Overweight child

[Itsthelittlethingz]

Has anyone had/have an overweight child. My daughter is 8, and has always been chunky. Recently she’s been getting called names like ’fatty’. I genuinely believe her body type is naturally strong/heavy set. I have been walking with her and eating healthy as well as reducing snacks. She dances 3 hours a week. She wears like 13/14 aged clothes from Zara.

I’m hoping as she grows she will lean out?

I workout 3 times a week and eat clean.

Any advice I feel like im failing her as a mum

Most kids I have known who are overweight have enjoyed food immensely and as a result have ended up eating larger portions than they should. I was shocked when I discovered the portion size for ice cream is only 60g which is the size of a small tomato. A single scoop in a cafe is at least a double portion. Check your portion sizes and make sure half her plate is vegetables. Make sly swaps like frozen yoghurt instead of icecream etc,

Don’t have sugary or fatty snacks available in the house.

Check what’s happening at breakfast - fruit juice, yoghurt and cereal can be loaded with sugars.

Make sure she is getting at least 60 mins of moderate to vigorous activity every single day. She should be getting her heart pumping and sweating at least 3 x 60 mins per week.

Maybe you can buy her a skipping rope or take her on long bike rides, or she could join kids park run, or someone is giving away a trampoline on FB marketplace! Or she could do a Zumba video on YouTube in the living room.

There can be medical reasons, while it's more common for adults to do everything right and be overweight, children can get conditions too, so I'd book an appointment with the GP.

What is she eating in a typical day? Weight is about food not exercise.

Children should be doing at least 60 mins exercise a day.

Perhaps her portion sizes are too big. Can you start by looking at the size of the plates you are using. My DD is a big eater and would just eat and eat, I have to be pretty strict. Also eating food that keeps them satiated for longer. Age 13-14 clothes in Zara is for children about 164cm tall, which will be way bigger than your daughter, and it's good it's a wake-up call for you.
You're not failing her as a mum. At age 8 you can make a lot of changes for her now before she hits her teens!

OP you’re a great mum for wanting to help your daughter.

what snacks is she currently having?
could she have one in the morning around 11 and one PM around 4? One of which is fruit?

What does she typically eat in a day?

Secretly weight up everything she eats across a few days and use chat gpt to get a calorie estimate. It might be just a case of having large portions or eating too many times a day. My DD was a little overweight at 6 and it seemed to be purely because she loved food and ate huge portions and I slowly reduced them. For children the goal isn’t to lose weight, it’s to stay the same weight and grow.

Kids need one hour of proper exercise everyday. This is fairly easy at 8 with biking, playing, roller skates , the playground….

No kid is “naturally heavy-set”. Don’t fall into a trap where you can’t see it. Because at 8, when have full control over what she eats, you can actually do something about it. DD’s similarly food loving best friend was the exact same size as her at 6 - they were both just a tad chunky. At 14 now, my DD has kept up a sport and is a healthy weight while her friend huffs and puffs up a hill and comforts herself with food. It’s really difficult during the teen years to tackle it as well as you completely lose control over what they are eating.

Being a healthy weight “effortlessly” is a lot about habits. How many times you eat a day, how you fill up the plate, what you reach for when you’re starving because you missed a meal. And your that the age where you can set those habits now.

Lots of exercise - unless maybe at the professional athlete level - cannot overcome a bad diet. Yes, it will burn some calories but your daughter sounds very overweight. I think you are deluding yourself that your eight year old daughter is naturally strong/heavy set. An eight year old should not be wearing clothes for a 13 - 14 year old unless they are exceptionally tall. "Healthy" food and "eating clean" is not necessarily low calorie food. I can tell you that as a child in the sixties, there was one slightly fat child in the school. Genetics has not changed that much since then. The rest of us would have looked malnourished to modern eyes - we had skinny legs and arms and there wasn't a pot belly amoung us. Serving sizes were a lot smaller. I think you need professional help and start weighing and measuring and get a calorie counter book or app and forgot ideas about eating healthy or eating clean. I suspect you will be shocked when your realise just how many calories your daughter is eating.

I will second the PP who suggested doing a secret food diary. For a week record every single thing your DD eats and drinks. Work out the calories for everything.

We did this for DD many years ago. It actually only took 24 hours to realise the main culprit was a 'no added sugar' drink. She would easily consume 2 litres a day. When we looked at it properly we realised it was a calorie bomb.

We restricted that drink to one glass per day and over the next few months the excess weight dropped off her.

What does she eat in a typical day and how active is she? Does she get exercise every day and run around, jump about?

What is her dad's / rest of the family's build like? My MIL's grandma was over 6ft tall and 16 stone; my MIL is 4'11" and 7 stone! I agree, don't make her self-conscious, poor lass, but I would look at diet, go for walks / runs / swims together (label it quality time together) and if things get worse, maybe speak to the GP.

Could she be having extra / secret snacks you aren't aware of?

Thank you so much for your advice. I’ve attached a pic. She has big legs but quite muscular too. She will be starting athletics soon too. She eats maybe too many snacks and I’ll have to watch her portion sizes. I think 2 snacks a day is better as mentioned above. We used to walk more often, so maybe over the past year we haven’t been as much. I don’t want her getting bullied as I can see is starting to happen. Thanks again as the parent you can become blind to it.

She isn’t very active as in jumping around, energetic and agile etc I do have to actively get her to move. She dances often without being reminded but that’s it. I’m on a mission anyway. Thanks guys

It’s difficult to comment from a photo behind with a very loose top. You should be able to see her ribs when she is naked. Can you see them?

Exercise never burns as much as you might think. It's always down to food habits and aiming for a calorie deficit. Another thing to look at is how food is intertwined with the idea of reward or love. I noticed that DH's family always use food as a "social glue" which is both good and bad. Eg The table is properly set for every single meal, every person is expected to eat together, everyone gets served similar sized portions and someone always asks if you'd like seconds the moment your plate is empty. There is also always dessert and coffee. Sounds amazing in theory, and it is lovely when you just go there from time to time, but being in such a family means everyone struggles with weight and food.

DH was actually flabbergasted to realise that some adults don't eat three full meals a day. A lot of our friends say they just graze all day, sometimes skipping breakfast or lunch out of necessity and will have a full dinner when they're no longer busy. DH has totally internalised the idea of eating three meals a day, ideally sit down or hot meals. So even if we're out and about, he immediately gets grumpy if he's hungry and needs to find a place to eat. If he tries skipping a meal he just gets hungrier and will binge a few hours later.

We're also trying to get healthier and part of that is breaking all the food habits that creep up. Eg when we go out, it's tempting to get ice creams just because it feels like a treat but there's no real reason anyone needs that. Same for a portion of french fries or a piece of cake from a cafe. We never allowed DD fizzy drinks at home but he would usually let her order one at restaurants as a treat. We've now stopped that as well and got rid of fruit juices & cordials at home. She recently had a filling done so using dental health is a very good alternate reason for reducing sugary stuff. I've very careful never to say she needs to skip snacks in order not to get fat but it's much easier to say it's better for her teeth.

And lastly, it's fine to get comfortable with the idea that you can feel hungry for 1-2 hours before the next meal. I think some children (and adults) dislike the sensation of hunger and want snacks to make it go away quickly. But there's actually nothing wrong with being hungry for a bit, provided all your nutritional needs are met at mealtimes. It's a bit like needing to go to the loo. It's not comfortable but it's also not the end of the world if you wait a bit longer.

I was an overweight child. Looking back on it my portion sizes were far too big. Try reducing her meal sizes and fill the empty space with salad, so it’s not obvious what you’re doing. Make sure you do the same to everyone else’s meals. Snacks can be fruit/carrots/yoghurt. Maybe get matching smart watches that tracks steps. Be competitive to see who gets the highest number of steps! If she asks why just explain that it’s important to be healthy and get the blood pumping all around the body!

I think the clothing sizes say is all.
If you daughter puts on very little weight in the next 5 years, she is the right size.

Can you shift the balance of meals to more veg, less calorie laden sauces etc? Increasing movement will help, but not massively.

i would say this has got to be down to portion sizes. If an 8 year old is in aged 13/14 year old clothes without any kind if physical issue causing it, then you are feeding her more than she is burning off. I lost weight using Nutra Check calorie counter, gosh that was an eye opener seeing all the ‘hidden’ calories I was taking in, especially drinks.

@Itsthelittlethingz you don’t mention her height which is an important factor - I very much doubt she is 164cm at 8 years old but my DD was 150cm at that age and wearing age 11-12 clothes because she needed them.
Any signs of premature puberty at all? There’s some good advice above, especially around hidden sugar. Also look at carb content of meals, as children get older they sometimes go a bit fussy and default to beige carbs (not helped by the crap schools dish out and the madly out of date NHS nutrition guidelines!) which can pack weight on quickly

My DGC is very overweight also aged 8. Parents are separated, father is aware and concerned, letters have been sent from school, mum refuses to discuss it or do anything about it. DGC is overfed, it’s as simple as that. Father can control what they eat at his house - they do 50/50 care - but can’t influence mum. It’s very worrying.

Thank you guys lots of good advice there and I’m a woman on a mission. I do feel like I’ve made her conscious about her weight. Her dad has said to her multiple times she’s overweight (her first bully) and I’ve said it to her we need to be mindful. She’s had a complex relationship w dad. She has always had a very ‘stick out’ belly and ‘stick out’ bum since she was a baby. This is where she carries weight. Hence the big sizes. She’s average height so the clothes are too long, hope this makes sense. Anyway thank you so much for your advice. Going forward I’m going to reduce her portion size and get more active. I always tell her she’s beautiful she truly is and I want to do this for her future self.

This is so tricky @Itsthelittlethingz. It’s so helpful to her that you are recognising it and taking actions to address her weight. It will be awful for her if she develops a complex around food and her body image though.

Fingers crossed this works. Really hoping for the best for you.