How can I encourage healthier habits in my overweight teenager?

[ElderFlour88]

My child is overweight. It’s my fault, I’ve allowed unhealthy food, low exercise and large portions.

I am encouraging healthier habits without focusing on her weight and size- I really want to avoid mentioning this.
She is a teenager and more independent, which means she is buying junk food with her pocket money. I spend all week preparing healthy food and encouraging exercise for her to then buy sweets crisps and fizzy pop and undo everything from the week.

I feel stuck in this place where I want her to lose weight for her health but don’t feel I can discuss that in fear of giving her food/body issues.

In all honesty, being as she is more independent now I think you will be fighting a losing battle unless she decides she wants to lose weight. Her habits are already ingrained.

The only thing you could do is stop giving her money to buy her own food but that will cause a whole other set of problems.

I think you probably just need to keep doing what you are doing and let her know you will support her to make any other changes if she wants you to, at any time now or in the future.

You could try suggesting that you do something together, like go for a walk every evening. You can sell that as Mum and daughter time together. It will help your relationship as well as starting to ingrain a level of activity as normal. I have always been active and I think its because we had no car when I was growing up so we had to walk everywhere. It just instilled a habit of moving.

I was afraid of this 😔
I have considered stopping her pocket money, or exchanging chores for physical exercise but as you say, that will cause different problems. She’s only 14, and already wearing size 18. She seems to accept that she will keep getting bigger, we bought new school uniform that was a little to big and she just says “my body shape will change and I’ll fit into them” 😪

This is a lovely idea, thank you.
We’ve moved and are closer to her school now so she is able to walk, we always had to drive before and that hasn’t helped.

I agree with PP I think by the time you hit teenage years it’s a battle you can’t fight for her, I definitely wouldn’t exchange exercise for chores or anything like that, it will only start even worse habits and become something she resents.

I wouldn’t make it weight focused but rather health, fitness, strength focused, exercising to lose weight gets old fast and it’s really quite a negative way to look at it as it makes it a chore really.

By 14 as you know yourself you’ve lost total control, she can buy what she wants to eat, and a lot of her eating habits are already engrained from growing up but there are definitely still changes you could make as a household to start making better habits now, off the top of my head I would

• Start with walks together, walk to school, go for a walk together after school/on weekends, walking is great and not only does it aid weight loss and fitness but it’s also a great chance to actually chat without phones/tv/distractions
• Control the things you can by making some swaps, wholegrain bread rather than white bread, more fruit available vs processed snacks, if you usually drink full fat coke/fanta/whichever drink swap to the low sugar or diet option, healthy balanced meals in general with protein & veg (assuming any of these apply, if not and you already do these things then ignore)
• Is there an activity you could try together? Swimming? Maybe running? My mum & I actually joined a running club together when I was about 12/13 and I totally fell in love with it and still run now

Most importantly though keep communication open and healthy, don’t focus too much on weight or weight loss, focus on health.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=p-Yd4PdmYzg&ra=m
an excellent TED talk.

Thank you for taking the time to reply, with really good suggestions.
I do hate that it feels out of my hands, so these options are really helpful.
We don’t have fizzy pop in the house or much in the way of sweet stuff, and I’ve replaced traditional puddings/afters with fruit and so hopefully adding those other things will at least change her view on eating habits.

Thank you! I love a good TED talk 😍

Not much practical advice sadly as I don't think there is anything you can do but there are ways that it could be made worse (restriction, perceived punishment along the lines of no pocket money etc could have the opposite effect) but don't think of eating treats or junk food as undoing your efforts. Everybody of any size benefits from healthy, homecooked meals and exercise so keep it up!!

Oh OP, I really feel for you.
I was in the exact same position with my DS this time last year. He was 15 then and seemed to be getting bigger and bigger. He’d stopped playing football and just seemed to want to sit in his room playing Xbox.
His diet wasn’t great and he’d turned in to a real ‘snacker’. Every time I left the house he’d raid all the cupboards for literally anything he could get his hands on.

Last July, when school broke up I told him I was going to set myself some challenges
— walk 10’000 steps a day, cook something new every other day, try a new sport etc. I was quite relaxed about it and just asked if he fancied joining me. To my suprise he did! He started to walking the dog with me twice a day and we’d chat and laugh and talk about football, football and more football….
I asked him to look online and in recipe books and find some different meals he’d like to try that we could cook together (he found Meals with Max on Instagram) and we started cooking together and chatting about the benefits of different foods.
Me and my DD18 started playing tennis and he wasn’t keen at first and would come along and watch but gradually took more of an interest and then joined in.

He started to become interested in different foods, protein and nutrients. As the weight started coming off the change in him was remarkable. He joined his old football team, had mates over to go down the rec and play football, started asking for polo shirts and jeans, rather than baggy T shirts and shorts.

1 year on he’s 4.5 stone lighter. He looks great but more importantly he’s much more active, more social, more confident and a million times happier. He rarely goes on his Xbox now and is always cooking up a new recipe in the kitchen. The boy that only ate nuggets and chips now makes his own sushi, loves a fruit salad and goes to the gym 5 times a week. He now tracks his calories on My Fitness Pal (his own decision) but that’s mainly to keep an eye on his protein.

I hope something in my long waffle of a post helps because I know just how worried you must feel x

Thank you Quarkkugel, I hope not all is lost and I can still help 🤞🤞🤞

I’ve proper got tears in my eyes from this story, thank you so much. I’d love for her to find a sport or activity that she loves. I feel like her weight stops her from enjoying sport at school, and of course the girls with talent and enthusiasm are prioritised during lessons and for clubs. She used to enjoy hockey and swimming, her swimming teacher wanted her to join a team even, but she moved away from all of it. That might be a good place to start for a shared activity though. ❤️
I’m so happy that your son came out of himself and started enjoying things again, and that you were able to share his story.

You’re so welcome! I had tears in my eyes writing it!!