HV rant - my toddler is 'overweight'

[sleepcrisis]

Well clearly he's not, he looks totally normal to me and any sane person. My HV on the other hand is massive.

DS was born on 25th centile for both weight and height. His height has remained steady on the 25th but as soon as he started putting on weight it crept up to bang in the middle of 50-75 centiles at 6 months and has stayed there ever since.

HV at his 2 year check this week told me that such a discrepancy must be monitored and that I should cut down his sugar intake.

The boy has a massive head (99 centile) and always has. Surely that weighs a fair bit?

I have found myself doubting his diet! He does eat a huge amount of fruit, fresh and dried. HV commented on sugar content of fruit. HE also has a Ellas kitchen cereal bar every day or so. She was scathing. Other than that he loads of veg and a balanced diet with portion sizes roughly 1/4-1/3 and adult size ( I have in the past wondered if he eats enough but never forced him to eat more)

When I have a cake or an ice cream (probably every other day) he shares it with me but rarely has his own. Although he likes to think it is his own - I just make sure I eat 3/4 of it! SHould I cut this out? He clearly does have a sweet tooth but he very rarely has biscuits (toddler group only), never juice, never sweets. The HV was banging on about sugar and sweeties and biscuits etc - he never has them!

Am I in denial about DS's diet and should I be more concerned than I am?

Oh and the other thing she critisized was that he eats little and often - for example he has a barely there breakfast but then 2 morning snacks at 930 and 11. (a banana and then later a box raisins or more fruit). She told me to cut out all snacks and just give him 3 meals a day.

Disclaimer: I was on here about a month ago listing his food intake and questioning whether he eats enough. Clearly I was wrong about that.

I thought the reason they advised switching from full fat to semi skimmed milk is because semi skimmed has more vitamins and nutrients in it?

In terms of calcium ss has 122mg per 100ml and ff has 120mg according to the bottles in my fridge. Not too worried about that.....

The sugar in milk is lactose. It's not added??

Look- I was just clarifying official advice. Which is based on 1,000's of peer-reviewed studies on 100,000's of people. The advice is the best information we have to guide good choices and you are of course at liberty to ignore it and make up your own opinion based on what you have read on Google (which someone referred me to earlier).

My view is based on science and the latest science at that.

I am not saying there aren't good fats in milk. I'm saying that you can cut down the 'bad' saturated fats and some calories, which cumulatively add up, by swapping to semi-skimmed milk from the age of two. And you retain the good minerals like calcium.

There are of course bigger issues with children's diets, which I'm sure are obvious and others have mentioned.

Hi crackers. I'm not having a go at you, honest. I think the older I get the more official "guidance" changes. Complete 180 turns.

I am a boring geek that reads a lot. There is a lot of science emerging about fats/good fats. Have a look.

Who knows - in 20 years time we might all be told coke is good for us....

Ooh... I'm not taking it personally!

I just want to reassure you that I am very well aware of the latest science. It's my job

The only convincing link between sugar and weight which is relatively new in terms of several large, good-quality studies is for sugar-sweetened drinks. And I say new in terms of now having confidence in the results.

Advice changes because evidence gathers over time until we can be more certain of the effects of not following it/following it.

Whilst it may be tiring and confusing that advice changes over time, that is not an excuse for ambivalence and we should do our best with what we know. That last bit is obviously my opinion.

You sound like you have an interesting job, crackers!

One of my issues with official guidance is that it is too slow to react. A lot of the current advice is still based on (flawed) studies from 30 years ago.

Want to come round for a nice cup of tea (with full fat milk) and a debate?! I am too boring for everyone else

Maybe silverfox's DH can come too... Strawberries and cream for dessert...

Its not about google crackers but what works for my own weight management , no-one in my house is overweight (unlike the people in the office who religiously use skimmed). And of course the biggest issue with ff milk being that it tastes gross in tea......

Or full fat greek yoghurt, yum

Low fat cheese isn't cheese

I'm surprised the advice is to.give low fat cheese to toddlers tbh. Even if it is current advice I will be ignoring that one! DS only has SS milk because that's what the rest of us drink - not buying 2 kinds of milk.

Sugary shit cereals, artificial sweetners and other crap does not enter the house though.

Full fat Greek yoghurt really would taste gross in tea

Its a much better breakfast with some chopped fruit...

what's your job crackers, sounds interesting. I've seen some recent papers about low carb diets, not sure they made it to publication though.

Will be interesting to see what happens to advice over the next couple of decades, if it changes away from the low fat/high carb thinking at the moment.

Actually, once you get re used to it, ff milk is ok in tea I am old enough to remember when there wasn't a choice - you just use less of it.

Crackers, how can semi skimmed milk contain all the goodness of full fat milk if it contains 50% less of vitamins A, D etc?

Full fat milk tastes gross in anything!

There again I would be happy if DS would entertain drinking any sort of milk, he hasn't touched a drop since 18 months!

I'm not sure who said grazing is unhealthy and a uk/us thing but this is not true. Three square meals a dy is a relatively modern thing. It's not necessarily compatible with kids who from birth are better off grazing or feeding frequently and not ha kg blood sugar crashes and going hours without. Yes popcorn at the cinema and sweet crap is a new snack trend but kids need to eat when they feel hungry and self regulate no be forced to sit and eat what's on a plate three times a day. That's how tummies get stretched and people can end up bypassing the full feeling ending up overweight. I let my kids eat healthy food when they feel like it and meals too which they can leave se of if they choose.

full fat milk is 96% fat free and since the cream is where the Vit D is, which helps you to metabolise the calcium, you may as well drink water if you drink skimmed. Unless you are a very outdoorsy person and are getting enough vit d from the sun (which most of us aren't) you won't be absorbing much of the calcium from skimmed milk. Semi-skimmed just sounds like people can't make their mind up.

If by "relatively modern" you mean post settled agriculture phase (ie in the last 15,000 years) as opposed to when we hunted and gathered, then I sort of agree with you, although the grazing in hunter gatherer societies only really applied to fruit and veg and easy to find stuff, not to meat and fish which as a precious resource was/is a far more ritualised sharing occasion. Mealtimes have been part of human culture since the dawn of time- they are a symbol of our peaceful coexistence and cooperation over obtention of food.

Socially yes but as far as bodies are concerned especially with children it's not necesarily the same. Breakfast for example the choices most kids have are really limited to sugary or carbs. My kids don't do breakfast unless its fruit yoghurt or proteins type. A long as snacks are nutritious and treated like fuel I think they are essential,

the problem is a lot of people use 'grazing' to justify over eating - they still have 3 meals and then just 'graze' between the meals. I would imagine very few people actually eat LITTLE and often!

Crackers the issue with low fat dairy is that it has far lower amounts of the fat soluble vitamins.

Full-fat dairy is really not the problem. Sugar is the problem.

Do you eat low-fat cheese? It is not cheese. Apart from which it limits you to cheddar and possible mozzarella which isn't exactly exciting.

Sleepcrisis: I was suggesting smoothies as an easy way of staying hydrated and having fresh fruit. They are not the same, in that from the fibre intake pov fresh fruit is better but occasional smoothies are fine.

robot I've always eaten a low ish carb diet naturally. Its only when I've got married to DH that I've eaten more, and guess what, I've put weight on.

brett when you said you've been putting ff in your tea, I thought you meant formula

cracker according to the Healthy start website children between 2 and 5 years can drink full fat or semi skimmed but not 1 percent as they don't provide enough calories. So there is a difference between should and can.

Sirzy, I agree with you. Grazing is not an ideal eating pattern for most kids. While kids can be whiny when they get hungry, at the extreme of the spectrum, children who have only one meal a day manage. I have seen it. It is not ideal, but when they are going to get their food they can sit quietly and wait for it even though they are very hungry and have been for hours. It all depends on what they are used to. So gradually reducing snacks will mean they can tolerate hunger better, and eat better at mealtimes.