With the concern today about childhood obesity, it can be troubling for a parent to notice their pre-adolescent gaining weight. The child who at age 6 or 7 was thin and lithe, may by age 9 or t10, begin to appear chubby. According to Miriam Kaufman, a pediatrician at Toronto’s Hospital for Sick Children’s Division of Adolescent Medicine and co-author of “All Shapes and Sizes: Parenting Your Overweight Child,” there is “definitely some weight gain at the beginning of puberty that fuels the growth spurt in kids.” Kaufman, quoted on the Web site TodaysParent.Com, says that between the ages of 10 and 16, children double their weight. While by age 18 most children are proportional, there can be a stage in between when there is a “mismatch between height and weight.”
According to Kaufman, parents should not panic when their pre-adolescent begins to gain weight. She says that the message kids need to hear is not “You’re getting fat,” but “Your body is getting ready to grow taller and that’s why your body shape is changing.”
Research shows, however, that excessive weight gain during preadolescence can be a risk factor for obesity later in life. How do parents know if their children are going through normal growth spurts or beginning a battle with obesity?
Keep Those Well Child Check-Ups
“You can’t just look at a child and tell if there is a weight problem. It can be deceiving,” says Amy Puls, registered dietician with Sky Fitness & Wellbeing in Tulsa. “One of the biggest mistakes I see parents make is forgetting to take their [school age] children in for well-child checks. At a well-child check, the child’s height and weight are measured and plotted on a growth chart. When your child gets regular check-ups these points [on the growth chart] make a curve. Your child will follow his own curve.”
What physicians and parents should look for according to Puls are “steep inclines or major deviations from previous points on the chart. These are better indications of where your child’s health is heading.”
Puls also recommends that parents turn their focus from a child’s weight to a child’s health habits. Does the child eat a balanced diet and get adequate exercise?
Nutrition, Exercise and Sleep
Puls emphasizes increased activity in addition to a healthy diet. “Healthy weight management comes from both a good nutrition plan and a fitness plan,” says Puls. “While having just one or the other is productive, we know from research that long-term health is achieved with both.”
Eric Hudgens, physical education instructor at Town and Country School and director of Personal Best Athletics, a fitness club for kids in third grade to age 18, agrees, adding adequate sleep to a child’s overall health regime. Hudgens encourages students to keep journals noting how they feel when they practice (or neglect) a healthy lifestyle.
“We did a week of breakfast,” says Hudgens. “I had them eat breakfast every day for a week—whatever they wanted—donuts to eggs and ham. I then asked them to journal how they felt before lunch.” He said the children discovered that when they ate a healthy breakfast they were more alert and were less hungry at lunch and, therefore, could think more clearly about making healthy lunch choices.
“I teach kids that their bodies are a mystery to be figured out,” says Hudgens. “What works for one may not work for someone else. If one kid is an athlete, he will need more calories than a kid who is less active. Through journaling they learn what works for them.”
Understand Your Child’s BMI
Hudgens also helps the kids figure their own BMI or Body Mass Index. He believes that the BMI is a more accurate representation of a child’s body composition than simply standing on a scale.
According to the Web site KeepKidsHealthy.com, children are considered overweight if they have a body mass index that is above the 95th percentile for their age. A body mass index above the 85th percentile for a child’s age puts him or her at risk of becoming overweight. They also add that “some kids who are very athletic and have a large muscle mass, may be overweight, but if they do not have excess body fat, then they do not need help with weight loss.”
Sky Fitness Services Director David Haley emphasizes the importance of getting kids moving whether it is walking the dog, playing Frisbee, riding a bike or being involved in a more structured athletic activity. “Parents need to create an opportunity for kids to have fun while getting exercise,” says Haley. “Don’t make it a chore.”
Haley recommends that kids get a balance of aerobic exercise and body weight exercises [as opposed to weight training] such as push ups, pull ups, sit ups and jumping jacks. “Being able to develop more muscle mass helps kids develop a higher metabolic rate—burning calories instead of adding fat.”
According to Puls, pre-adolescence is the perfect time to open up a dialog with children about health and wellness. “Parents need to start that conversation before the teen years,” says Puls. “By the time a child is 6 or 7, parenting changes. Parents should move away from telling a child what to do and toward encouraging kids to learn ‘grown up’ skills such as making healthy food choices.”
For Eric Hudgens the payback is seeing kids develop habits that will serve them the rest of their lives. He teaches kids not to compete against each other, but against themselves—aiming for their own “personal best.” “They aren’t all going to be track stars, but they can find joy in setting new goals.”
To learn more, visit Sky Fitness at www.sky-fit.com or call 299-5500. For information about Personal Best Fitness visit www.personalbestathletics.com. |
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