had a letter to say dd is overweight

[steppemum]

dd1 is year 6. They were weighed in November and she has come back as overweight. I know she isn't skinny, but I was surprised when I put her details into the NHS site, that she is at the upper end of over weight.

She is dc2, and dc1 and 3 are both at the lower end of weight scale. Ds at times was underweight.
They all eat the same, we eat a home made middle of the road diet, plenty of fruit and veg. No fizzy drinks, only 1 juice allowed per day. No fancy sweet puddings during the week (we have nice pudding on sat/sun)

She does football once a week, and walks to and from school. In the warmer weather she is often out on her bike, playing outside, but it has been raining since september and wet, muddy and miserable.

I am at a bit of a loss as to know what to do. I can't get out and about with her 3 days a week as I am working, and it is dark when we get home. The week is pretty busy as it is, and she does a lot, but it isn't sports clubs (she plays in a brass band, does newspaper club at school, and scouts)

There is a part of me that is a bit philosophical, because in sept, when she goes to secondary, she will do a 10 minute cycle, train ride and then a 15 minute walk every morning, then reversed in the evening, and she will be doing plenty.

She has done the thing where she gets fatter, and then has a growth spurt and get thinner. But she is never really thin like the other two are.

jorah - you may be right, I have often wondered if she is hypermobile, her wrists are, and it would explain why running isn't comfortable.

chipped - school clubs are free, she does all the sports ones she wants to do - which is football.

penguins - lots of good ideas in there. Food wise we do about half of them.

with 2 skinny hungry kids it is hard to find the balance. eg tonight dd1 (who we are talking about) and dd2 (younger) both had a small portion of dinner. For dd1 that was enough, dd2 had seconds and thirds!

and I totally agree with you about not talking to her about it. I have always been careful to talk about all of us being more healthy, not about weight, or about her in particular.

so - ideas for breakfast please!

Breakfasts... I actually think this can be quite a challenge if you are trying to avoid sugary cereals, croissant type stuff or toast and jam/honey/chocolate spread etc that are so ubiquitous.

Does she like eggs in any shape or form? They can be a great option (though only half my kids eat them, grrrr).
Porridge is the best staple standby we've come up with that is cheap and reasonably quick to prepare. Sadly, only half my kids eat that (only one of whom also eats eggs! More grr).
Small portion of leftover dinner? Oath culture don't have 'breakfast foods' like we do. An NHS dietician once suggested to me to consider what foods my kids liked at other meals, and then save some of that and give it for breakfast. Worked when they were little.
Sometime I do pancakes (surprisingly quick to make), but my sugar fiend child then has to be closely supervised with respect of toppings. I'm not convinced it's the best option, but at least has some protein (egg), and I try to limit them to a small amount of high fruit content jam as topping.
Nuts can be good, one of mine has those and oatcakes sometimes if they are refusing eggs/porridge (yes, one hates both!!).

One of my few parenting regrets is that from weaning I didn't make porridge the single only breakfast option. Porridge or the highway. Oh for a time machine...

My DH has a thing about protein for breakfast with complex carbs, so he gets up early to make my lot things like:
a poached egg on toast
a bacon wrap
boiled egg with dippy soldiers
cheese on toast
or an omelette with peppers and mushrooms which everyone shares

I am not so good at getting around to cooking, so I would provide:
bran based cereals (bran flakes, All-bran, Shreddies)
Total Greek yoghurt with a little bit of honey and a sprinkle of muesli or fruit
Crusty bread with a slice of cheese or ham or both

[Given the choice, my DS2 would prefer Coco Pops which he discovered at Cub camp]

DD is happy to eat all of the above. She takes a piece of fruit for break (usually a banana now she has braces), usually has a hot wrap or pasta for lunch; maybe a cereal bar after school; family meal in the evening (no dessert). She has chocolate sometimes, so not as saintly as this might seem :)

Oh yes, my DH also makes porridge, but I loathe the stuff so I've clearly blocked it out on some level...........

Penguins my DH has fed them chilli wraps or chilli with rice on a number of occasions......
I make chilli pretty HOT - I'm surprised they wanted it at 7.15am...

she will eat porridge, but wants brown sugar on it (that was my mistake early on)

I may try to do banana porridge.

She keeps chickens, and loves eggs, so an egg on toast would work.

I am happy to try all of the above, but help me out here, why are some of those better than cheese on wholemeal bread? It has protein, and no sugar?

I think cheese probably has more fat. Though I may be talking out of my arse here...

bread is wholemeal.
cereal we have in the cupboard are:
asda brand shreddies (which are wholewheat)
weetabix
cornflakes
porridge

I would have thought that an egg and slice of cheese were roughly equivalent (both better than jam or nutella). The egg might have a bit more protein.

OK, another difficult point is after school snack.

they are hungry, dinner isn't til 6pm.

they need something to fill them up until dinner, which is healthy. At the moment it is cake/biscuit plus glass of milk. It is the one time in the day when they do get 'unhealthy' stuff, but it really fills the gap.
And I do want the girls to drink milk, it is important they take in calcium.

So, what do I give them instead? Fruit doesn't fill the gap here.

Banana?

An egg on toast with butter would provide protein but less fat than cheese which also contains protein.

Maybe try swapping say half the cheese breakfasts? They are better than most anyway and that way she won't notice so much or want them as can have every other day

I would also look at the sweet stuff. Juice, school desert, biscuit after school, jelly desert is a lot of sweet stuff in one day! Easily fixed by ditching juice ( do you know a glass of innocent smoothie has more sugar in than cola?), and ditching daily sweet snack. Do you all have a desert every day?

Sorry I did see what you say about fruit but bananas are different somehow

Ok I looked it up. 28g cheddar has over twice as much fat as one medium egg. I take your point, however re sugar.

Not very seasonal, but if you blend bananas and some other fruits then freeze it as lollies, it takes longer to eat and seems like a food rather than essentially a smoothie.

I will check in tomorrow as this is a very interesting thread, but off to bed now. Night!

I really don't like the year 6 weigh-in. So many girls are hitting puberty, they are all different shapes and sizes. Growth spurts come and go like mad.

I wanted to refuse my DDs, mainly because they talk about it afterwards and compare, and I don't think it's all that helpful for their self-esteem or as a measure. A friend of my DD was told she was overweight but was the first to hit puberty, had a completely different body shape to everyone else. They're in between a child and an adult but the chart they are plotted on doesn't acknowledge that.

I strongly object to kids being put on diets. My DS1 would get quite chubby, shoot up, get chubby, shoot up.

Kids need to eat during a growth spurt. I agree with stocking up on protein (I buy packs of chopped chicken and yogurts are freely available in the fridge).

I think they should measure them at the start of year 5 personally. Before it all starts to happen.

right, so the plan is:

swap some breakfasts for others eg egg on toast, porridge (no brown sugar!)

find alternative to after school snacks, or at least cut down, and add in eg fruit.

loose the juice.

look at alternative deserts.

re weigh her and see if the stats are correct.

Thank you for all your help guys. I am off to bed, but keep them coming!

Actually large amounts of dairy as an 'essential' calcium source is a myth. Marketing. There are loads of other sources (green veg, some nuts...) and some intake of other milk products (eg hard cheese/yogurt) can provide a surprising amount. No-one needs to drink cow's milk.

Snacks? Again, I would turn to oatcakes, nuts, plain nut butters (no added sugar) wholemeal crackers, boiled egg, fruit, veg sticks, sometimes scones (lower sugar than traditional cake). Serving cake/biscuits every day is not great, especially if a child is not doing daily sport to burn it off -also not 'filling', just junk calories, especially if shop-bought. It is normalised in our culture, however.

Caroline Walker Trust and First Steps Nutrition produce some handy resources on meal planning (often badged for schools), and recipes/photos of appropriate portion sizes.

good - in dds school the kids weren't told the results, and they didn't come home via school.

The results were posted to us from the community health person, and I think it is only posted to people who are a concern.

I agree about diets. The focus for us is healthy eating as a family, and that is a lifestyle thing.

Could try a tiny amount of maple syrup (the real no added refined sugar syrup type) or honey to give the sweet zing for porridge but for less actual sugar than brown sugar maybe? Depends how much she is adding though, a tiny amount won't hurt. There's not need to throw the baby out with the bath water!

From what you have said so far, I would say the things that might make the biggest difference are if she could do more physical activity (both routine walking and 30mins exercise 5x per week), reducing cakes/biscuits to far fewer times a week, and minimising drinks other than water. Hard to gauge whether portion size is relevant or not.

Looking at the picture, I really don't think you need to worry. Even if she is a bit bigger now, that's how kids grow. You can see when there's a problem, you don't need a government manufactured policy to tell you. Were you worried before the results? Probably not is my guess.

You sound like you know what you are doing and are making good choices for her. Please don't let this become a 'thing'. I wouldn't be worried. If she's healthy, happy, looks about the right size and shape, and her teeth aren't rotting - seems to me it's all fine!

Don't take away the after school milk, like you say it's very important.

There's some handy info here about calcium recommended intakes and sources. It is surprisingly easy to get the right amount from some cheese, yogurt, milk on cereal and/or other sources that have smaller amounts (e.g. Bread, green veg, nuts/beans etc). 30g cheddar alone contains almost a third of the daily calcium an 11yr old girl will need.

The other thing to consider if bone health is the concern, is vitamin d3 intake. This vitamin affects how the calcium is used in the body. Arguably everybody in the UK should be taking a vitamin D3 tablet daily from Oct-April. Unlike some other countries, UK milk doesn't have D3 added either.

What you eat isn't that great. Puddings, biscuits, sugary yogurts work out to be a lot of unhealthy treats daily. School dinners are often crap and really she only needs one main hot meal a day.

Can everyone take lunches in three days a week plus school dinners twice?

Also healthy snacks on getting home.

Being slim doesn't mean you're healthy. An unhealthy slim person can have all the same issues as overweight people.