Though I do not have any children of my own yet, the idea of child obesity is terrifying. I am living in a time period where the possibility of a generation full of sick or dying people due to chronic diseases could be a reality. And when you consider that it is all preventable – that kids are sitting and eating themselves to death – it is staggering.
My family is pretty big. Just from my father side, I have at least 20 cousins. And we all range from our 40s to early teens. Very few of my teenage cousins are at a healthy weight. The cousins within my age group were all chopsticks thin during our teens. It is interesting for me to watch how as my family assimilates into mainstream American culture, our body morph from chopsticks to Pillsbury Dough Boys.
During a visit to an uncle a few years ago, his 10 year old son challenge me to a game of Dance Dance Revolution (pre-Wii era). There was only one mat and one remote controller. I ended up dancing on the mat while my chubby little cousin challenged me on the sofa with the remote controller. He exercised his thumbs while I moved my entire body. I lost pretty badly. I remember complaining annoyingly to my uncle about the gloating I received from the child. Five years later, my chubby little cousin is a sourly overweight teen.
My uncle’s complacent attitude is probably the biggest contributing factor to my cousin’s weight. Children are developmentally unable to understand the long term health consequences of their sedentary lifestyle and food choices. My uncle owns half an acre, a huge backyard compared to the typical eighth of an acre in California, but his kids are rarely outside playing. With both parents running their own businesses, it is much easier for them to just give in their children’s demands for sugary cereals, salty chips, and video games.
I think most parents do not make the connection that by taking the easier route they are compromising the future health of their child. Monitoring what your children eat and teaching them to make wise food choices is an important duty. It is a duty that deserves equal if not more consideration than which educational toys to put in the nursery or planning for a college education. After all, if you do not have health, you have nothing.
But what do I know, I am not a parent.
Until next time and thanks for stopping by Small Steps to Health.
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{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
There are lots of fathers and mothers out there, but a lot less parents.
Letting your kids do and eat whatever they want is not parenting.
Setting them up for type 2 diabetes, obesity, etc… is not parenting.
What does your uncle think of this post???
I agree with you Asithi. I think part of the reason I’ve never been fat is that both my parents were quite strict with our diets when me and my sister were younger. My Mum was constantly getting me and my sister to eat brown bread, fruit and vegetables when we were younger and gave us home cooked meals almost every night. Plus, she used to ration us to one small portion of sweets per week.
I didn’t appreciate it at the time as I just wanted to be able to eat all the treats that the other kids were eating. However, I definitely appreciate it now. I don’t think I would be nearly as disciplined with my eating if my parents hadn’t forced me to eat well all those years ago.
Tom Parker – Free Fitness Tipss last blog post……Vitamin B12 (Cobalamin) Explained
@DR – I rarely comment on people’s parenting including my uncle. When I do say something about parenting, even in general terms, I often get “wait until you have kids, then you’ll see.”
I like to think that I will make the effort because I want to raise children who I would like to spend time with when they are older. It will break my heart if I raise children that have more health problems than me in their 30s when I am in my 60s.
I often get the 1 minute tolerant smile when I talk about my blogging from my family so I doubt it if any of them read my blog. Now if I was turning a profit, maybe they might pay more attention.
@Tom Parker – Did you OD on junk food when you first moved out? I sure did. I remember my first year in college – I had soda at every meal and a Twinkie (or two) every day. But after 10 months of that, out of the blue, one day I just decided that I had enough and stopped. By body just did not like the junk food. I can feel that I was as energetic as before and I always pride myself on having more energy than my friends.
So true about not appreciating the home cooking until you start having to cook for yourself.
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