Childhood obesity causes: A poll (Page 2)

bradword - 2009-08-20 2:12 PM Leegoocrap, Ya got a problem with my level 80 warlock????

Reminds me of my race this past weekend, in Indianapolis . . . where the 30,000 attendee-strong GenCon conference was going on.  It's a gaming conference, and I'm not making any judgements here, but as I observed some of the folks walking around downtown, the first thing I thought of was:

I've got one kid that pretty much only eats processed foods, and one that eats a higher percentage of  vegetables and fruit than probably 99% of the US population.  The one that eats the good stuff happens to be the go-getter and is active and athletic.  The one that thrives on grilled cheese sandwiches, pizza, frozen dinners, etc., is lazy and presents a big challenge to get to do anything physical.  He is overweight.

I've given up on the food battle in my house.  My wife buys the food, and she buys tons of crap along with the other good foods.  The only way she will stop bringing it into the house is if I can get her in for a physical and have her discover that her cholesterol is 400.  But I can't get her to go to the doctor, she just refuses to make an appt.  So I try to engage my kids in activities -- bike rides, swimming, football, running whatever.

Also, I do my best to explain to the kids what makes a good diet, a bad diet, and the consequences of bad eating.  My wife is upset with me over this because my one son now thinks that he is fat, which he is for a kid IMO.  A 10yo kid shouldn't have any obvious body fat.  I tell him he has more body fat than he should have, and it's because of what he eats and from not being active enough.  I figure the best thing I can do is to shoot straight and be honest.  Eventually maybe the light will go on for him, and he will make better eating decisions on his own.

So yes, parenting is part of it.  But another big thing is snacks.  There isn't an activity that kids get involved in that doesn't end with a bag of cr@p being given to every kid with chips, candy, and sugar water, aka, "juice".  Every practice & game for soccer, football, baseball, basketball, you-name-it -- always a load of junk for kids every single time.  It's a cultural problem now.  Food is everywhere, all the time.  And mostly it's junk food.

KSH - 2009-08-20 1:08 PM  So, your wife knows the 10 year old is overweight for his age... right? If so, then why does she still buy all the food that is probably assisting him in his weight gain? I don't understand. At least you have one kiddo on the right path to a long healthy life though!

My wife prefers denial.  She insists that he isn't overweight.  I don't know, I can't explain it, I don't get it either, and I've given up battling with her.  There is no reasoning with her over it.  Maybe for a week or two I can get the junk food to disappear from the house when I really drive home the point.  Then, amazingly one day I come home and there are two big bags of potato chips, three gallons of ice cream in the freezer, and five pounds of various chocolate bars in the cupboard. 

"He has a sensitivity to certain food textures" she says.  From my perspective, if the kid can eat pizza and a grilled cheese and frozen dinners, then he can handle a carrot or an apple.  He'll eat the food that is available, and if there are no frozen dinners, he won't eat frozen dinners.  But my wife chooses to pander to his poor eating habits.

Thanks for the tip, I will get a copy of the show.

Some great comments on this thread - thanks especially PhoenixAzul & DophinGirlMB for sharing some of your personal experiences with this.

The "parenting" problem is MULTI-generational now.  People flat don't know HOW to cook healthy food, or what a sit-around-the-table, everyone-eating-the-same-homecooked-items, family dinner lifestyle looks like.  (Which is sometimes, "suck it up buttercup, no the dog won't eat the broccoli for you.")  StevenZulu raises a great point that I hadn't thought of: BOTH parents have to support it.  Your situation right now sounds rough.

The other contributing factors are a whacked-out food industry, government subsidies for the least healthy stuff out there, school lunches, a complicit FDA hijaked by said whacked-out industry, a "market" for cheap-convenient-addictive, disordered time priorities, lack of fun PE in schools (who wants to re-do Jr. High with PhoenixAzul???  PICK ME! PICK ME!), and yes also for many people, food addiction.  These factors all work together.

There's no magic bullet.  What are you doing to change it?  I do a LITTLE - I support farmer's markets etc. when I can, introduce my friends to new healthy foods, and in Philly volunteered for a physical-activity program basically running around the schoolyard with inner-city kids during their lunchtime, and DON'T support factory farms.  I'm starting to work out again and incrementally influencing friends to do the same.

Excited to see Food, Inc. here in OKC next weekend and drag invite as many friends as possible, hoping to make a nudge in their eating habits too. 

Wish I had the energy to lobby for changes in Food Policy in D.C., but there's too much chaos over bigger issues right now, will lay low.

But, lunch yesterday was 1/2 a bag of tortilla chips.  (Which made me feel like poop for the rest of the day.)  So it's not like I'm Queen Perfect either.

Let's keep talking about it, but let's do something too.

PS:  Sorry for such a long post.  Obviously I care about this and have trouble shutting up.