DD (14) is getting fat

[OneHandFlapping]

I know she knows and doesn't like it, because she once said "Oh I'm so fat" in a despairing tone. I wish I hadn't just brushed it off with "No you're not. You're lovely."

She hasn't mentioned it again, and since then she has put on quite a bit more weight. She gave up gymnastics 6 months ago which was 9 hours a week of intensive training in order to concentrate on sprinting which is about 5 hours a week of training. On days she doesn't sprint she does nothing but sit/lie about.

Her diet is terrible. She resists eating fruit and vegetables, and ODs on carbs of all sorts.

I've been ignoring it, apart from occasional exhortations to eat more healthily and maybe take up another sport. These have always fallen on deaf ears, but recently even my mild comments have been met with screaming tantrums.

I guess she's telling me to back off, and I'm going to have to shut up, but I know she is hating herself, and that the longer she leaves it, the more likely she is to create a lifelong problem for herself.

I think she's about a stone overweight, and at 5ft 1 that's quite a lot.

Well, it's a fair bit overweight, but it's not truly huge. She'll be far from the plumpest girl in her year.
How motivated is she about the sprinting? Could you talk about getting more into the training side, swimming or similar as supplemental train? And into the nutritional balance side?

I am trying to think of a way for her to focus on a goal of getting fitter/faster, without making weight/size/food quantity the primary focus.

Hmm, sounds like she's doing a fair amount of exercise so maybe focus on the carbs - is there any way you could buy less/better stuff without making a big deal out of it?

I think you're going to have to tread very carefully.

Why don't you suggest doing things together - bike ride, zumba class, going swimming.

I've been there.
I have two boys. DS1 tall, skinny, eats huge piles of rubbish.
DS2 also tall but apple rather than pear shaped.
I have always weighed him and checked BMI and while he was always a little chubby he was never technically overweight.
I became aware about a year ago that he was self concious about his shape, he has a spare tyre. I was too subtle. I tried to encourage him to eat healthy food and exercise but I never used the F word.
On holiday I saw him without a shirt for the first time in ages. It was enough for me to sit him down and say that he was over weight. It was my responsibility as a parent not to ignore it.
I was amazed how well he took it. It was hard but he was grateful to be able to discuss it openly and we hatched a plan.
I drew up a list of food in 3 groups, red, yellow and green (ie good, medium and bad). I said he was not to diet but to change his eating habits and consciously make more healthy choices.
He is not sporty but I promised to help him find something he enjoyed for exercise. We did a lot of walking. He took up cycling and we got a treadmill.

One year on he is still working at it but he has made a lot of progress.

I do focus on the carbs - eg. giving her a bit less rice/pasta etc with her dinner. I think she is eating an enormous panini at lunch at school most days, which is probably too much, but I can't really influence her there.

She eats huge slabs of white bread, and refuses brown, which is always on offer. DH won't countenance just getting brown because he likes white too, and isn't prepared to do without.

She is a very fussy eater, and often refuses the food I've cooked for the family in favour of making her own - which is usually a bit light on the vegetables side of things. The only fruit she will eat is mango and cucumber, and she will eat a whole of each of these at a sitting.

Her whole attitude to food seems to be that she is only going to eat the things she likes best, and that anything that is a bit meh, is not going to be eaten. She's been like this all her life, but the weight thing is escalating. Clothes she bought in January are now tearing under the pressure.

I've suggested:

• her doing some distance running with me - I run regularly
• her coming to karate with me
• doing zumba together/with a friend
• doing the shred ( which she reluctantly does v. occasionally)
• joining the gym - either the one I go to, or the more expensive, more convenient one that's on her way home from school
• anything else she can possibly think of

I too have avoided the F word like the plague. I know how carefully I've got to tread, and tbh, I'd rather she was overweight than developed a lifelong eating disorder.

My main problem is her recent attitude to "interference" from me. It seems we can no longer discuss it at all.

It already looks like you are doing lots to support your daughter. Do you think she would be open to the idea of a weight management program?

I work for the Institute of Child Health and they are trialling a free weight management programme for teenagers. Have a look at www.helptrial.org.uk for more information. Ideally you would have to be in the Greater London area to take part....

That looks like a fantastic program, Beth. Sadly we are in Bucks, and even if that is flexible, I don't think I can commit to taking her to 12 sessions at Great Ormond St, as I am trying to get back to work.

There would only be 4 sessions at Great Ormond St. over the course of the year. The fortnightly sessions would be held at a venue that is local to you, and there is the possibility that parts of Bucks will be included in our programme in the near future.

If you are still interested then maybe drop us an email on [email protected] telling us whereabouts in Bucks you leave. If it turns out that the programme is flexible enough to include you, then I can always get back in touch via email.

Sounds like you need to talk to DH and get him to suck it up for the sake of your daughter.

Slimming World have a special programme for 11-15 year olds, so I believe - if it's too tricky getting her to a group (none of my 3 would entertain the idea) then I would buy a couple of their magazines and try out the basic principles. The Extra Easy plan doesn't even feel like a diet.

Could you pay for her to see a nutritionist on the back if her sports, to help her sprinting?

Can you tell her you need to have a proper chat and then show her where she is on BMI and how it's changed over the last year, how you are worried and that fixing it now will be easier than fixing it later. That you love her and care about her deeply and want to help her be happy and self confident. Baring your feelings may make her realise how seriously you care and want to help her.

I'm using the myfitnesspal app on my phone to lose baby weight and it is fab! She might like it as she can do it by herself On her phone and no one would need to to discuss it with her if she didn't want to.

I don't know what you can do about her lunchtime eating (I live near a secondary school and see what the children eat for lunch), but I would stop buying any crap for the house and only serve up healthy food - I wouldn't allow substitutions.

Your dh would have to go along with it for the good of the family.

My dh used to serve white bread and go on about how lovely it was - all the children bought into this. I started only buying wholemeal, or seedy (as the children call it) and not allowing any white in the house. it was a very smug mother moment when my children told me that they much prefer wholemeal bread.

OneHand - why not stop focussing on the exercise and focus on the diet which you could probably control far more than you do:

• stop buying white bread
• make sandwiches for lunch (we do this for us so I know it is possible)
• restrict access to cash for buying excess snacks

Dont have excess snacks in the house. Enough people on these threads will tell you about locking away food if necessary.

Gnome, partly because I feel she is almost an adult, and I don't want to treat her like a child. She needs to find a way to manage her weight in a society where we are always surrounded by delicious, tempting food. Same applies re restricting money. Especially as school lunches are paid for using a pre-paid card. It's hard to stop her buying pizza and chocolate cake if that's what she wants.

We don't have snacks in the house, but she has been known to help herself to tins of tuna, spam (boak) and she mixes up cocoa powder and sugar. It's hard to control food at that level.

I did talk to DD last night, when I had her trapped in the car, using a "how is your sprinting going?" intro as suggested by ragged above.

She agreed that she is no longer beating girls she used to. She says sweet stuff is her weakness, and that she will do a Zumba class, and try and work on eating more fruit and veg.

DH may have agreed to buy brown bread, and no doughnuts at the weekend, but he made a big deal about it.

I'm just the same as her, and I find that exercise is an enormous help in controlling my weight, so I suppose that's why I've been focussing on it. It makes me feel physically good, improves my mental state, and reduces my appetite. I've only ever sucessfully lost weight when exercising.

Thank you everyone for your help. Beth, I don't thinks she is ready to take part in your program at the moment.

OneHand I have DCs this age but I guess my view is that almost an adult is one heck of a long way off being an adult. At 14 they are still very impulsive without really thinking through consequences.

The problem with exercise is that it really uses up very few calories (dont know if you watched the recent Horizon programme 'twas very enlightening, get your DD to watch it if still available on iplayer)

Yes, I saw the Horizon program, and still have it on the digibox for DD to watch. It was interesting. Actually the most interesting thing for me was that you could burn off an extra 500 calories a day just by getting off your bum more.

It is her sporting habits that have changed rather than her (bad) eating habits. Anyway, I am pursuing a 2-pronged attack - eating and sport. I'll have to see whether she continues to be responsive, or whether she puts up the barriers again.

Just looking at it from another perspective, it sounds like you OP are very fitness oriented, with your list of exercises:

• her doing some distance running with me - I run regularly
• her coming to karate with me
• doing zumba together/with a friend
• doing the shred ( which she reluctantly does v. occasionally)
• joining the gym - either the one I go to, or the more expensive, more convenient one that's on her way home from school

Could it be that she isn't actually "fat" as you charmingly call her, but just changing shape as she grows up?

I'm not saying you shouldn't provide her with healthy food and the opportunity to do some physical exercise, but your idea of a normal amount of physical activity may be somewhat skewed. If you start projecting your own fears about weight onto your daughter you are asking for trouble.

Epilator, I definitely don't want to be one of those mums who destroy their daughter's body confidence by projecting their own weight issues onto them.

If I thought DD was happy with herself, I would leave it, but I don't think she is.

Long shot but I had polycystic ovaries at this age and put on weight . My periods were virtually non existant which was the clue, but back then it wasn't known about.
If your dd has menstrual problems this could be the problem and processed/white carbs are part of that problem and cutting back helps as well as exercise.

But who amongst us can honestly say they are happy with their body? Of course she's not happy, she's changing from an androgynous child into a woman and her body will continue to change over the next few years.

At the age of 14 I was mortified that my mum took a photo of me in a bikini on holiday because I was soooo fat. When I look at that photo now, with my sullen face and my flat-tummy-ed size 10 body I feel so sorry for that young girl who didn't realise how beautiful she was.

Without seeing your DD I don't know if she really is a bit overweight or whether the body that you and she both see is actually being distorted. Whichever way, please be very sensitive in your approach to her as her body-confidence needs boosting at this age, not destroying.

I will ask ggirl. She started about 18 months ago, but after the first lot, she's never asked me to buy more STs, so they may still be very scanty. Did you have any other symptoms?

Epilator, she really is noticeably fatter now than 3 or 4 months ago. She's fatter than her friends. She is a definite apple, with most of her weight on her stomach. As a short girl, it is noticeable.

Until last night I'd completely avoided the issue, apart from vague "healthy" comments, despite her "I'm so fat and ugly" remark. I'll just have to see how it goes.

There seems to be a bit of an obsession with white bread . Is brown bread somehow less fattening?
I'm thinking TheEpilator may have a point. What does she weigh?
I have never been overweight or dieted in my life and there isn't any food that's forbidden here. If DS2 wants chocolate then he can have some but in moderation. It's life long healthy eating habits that matter at this age .

as a teen no I had no other symptoms, they developed a lot later , excess hair on upper thighs and on line down from navel to pubes
it's diagnosed by blood tests and ultrasound scan of ovaries
dd wasn't diagnosed until 16 because at younger age infrequent periods can be entirely normal as they adjust to adulthood

I agree with the no food forbidden thing. IME it's the one thing guaranteed to trigger bingeing if you feel you're not allowed something.

I don't know what DD weighs, and I don't want to get her onto that awful cycle of obsessive weighing and "oh I've put on a pound this week, even though I've been good. I might as well go and stuff myself with everything I can lay hands on". I'm just going on appearance.