Should I have a conversation with her about her weight?

[LandofBears]

DSD is 13 and very overweight. She's gone from a very normal weight kid to a very overweight one over the last two years. We see her EOW and 1/2 the holidays. I have been in her life since she was 4 and we generally have a very good relationship. I'm really worried about her. I love her and I worry about what effects the extra weight will have on her health.

DH has spoken to her mum and she doesn't see it as an issue and sees it as "puppy fat" that she will grow out of. DH is being a bit crap and doesn't want to say anything for fear of giving DSD a complex. I'm watching her get bigger and bigger thinking she's not going to thank any of us for this when she's adult and maybe she'd want someone to say something? But how? In a loving way can I approach the issue with her? The whole thing seems fraught.

Getting DH to deal with it is simply not going to happen so telling me to get him to sort it isn't going to be helpful. This is really about should I do/say something.

If you were her mother, then yes, you should talk to her about her health. However, you're not her parent so absolutely not. This is an issue your husband and his ex need to handle. All you can do is try to model healthy behaviour to her.

Hmmm. I think you're in an impossible position as she wouldn't thank you, even though you probably would be doing the right thing. She's too old for puppy fat, her periods have probably started? At that age and being overweight. Therefore she won't grow much more.
Could you start a healthy eating regime? Even if you don't need to.. But to get her involved and hopefully learn to make good decisions with food, eat enough and even have some treats.
My DM always told me I was overweight, and my response was probably to eat more... I'm not even sure I actually was particularly but it hasn't helped my relationship with food.
Maybe you could go from a fitness angle? Start running and therefore talk about the food which is best as fuel? Tricky, sorry!

Would DH be willing to contact her school? Does DSD have an approachable head of year or someone with responsibility for wellbeing? They might have some advice for him about how to tackle this.

Has she hit puberty?

As her SM i would say absolutely keep your mouth shut. This is something for her parents to address. All you can do is provide healthy food in small portions, and encourage exercise.

I hands down wouldn't discuss it with her. I promise you that even though you mean well the outcome won't be positive. My mother and grandparents pointed out my weight at a similar age and it sent me into very disordered eating which I still haven't recovered from nearly 15 years later. I am now a healthy size for my height (BMI of 22) but still struggle with shame around eating.

The best way to approach this would be to engage as a whole family and not single her out as the overweight one. Encourage healthy eating as a family when she stays with you- everyone sits down at the table with a plate of healthy fresh foods. Maybe invite her to cook fresh recipes with you to engage her in healthy cooking. And get more active as a family when DSD is with you too. Maybe enquire about sports at school and whether she likes anything and then suggest taking up a family hobby of cycling, tennis, netball etc whatever she likes.

Sorry for the wall of text, the phone app keeps deleting all of my paragraphs.

She probably knows she's overweight. Id try to encourage your partner to talk to her about it. Like other PP said, id try and be a healthy role model for her. Eat healthy stuff around her, maybe go for walks/runs/buy some fitness stuff and use it around her. Maybe she'll pick up and copy the behaviours.

She got her period last year. She doesn't do any sports or activities. She goes home after school and eats junk. Since lockdown I think it's just gotten worse. We are very active and she does cycle/go for hikes/swim with us. At dinner time she will eat at least two portions of whatever is on offer and would go for thirds if there's any left.

Can you have her 50/50 to have more of an impact on her lifestyle?

The modelling doesn't seem to have done anything. She's not a little overweight either and it's been a dramatic change in the last two years. I just feel sad for her and worry what impact it will make on her health. People don't even recognise her in photos any more.

Stop giving her 2 portions?

Sounds like you could cook a lot less to start with. I would never have gotten away with having three dinners! My mum only made enough for us all to have one portion.

Hi, I gained weight as a teenager, and I wouldn’t talk to her. She definitely knows!
Two things I would encourage:
Sports! Anything you can find she likes and feels comfortable with (I understand right now this is difficult), swimming, aqua size, dance classes etc. Maybe do some youtube classes with her?
Focus on her emotional wellbeing. Why is she suddenly eating so much? Is she unhappy, depressed, troubles at school? A sudden change in her life.

It’s great that you care, but your Dh also needs to step up and take an interest in her wellbeing and encourage active lifestyle. Being an overweight teenager is no fun at all and it will really harm her confidence and self esteem.

She has a teenage brother who is very sporty and slim. She also has a younger 1/2 brother who is also sporty and slim. They always go for seconds and it would seem wrong to deny them food. And surely saying no to her without some sort of conversation wouldn't be healthy?

No. She'll definitely know because her peers at school will be a smaller size and I suspect much fitter than her in PE at school.

This is a difficult one because, being her step parent, you’re one step removed in a sense from being in a position to directly influence the situation. I think the best thing to do would be to work on your DH and figure out how the both of you together can plan a united approach.

The first thing I would be encouraging him to do is to find out whether anything significant happened to her a couple of years ago. Food addiction and overeating can be a response to emotional or physical trauma - I'd want to make sure that there is ant anything that had triggered this.

Don't talk to her, please. Suggest no seconds for anyone might be easier

Of course she doesn’t want you to say something! Why do you have to point it out anyway? If you really want to help ensure you all eat well when she’s with you and have plenty of exercise. Get your DH to talk to her Mum and you can all help her from the sidelines. You are living in cloud cuckoo land if you think a conversation is going to go well.

Do.Not.Say.Anything.

Unfortunately as a SM I think you need to step really carefully with this one. I would not say anything but make sure there isn't an option for seconds when you cook meals when she is with you and encourage as much exercise as possible.

Dont let any of them have seconds. Just make the brothers portion sizes a bit bigger and hers normal. Stop making so much food, if you havent cooked it there isnt more to have.

Say something. I was a very fat kid at that age and would have loved it if someone had sat me down and sensitively broached it with me and taught me about things like calorie counting. If she is eating large amounts of junk (nowadays massive bags of crisps or large bars of chocolate are available for £1) then she probably doesn't know how bad it is for her.

Obesity is a much bigger problem than eating disorders for teens as a whole, if it is handled well then she will not develop one.

I think saying something could backfire spectacularly. You mention it, your SD runs to mum and says "LandOfBears called me fat!", and then all hell breaks loose between her, you and your husband.

You can’t say anything. But I sympathise with your concerns and I’m in a similar boat, though DH agrees.

My DSS is obese, he’s younger than your DSD, tall for his age and nearly 4 stone over weight. There is extremely disordered eating going on at his mum’s house and while we have them a lot it’s not enough to counteract her influence. She’s very overweight herself and swings from self loathing and banning snacks and taking the kids to watch her do boot camp or whatever, to saying it’s fine to be curvy and bingeing while they watch tv or play on x box all day.

They talk about how they try and hide snacks they want because otherwise she’ll eat whole packets of biscuits and there won’t be any for them. So they’re picking up very mixed messages and DSS is either proudly saying everyone is a different shape and size and mum says it’s fine to have a healthy appetite, or that he’s being bullied about his weight at school and he wants help to be slimmer. It’s a total fucking mess.

Here they eat fresh home made food, run around in the park, have sensible limits on screen time and we’re both pretty active and healthy. But there’s a limit to what we can do and that’s very hard.

I do feel for their mum as she’s obviously got serious issues around food but as the adult it’s up to her to seek appropriate help and putting all that dysfunctional crap on the children is very dangerous and irresponsible.

I know that’s a different situation in many ways to yours and with both parents in denial you’re on a hiding to nothing.

DH is being useless. He acknowledges the problem but doesn't know how to approach it and hasn't/won't do anything about it. I have a few friends who were overweight as kids who all wish someone had tried to help them as kids. Hence me wondering if I should try.

Her friendship group at secondary are all overweight girls who joke about it and eat tons of junk. Whenever they come here they come laden with bags of crisps and sweets. They then stay on DSDs room eating it all.

I try not to pile the boys plates too high because they can be fickle and if they decide they're not that hungry it ends up in the bin. But maybe that's a better option.