talk about being a healthy weight in this house. My DCs know about a balanced meal/diet and they are now learning to control their own portion sizes.

You must be disappointed that the boys failed to put into practice a lot of what you've been teaching them.

Never mind. Now you will be able to teach them how to diet correctly. The only problem is that they may not retain that information either.

The little one will however remember his feeling of misery. Be careful. Although this thread has had its outrageous moments, surely Bonsoir you can see that feeling guilty about his excessive weight gain is not good. Give him lots of cuddles and blow raspberries on his tummy and don't encourage him (subliminally or otherwise) to be resentful of his mother.

thedolly - he is 12 and would be totally and utterly destroyed if anyone blowed raspberries on his tummy.

DSS2 was very apprehensive about this trip and asked DP for a special tête-à-tête the day before the holiday to discuss it... but of course, a 12 year old is pretty powerless when alone with his mother who he desperately wants to please and whose attention he is crying out for...

One thing confuses me here, Bonsoir - it was only two weeks with his mother and 4kgs? (which is significant but for a teenager not impossible to shift quickly).

If the DSS live with you and your DP on a 50% basis, and you and DP teach them to eat normal, balanced meals, and the EX-W puts them on extreme diets half her time with them, how can they even be close to having a weight problem - even with additional 4kgs, it it did tip them over some arbitrary line, it would not be like they were morbidly obese as a result.

I really think your DP's reaction is extreme, even for a french man, and I suspect, as an earlier poster said, it is more about his image, than any care or concern for his sons.

Don't be confused - your information is very incomplete. Read the thread - I'm bored with repeating myself.

If your DR would put a growing CHILD on a diet, let me give you the name of our very good French paediatrician (and yes, teenagers go to him on a regular basis from what I see) who would recoil at the thought - he would suggest strategies for maintaining weight - but NOT reducing weight of a child - unless morbidly obese (and I take it that they are not). We obviously live in very different parts of Paris!

LOL I know a 20 month old baby whose paed has put her on a diet.

Deep down I think you don't want to be a step-mother

I really don't understand how weight is interesting enough to be the focus of so much attention in France.