Why do people let their kids get Fat!!?! (1 Viewer)

[tyler payne]

Not having kids of my own, I guess I have no right to point fingers, but I really have to say that a lot of this is the parents fault.

Growing up I was a pretty trim guy. Summers were filled with swimming lessons, riding my bike all over the place, and hiking. (Gotta love Northern New Mexico, warm summers, and snow for skiing in the winter.) During the school year I always played the school sports, football, and basketball in the fall and winter and little league in the spring. Soda was rare in my family. Usually it was in the fridge for guests.

Anyway the point is my parents always encouraged me to take part in activities. Sports, piano lessons, boy scouts, anything that was constructive, my parents were willing to take me to lessons, or practices. (I know not all parents can do this with working multiple jobs, or being single parents, time is limited.) In high school I stopped playing sports as I got a job bagging groceries, but my parents still made sure meals were healthy, and I still played a lot of basketball with friends. God, we used to play from noon till 9 or 10 at night.

After I graduated I left home for college. It was cheaper to rent an apartment, then to live on campus and my weight blew up. I went from 5'8" - 165 freshmen year to 210 about a year ago. And I have to blame myself for that. Living on my own, I could have soda whenever I wanted, and as much as I wanted. I went from mom's well balanced meals, to fast food once or twice a day. No one was around to monitor how much TV I watched, or video games I played, which was always monitored with my folks.

My point being that parents have a lot of control over how active their kids are and what they eat. Fast food was a no-no, and when we did not eat at home, it was a sit down meal after church, or for special days. Birthdays, etc. I know restaurants are not the healthiest place, but the selections are better than, those at the average hamburger joint.

I really took what my parents did for me for granted. They were making choices and sacrificing their time to make sure I was happy, and just as importantly, healthy. It was not until I left home that I realized this. (And I really noticed it when one day I sat down to play X-Box and I could rest a bowl of ice cream on my stomach while playing. Pretty sick. I have since started to exercise every day. Combination of exercise bike and weight training. I have gotten down to 170, and I feel better, have more energy, and I also have more confidence in myself in social settings.)

As I stated before, I know that certain family circumstances make it hard for parents to be as involved in the activities of their children as they would like to be, but it makes a huge difference when they are.

 

[Glenn Overholt]

What irks me about this whole 'overweight' thing is a few years back when the 'normal' weight guidelines were changed.
It didn't bother me personally, but I knew that a lot of people would now be classified as overweight that weren't overwiehgt before.

It just ups the statistics. I think it was a dumb-ass thing to do, as it just made more people fat that weren't before. If you don't like women 'skin & bones' you now had to pick what our feds called - a fat person - when they were only a little heavier than the rest not long before.

I did figure that every child in school would get weighed and evaluated though. A lot of good that did. Any students here know of other ovrweight classmates that have been lectured to or have had a letter sent home?

I'll bet that it is few at best. It just tells me that our schools have failed there too.

As long as I'm here ... As for the blame, part of it goes to the schools, as I just mentioned, and part to the parents, most of whom are both working full-time now; as oppposed to the '50's & '60's when usually only the husband worked. It is a bit harder coming home after a full day of work and making a good, balanced meal for your family.

What I have found shocking is that people are supposed to be paying no more than 25% of their wages for rent. I don't think I have ever seen under 35 - 40%, which would put an undo burden on the adults and force both of them to work, which makes both of them tired.

But all in all the kids should know better. If they don't learn it at home, then they must learn it at school, right?

Glenn

 

[Joe D]

If we didn't have fat people who would sumo wrestle?

Seriously though, my dad weighs 250+ and my mom weighs 95 lbs, and my ideal weight is right in between. And I am a little bit over but not by much. But in high school I was extremely active(Cross Country, Swimming, Weight Lifting, Golf???) and I could never really get very tone. So I feel genetics are part of it.

The article by Mike Mentzer was very cool, the human body has adapted to storing fat to survive and now we are trying to get the human body to not store fat because we have way too much food at our disposal.

 

[Kenneth]

Although parents certainly have much of the blame I think a fair amount of blame could also be put on our schools and culture. I have three children who live overseas with their mother. None of them are fat. However, they spend 11 hours a day at school (travel time and school time). They also have year round school and phys ed and health is a required part of their studies. My significant other also limits their computer time to the weekends and makes sure they do things outside the house. Two of them also participate in school sports. I think a longer school day, year round school, mandatory phys ed and health classes, and closed campuses to control student diets would definitely help the situation in this country a little.

Cheers,

Kenneth

 

[Brad_Harper]

I really have a hard time believing parents that say they just don't have time to cook their kids decent meals. In the time it takes for someone to go to Burger King and go through the drive thru, I could have made a chicken stir fry and ate it. Cooking well balanced meals is not that hard. You just have to plan ahead a bit when you go grocery shopping. I am the laziest guy I know and I can eat well in under 10 mins most evenings.

 

[Mike Broadman]

I have never seen such a book. That is ridiculous. There are plenty of other kinds of stupid health books, like "How to Get Thin Eating Chocolote" or whatever, but no one suggests that being obese is healthy.

 

[MickeS]

OOh, another "back in my day, kids were great and now they all SUCK and so do their so-called parents!"-thread.



I think this is part of the problem for sure. Kids rarely seem to be out just playing anymore, seems like they're always driven to malls (how's that for a great child environment, huh?) or other places where they just sit around. And sports seems to be mostly through organizations, less of the spontaneous thing at the basketball court or soccer field it used to be (probably thanks to videogames and other things).

I'm not sure what needs to be done, but there's no easy solution to all of this...

 

[RobertR]

It may be ridiculous, but organizations that promote the idea that it's ok and healthy to be obese do exist:

http://www.naafa.org/

 

[Mike Broadman]

Yeah, there's also NAAMBLA, but that doesn't mean there are hundreds of books promoting pedophilia contributing to child safety concerns.

 

[Dome Vongvises]

If I were gambling and had to put my money on something, I'd bet on overeating. I like the odds on that one myself.

Guess what? I'm fat, and I'm working out at the gym to shed the pounds. I'm much more muscular now (shirts getting tighter) but that damn belly isn't going away. I'm eating less and cut out greasy and fried foods, but I still have a huge gut. I do great ab exercises too.

So no excuses. HIT THE TREADMILL AND WEIGHT ROOM. IF I CAN LOSE THIRTY POUNDS, SO CAN YOU!!!

P.S. actually, Haggai has seen me, and I'm not morbidly obese. I just feel fat.

 

[D. Scott MacDonald]

I think that this largely nails it. When I was a kid, I would take off with my friends in the morning and play all day. This doesn't happen anymore. Parents need to to organize the kids time via playdates, organized sports, or expressly taking them to the park to play or ride bikes. If you don't do this, most other parents will consider you a bad parent and may not let their kids play with yours. These are the new rules in society, but they only work if the parents have the time an inclination to make them work (which many do not), and even then most kids don't get the same level of excercise that I used to when I was a kid (when my friends and I would jump on our bikes and ride 20+ miles a day).

 

[Evan S]

Time Magazine did a special report just a few weeks ago on the obesity problem in America. There are a lot of causes and the solutions are often difficult.

1) abundance of unhealthy fast food in America and the proliferation of fast food advertising.
2) reduction of physical activity by school age children, which promotes the lack of physical activity in adulthood.
3) video games and computers as well as the addition of over 400 channels of cable programming to attract kids attention.
4) relative cost of cooking a healthy meal (expensive if you get a lean cut of steak) vs. the cheap ability to nuke a hot pocket purchased at the local convenience store. Statistics prove lower income families are typically higher in BMI index weights than high income earners.

Me? I was pudgy in high school and college. I drank beer, ate fast food and very rarely played intramurals (mostly because I was on the college golf team and traveled a lot). When I was 23 I got into lifting weights and playing hockey. Now I am 5'10" 180lbs with 8% body fat. I eat what I want, but in moderation. I NEVER eat fast food (MAYBE once a month, tops). I only eat till the hunger subsides, never more. I don't buy ice cream, I get frozen yogurt instead. I drink diet soda.

It's hard, but with the proper eating habits and exersize routine, 98% of the population can be healthier and thinner.

 

[MarkHastings]

I gotta agree with those talking about people getting more exercise in the past. I was discussing carbs with some of my parents friends and they were all like "Why are carbs bad? We grew up eating bread and pasta and we're fine!"

I argued that when they were young, they did a lot more physical activities (to burn off those sugars). Hell, even thier jobs were more strenuous than ours. Now a days, the typical person drives to work, sits at a computer and hardly walks around much. And when we leave and come home, we use our electronic garage door openers so we don't have to get out of the car and life the garage doors.

Now, I drive 5 houses down to visit my friend, 30 or 40 years ago, this would have been mind blowing.

 

[JonZ]

Dome,
Id suggest eating more small meals throughout the day,and decreasing ur carbs and fat. Also 40-a hour of cardio a few times a week.

Dont feel bad.If its that last 20 pounds, its the hardest to loose. Your body is very stubborn and doesnt want to give up that last 20 pounds of blubber.

I know

Congrads on loosing 30 pounds though

 

[Dean Martin]

Many times I see people coming out of Mcdonalds and they are incredibly obese and I'm thinking 'WHAT are you doing here???"

 

[Scott McGillivray]

I am curious if those that say "Just stop eating so much" would say a similar thing to an alcoholic or drug addict. No need for AA or other organizations...just stop drinking. No need to help an anorexic...just toss some food down their throat.

Let face it, there is a LOT more to it than that. There are dozens of factors and each case is different.

 

[MarkHastings]

Scott, I was going to say the same thing. Even though obesity is caused by overeating, it's not always something a person can just stop doing once they've gotten additcted. Just like people who smoke, or people who drink, or any other additction.

The thing with food addictions is, there is a reason why we eat food, so the lines between "eating to live" and "addiction" sometimes get blurred. And it is much easier to get addicted to food since we eat food every day since we are born (unlike other addictions like smoking or drinking alcohol).

I serious doubt that ANYONE who is extremely overweight is doing it because they want to be fat. If you truly believe that a fat person can easily stop eating, then why aren't they doing it? They're not stupid.

 

[MarkHastings]

Scott, I was going to say the same thing. Even though obesity is caused by overeating, it's not always something a person can just stop doing once they've gotten additcted. Just like people who smoke, or people who drink, or any other additction.

The thing with food addictions is, there is a reason why we eat food, so the lines between "eating to live" and "addiction" sometimes get blurred. And it is much easier to get addicted to food since we eat food every day since we are born (unlike other addictions like smoking or drinking alcohol).

I serious doubt that ANYONE who is extremely overweight is doing it because they want to be fat. If you truly believe that a fat person can easily stop eating, then why aren't they doing it? They're not stupid.

 

[Ted Lee]

 

[Ted Lee]