If your child was very overweight, what would you do?

I was a fat kid, and I’ll tell you what.. there’s a difference between constructively trying to encourage healthy foods and more physical activity, while focusing on the health risks and benefits, and telling your kid that they are ugly or will be unloved or undesired as a result of their appearance. The idea isn’t to let your child be oblivious, it’s just to not deliberately make them feel like less of a person. You would address any other disease or illness in your child without insulting their self esteem, why should weight be any different?

I think that if a child is overweight to the point that his/her doctor is concerned about it, then a parent should be able to address the issue with the child by focusing on that: health. Kids shouldn’t be taught that being overweight is ugly – they should be taught that being healthy and active is important. Looks shouldn’t be brought into it at all.

I just can’t imagine that other than some fast-moving disorder befell them…I wouldn’t have them reach a point of overweight, whatsoever. I am (sad to say) overly vigilant about that kind of stuff (w/o, mind you, ever saying anything negative to them about fat or weight or whatever). If they were overweight, I’d do the usual nutrition + exersize and talk to experts at working with children, holistic ones, utilizing mind+body connections. I also recognize the tremendous amount of privilege I possess when it comes to having access to information, insurance, multiple degress relating to the health field, etc.

Like @Simone_De_Beauvoir I can’t imagine it even happening unless it was brought on by some medical condition. My son is usually slightly underweight for his height.

In our case, we’d as a family, get even more active. More hiking, walking, playing outside would be encouraged as a group.

We eat organic. I guess I’d implement a homemade juice prior to each meal. We already have a family rule: Healthy food first ie: if you want a cookie, you may have one if you eat a banana first

I’d put them on a healthy diet and make sure they lived an active lifestyle.

I’d hope that I would have done that, as a parent, in the first place anyway.

First. I was a fat kid. I was the fat kid for many years growing up. It sucked for many reasons. The screwed up thing about it was that I was a fat kid in a family of skinny people. I realized years later that my mother has eating issues and was doing some crazy vicarious eating through me and providing me with some really unhealthy food.

I have 3 kids and all of them are tiny. They are all extremely skinny and eat whenever they want. It’s possible that if we had a house full of junk food, the kids could blow up, but I don’t see that happening.

We know 2 families that have kids my daughter’s age. The girls are extremely overweight. In both cases, the families eat at McDonald’s all the time and make eating large amounts of junk food a family-bonding experience. The doctors have told the parents that they are not healthy, so the parents are attempting to make some lifestyle choices in order to get their weight down.

In my opinion, you don’t focus on the weight – you focus on developing healthy eating and exercise habits. My kids are always outside and active. We don’t have video games and we don’t watch TV. If you eat junk and sit in front of the tv, it’s easy to put on weight.

F*ck the way society will judge my kids. I want them to lead healthy, long lives.

@tom_g ” I realized years later that my mother has eating issues and was doing some crazy vicarious eating through me and providing me with some really unhealthy food.” – sorry to hear it.

I would also like to add that my stepchildren struggle with weight issues, and I think that gives me a unique perspective because I didn’t have the control over their diets in a way that I could have prevented it. Which leaves me in a position where I have to do my best to undo bad habits that have already been learned.
I definitely don’t make them feel bad about the way they look. It doesn’t even have to come up, and it never should. The focus in our household is on health and wellness.

Instead of making my child insecure, I would conduct a complete change for the whole family. Healthy eating, family exercise, and family encouragement. It’s only fair.
My mother wants to be healthy and she tried just changing her diet while allowing the rest of the family to continue unhealthy eating. That failed, so now we are doing a complete change for the entire family. We all need to hop on the ride for it to work successfully, since a lot of kids, and people don’t have the will power to resist an oatmeal cream pie or two (for example, you can change “oatmeal cream pie” with your personal favorite unhealthy snack) once in a while.
Growing up overweight I know that I needed help from the people in my environment to keep my morale about losing weight high. So, I would do just the full-family change for my own child.

Much like @MacBatman31 I’d make it a family affair. I wouldn’t want to single my child out and add to his/her insecurity. I think it’d be a good way to bring the family together alongside the positive health benefits for all.
Having said that, I wouldn’t allow it to get to that stage in the first place.

@stardust I agree, but for sake of discussion, if it did get to that point, I feel the family affair would be the best approach. Especially if you made small, subtle changes over time. The family would hardly notice until they are completely changed and realize they actually like the change that is made. Nothing beats family bonding either! :)

Are we also assuming that I’m lacking severe knowledge about health and lacking the awareness to see the initial onset of extra weight as well? Because that’s the only way I could see that happening.

There is a difference between conveying the message that size matters and conveying the message that you have to take care of your body in order for it to function well and remain healthy over the long term.

In short, rather than conveying “being overweight is a character flaw” you need to convey that being overweight means that you need to keep an eye on what you eat and how much your exercise if you want reduce your chance of obesity related health problems in the future.

I’d wake up, realise it was just a bad dream & go have another game of tennis with him/her.

My Sister in law had a serious issue with her oldest son, who has numerous health concerns. They joined a special “study” that was trying to find ways to relate to overweight children. When the study was over, the families made up an internet group to keep in touch with tips and ideas on what works and what doesn’t.

Perhaps you could find a similar online group.

I’d put them to exercise a whole damn more. It’s enough that I am over the weight for my age and height. I don’t need others to follow me that young ^^

If I was still me then my child wouldn’t be overweight unless due to some imbalance of the thyroid or whatever. I’m one of those weirdos who doesn’t believe children under 5yrs old should be given fast food or junk foods. I also believe in outdoor games, outdoor activities and mingling with other children to play instead of hole-ing up indoors to develop callouses on the hands from playing video games. If my kid became fat due to my neglect then I’d feel like crap and start looking around for some groups/camps/trainers, whatever.

Every kid should be able to at least reach adulthood not fat and after that, whatever they make of themselves is on them.

I was the fat kid. It happened slowly, but I was fat by 2nd grade and obese by 7th or sooner. My mom felt guilty for how her remarriage was affecting me and allowed me to self-soothe through food. Then it went to eating due to boredom. Then it was habit. She tried to encourage me to go on Weight Watchers with her a couple of times or mention in passing that I should watch what I eat, but was never proactive about it.

Because of this, I am hyper-aware of my daughter’s size. (She is fine. I just have a tendency to get upset with my mom and MIL for giving her so many treats.) I’m not perfect; she does eat some junk food and probably watches too much TV, but she also runs around like a maniac playing for hours at a time and loves vegetables.

I can’t imagine letting her weight ever get to a point of concern. If she somehow does start gaining weight, I will address it at the pudgy stage and make whatever changes necessary to get her back to an appropriate weight. I would not make her feel bad about herself. It would be addressed as a health issue.

I think if a kid’s weight suddenly ballooned out, there would be other signs that something is wrong. I’m not talking about a strictly medical issue—I’m thinking they may be depressed. I’d check to see if their grades were starting to slip. Do they want to sleep all the time when they used to be active? Are they putting off bathing and other self-care routines? Are they showing signs that they might be getting food from other sources and secretly binge eating?

Obesity can be a sign of serious emotional problems—especially in kids near puberty. I’d likely first ask the doctor for a round of blood tests to rule out physiological problems and then try to talk to her and see if there were some problems in school or something she isn’t comfortable talking about.

I don’t think people should assume that it would NEVER happen in their household because they have so many good healthy habits in the house. Eating disorders can happen anywhere to anyone in any family. And sometimes, the more you think you can make rules and control what your kids eat, the more they might try to prove you wrong.

Feed them a nutritious diet and keep healthy snacks around the house, all while knowing they most likely will grow up just fine without interference from government, medication, or activists.