Childhood Obesity

RadishRose

RadishRose

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Connecticut, USA
Cover illustration for "Childhood Obesity," an article in Pharmacy Practice dealing with the inactive lifestyles and poor eating habits of children and the resulting problems.

Joseph Salina, illustrator

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I was an obese child and was quite active. My mother provided me with home cooked well balanced healthy meals. I ate every bite of everything thing my mother made for me, and often raided the refrigerator and pantry for more. I worked hard find more food and junk food, I succeeded. I had strong cravings for fat and sugar, and all too often figured out how to satisfy. Spent most of the money I got on junk food and learned which friends had more available food at their houses...

I suspect childhood obesity is more common today, and no doubt some is due to lifestyle. However that is not the only cause...
 
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Some of the factors I think contribute to childhood obesity that weren't in place when many of us were growing up.
1. Both parents working, relaxing at sit down family meals not so much any more.
2. Playing outdoors until called to come in & eat or take a bath for bedtime.
3. Social ills make letting kids out by themselves to play dangerous
4. Cell phones & video games creating thin fingers but heavy bodies.
5. Many schools removed PE from the curriculum.
6. Fast food cheaper & more accessible [two of competing fast food places on every block] than better choices help busy parents substitute that for kids dietary intake.

Probably more but I can't think of any more that are really different than when I grew up. My kids were in the stay out & play until dragged in.
 
Chet said:
Often when I see an obese child I see them with an obese parent. Maybe obese isn't the right word but overweight might be.
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You brought up a good point about difference between overweight & obese. This article does a decent job of explaining.

Defining overweight and obesity in children
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Obesity means having too much body fat. It is not the same as overweight, which means weighing too much. Obesity is becoming much more common in childhood. Most often, it begins between the ages of 5 and 6 years and in adolescence.

Child health experts recommend that children be screened for obesity at age 2 years. If needed, they should be referred to weight management programs.

Measuring Body Fat
Your child's mass index (BMI) is calculated using height and weight. A health care provider can use BMI to estimate how much body fat your child has.

Measuring body fat and diagnosing obesity in children is different than measuring these in adults. In children:

The amount of body fat changes with age. Because of this, a BMI is harder to interpret during puberty and periods of rapid growth.
Girls and boys have different amounts of body fat.
A BMI level that says a child is obese at one age may be normal for a child at a different age. To determine if a child is overweight or obese, experts compare BMI levels of children at the same age to each other. They use a special chart to decide whether a child's weight is healthy or not.

If a child's BMI is higher than 85% (85 out of 100) of other children their age and sex, they are considered at risk of being overweight.
If a child's BMI is higher than 95% (95 out of 100) of other children their age and sex, they are considered overweight or obese.
https://medlineplus.gov/ency/patien...d's BMI is,are considered overweight or obese.
 
Over 40% of our population is substantially overweight....and more and more children are being included in those numbers. Kids used to get outdoors more often and burn their calories...now they Text and Tweet.
 
Sadly, I'm afraid that it will get much worse as food costs increase due to inflation.

This morning the local Wegman's had two-pound bags of the tiny mandarins that kids like for $5.49.

You can buy a box of sugary cereal, a quart of milk, and a can of SpaghettiOs for less than that.
 
I was talking with my niece tonight, her kids are 11 and 13. We got talking about kids and weight and she informed her kids school doesn't have gym classes, also at recess or lunch they have the option of going outside or staying inside. I can't imagine how a school system can think less activity is a good thing for kids.
 
A few weeks ago, we were at the oldest great granddaughters 16th birthday. She is a little "chubby" but some of her friends were quite a bit overweight. One of her girlfriends was extremely heavy....so much so that when she walked through the house, you could feel the floor "flexing". That poor young girl is headed for some serious health issues if she continues that way.
 
One of the granddaughters was a very large child, enough that the doctor told her parents to change her diet. In a few years she became an athlete and was really slim. It seems those genes are returning in her later teens. She’s still very active but the weight is slowly returning, though I didn’t even notice it when she was here. She’s upset that her friends wear tiny sizes. Her parents both have weight issues and are big boned. She’ll never be tiny but comparing herself to others is upsetting. I can’t imagine how difficult it is for really large children.
 
Alligatorob said:
I was an obese child and was quite active. My mother provided me with home cooked well balanced healthy meals. I ate every bite of everything thing my mother made for me, and often raided the refrigerator and pantry for more. I worked hard find more food and junk food, I succeeded. I had strong cravings for fat and sugar, and all too often figured out how to satisfy. Spent most of the money I got on junk food and learned which friends had more available food at their houses...

I suspect childhood obesity is more common today, and no doubt some is due to lifestyle. However that is not the only cause...
Click to expand...
Ditto for me. When I was 9, I wore Husky size. I remember someone calling me "big butt" in elementary school. I was also active and spent lots of time outside. My mother cooked balanced meals, although I do remember eating Swanson TV Dinners sometimes at home and things like Sloppy Joes in school that couldn't have been healthy.

When I hit puberty I got taller, went on a very strict diet and joined the track team. When I graduated I was 5'8" and 135 pounds. My mother supported me and never insisted that I was eating too little.

My nephew went into his high school years locked in his room hooked on video games. My sister-in-law had him enlist in the Navy and that gave him the purpose he needed in life. I think so much of the issue today is due to lack of activity and poor nutrition, although there can certainly be other factors.
 
Chet said:
Often when I see an obese child I see them with an obese parent. Maybe obese isn't the right word but overweight might be.
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And often times, it is intentional on the parent's part. I've notice this in my own family as well as in others.
If the parents are overweight, they're more comfortable when their kids are also overweight.
And often times, the overweight kids allow the parents to say, "See? I told you being overweight is genetic & therefore, it's out of our hands, so don't blame us; we can't do anything about it."

In my own (dysfunctional) family, after I lost weight many years ago, my mother became upset because my brother was still overweight, so she would tell me "You're too skinny." (5'11" 185 lbs is not too skinny). Finally, after hearing this crap several times, I told her: "You just want me to look more like him; it would make you more comfortable."
 
I was never fat as a child... chance would have been a fine thing, because we kids were actually half starved by our parents... the only time we got 3 meals was when we were in foster homes.. . Add to that working before school, playing outside all day at weekends , and 4 - 45 minute lessons of PE per week.... we were actually skin and bones..

Despite that, I never craved sweet foods.. had the occasional sweet when I could get them but never craved sweet food at all..

As a teen and young adult, I danced all the time.. too.. and if I could run rather than walk anywhere I always did...

As an adult I've always been a decent weight until I got to after 55, .. since then I've had to seriously watch my weight because I have developed a sweet tooth .
 
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I weighed about 120 in high school (I'm 5'6") then went up to about 130 during one summer between college years -- my mother told me my father was ashamed of me for being so fat. Soon after that, I went down to about 110 and stayed there until I was about 50 years old. People were always asking me if I was a model -- my father was always telling me I was too skinny.

I don't know what can be done about childhood obesity, but I do know it's awful to make a child feel bad about the way they look and I'm afraid a lot of the efforts by schools and parents, intending to help the children to lose weight, only succeed in making them feel self-conscious about their bodies.
 
C50 said:
I was talking with my niece tonight, her kids are 11 and 13. We got talking about kids and weight and she informed her kids school doesn't have gym classes, also at recess or lunch they have the option of going outside or staying inside. I can't imagine how a school system can think less activity is a good thing for kids.
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probably not thinking about activity but fewer staff to supervise outside recess...
playing on games or computers and phones has limited kids imaginations for outside play ...IMO ....

Don M. said:
A few weeks ago, we were at the oldest great granddaughters 16th birthday. She is a little "chubby" but some of her friends were quite a bit overweight. One of her girlfriends was extremely heavy....so much so that when she walked through the house, you could feel the floor "flexing". That poor young girl is headed for some serious health issues if she continues that way.
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i would agree .. they never look happy or comfortable in their own skin ...
the sad reality is they are having their organs work overtime the stress on the joints etc.
Illness and damage that will not be erased even after dropping wieght..... the younger it starts the worse bone bowing etc can be.

Had a step sister whom no one wanted to invite over.......... as she plopped on furniture and often broke it as her knees were under a great deal of stress. every illness was a major problem and she ever so slowly healed if injured.... died very young never even lived to see her daughter grow up.
When ever i see someone no matter how much some try the do NOT seem happy and confident but always looking to hide behind a wall or loose fitting garmet etc
 
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I agree with Della's thoughts on this. My mother kept me isolated in the house or yard. Not allowed to go out much.

I wanted to counter the original picture in this post with a childhood drawing someone posted on the borderline sub I used to post on but I can't find it. Thought I right clicked and saved it. The self drawing of this child was terrifying. And I could totally relate to it.
 
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