Dopers overweight as children: What would you criticize your parents for?

In My Humble Opinion
61

I definitely blame my mother for my continuing weight problems well into adulthood. While I know she MEANT well, what she did to me as a kid messed me up so bad mentally and emotionally I’m still dealing with it.

From as far back as I can remember (about 7 or 8) I was constantly on a diet. Whether I wanted to be or not. Jenny Craig, Weight Watchers, Tops, Nutrisystem, I was on them all and then some (including ridiculous fad ones). They also attempted to ‘bribe’ me to lose weight with things like toys and when I got older a car. I was not allowed anything sweet at all. The most hated phrase of my childhood was “you don’t need it”. At parties and family get togethers she would refuse to let me have any cake or treats that the other children would have and I often had to sit there watching all the other ‘thin’ kids eating cake and ice cream while I sat there with nothing. Nearly daily I would hear such things as “you have such a pretty face but…” and “you can’t wear that, it makes you look fatter” and the much loved “when you lose weight THEN the boys will like you.” Any time there was a talk show about fat kids and how miserable they were, I would be forced to stop whatever I was doing and sit down and watch the entire thing. Weekly weigh-ins were mandatory and when I got older and in my senior year of high school I started to resist more and she started to threaten me with such things as losing my car privileges and even threatening to pull me from school and force me to transfer so I couldn’t graduate with my friends. In the end, it completely backfired. I remember hoarding sweets and candy in my room as a kid, binging on candy bars that I was supposed to be selling for school. Hell, I remember once having about 30 Advent Calenders to sell for German class and sitting down and opening up the little windows in all of them, stuffing myself with the chocolate until I was sick. It completely affected me in the opposite way she intended.

It should be noted that my mom was (and still is) overweight, as am I. My daughter, who is 3, is beginning to show signs of overeating and I’ve been talking to a dietitian about the proper way of handling it, as I know what can happen if it’s approached the wrong way. But still my mother’s trying to force me to do what she did to me as a child. It’s caused some fights between us and brought up some old resentments on my part, but I’m not backing down. No way I’m putting my child through what I had to endure.

62

I can’t believe the stuff I’m reading. How is it not the parents’ responsibility? These are children we are talking about. I don’t care if your child is uncomfortable at the conversation you are about to have, obesity is an epidemic and they are your responsibility. Not knowing how to cook or having latchkey kids isn’t an excuse.

Would you neglect to teach your children how to brush their teeth? I didn’t think so. Why neglect the rest of their health? Look at the rise of Type 2 Diabetes in children. I’m horrified everytime I see a significantly overweight kid. Horrified. That’s their life you’re messing with. The consequences of being the ‘fat kid’ extend well into adulthood.

You don’t have to degrade your child or put them on a ‘diet’, but a diet is basically what you’re eating. Change your diet. Exercise. And for Pete’s sake, see a friggin doctor if you can afford it!

I don’t advocate removing overweight kids from their parents’ homes like others do*, but not paying attention to your child’s weight or doing anything about it is a parenting FAIL.

If a parent wakes up one day and says, “Oh, little Suzie is lookin’ a little tubby 'round the waist!” and doesn’t do anything about it, it is absolutely 100 per cent their fault.** And a parent who doesn’t notice their kid is 40 pounds over weight in third grade needs a few slaps upside the head.

*Unless it is very extreme.
**This excludes kids who are chunky/overweight ‘naturally’ and their parents are on top of it.

63

This is a prime example of what you shouldn’t do. I was a little chubby in high school - still within a normal BMI - and my mom would try to bribe me. Later in college, I’d have a bout with anorexia. But really, my mother didn’t know how to cook anything and she stocked the place full of junk food, pizza, soda, and mac & cheese. Er, duh. (She also is rather laxative-dependent and lived off of diet soda for most of my childhood.)

My son was a chunky kid at 2 and he’s a skinny rail now. Even at six, he has a basic understanding about calories and nutrition. He’s pretty good about what he eats and even though he wants to eat EVERYTHING, a salad and fruit is his most-requested sack lunch. He also grew up so far on water (or flavored water) and not juice. So, your daughter may really just have ‘baby fat’.

best of luck. :slight_smile:

64

I was in the 98th percentile for weight by age 2, though I was exclusively breastfed for the first 9 months of life, and still largely breastfed until I was 2 and a half. There is no adult woman on my father’s side of the family who is anything smaller than a size 20. Women on my mother’s side of the family tend toward chubbiness around the middle and big hips. I’ve got both genetic legacies writ large on my very large body.

But I am and have long been larger than just my genetic heritage would explain, because of my emotional behaviors and emotional eating.

I would, in hindsight, not criticize my mom, but wish that she had been able to understand that it was counterproductive to try so hard to make me thinner (in fits and spurts) rather than making me healthier, emotionally.

I was prone to anxiety and depression from the youngest age, and when my mother would restrict foods, I’d get worried and scared, and then I’d stop eating altogether, then binge in the middle of the night or when I had any unrestricted kitchen access. (Where binge = 2 peanut butter & jelly sandwiches, or handfuls of cookies, I was eight years old.)

I didn’t overeat, per se, most of the time, but when I did, it was always binge-like and always emotional. I got sad or scared and I’d want a milkshake or some cookies, and I often got them because they calmed me down, stopped me from shaking and crying. (And they still do 30 years later.) I don’t think anyone realized what a habit it became and how much of an impact it had.

But it was the early 80s and no one was really talking about anxiety and depression in children. But Weight Watchers was starting its first big advertising push (Lynn Redgrave showing how she went from tent dresses to form-fitting pencil skirts, and the first line of WW branded frozen foods) and clearly my being fat (and my mother being pudgy) was because I was an overeater with no willpower or understanding of “good” vs. “bad” foods, not because I was from a long line of fat females with a messed up brain.

65

Actually childhood obesity rates have been falling for the last decade, and especially amongst preschool aged children.

66

While that link provides some very good news, it does not say what you think it says. The numbers went down in the 2007 - 2008 period compared to 2003 - 2006, which was a peak. That is not “falling the last decade”; it is falling in the most recently reported period. It is still at 10.4 percent, which is still up from the 5% norm of three decades ago and still can be called an epidemic.

That said, it is nevertheless excellent news. As a society we have been making changes and increasing awareness of what healthy habits actually are and how important they are. Some mock the efforts, but this is a sign that it is working. I’d have been thrilled to just see that the year on year increase had stopped; to see an actual decrease is golden. It complements nicely the fact that

67

I think that parents just need to pay attention and take responsibility over what they’re feeding their kids. Saying, “Well, big bones run in my family,” is not an excuse to feed your child junk. I also think that kids who are overweight should be seen by a doctor and that it really is the parents’ responsibility to create a food-healthy household. According to the CDC, 17 per cent of children (2-19) are obese. Not ‘overweight’, but obese. According to the link that tumbleddownprovided, about 1/3 of children are overweight or obese.

It’s really sad.

68

I don’t think anyone is saying that parents aren’t responsible for the health of their children - more that some people can’t really blame their own parents because they didn’t have the knowledge or resources to address the issue.

The problem with dealing with overweight kids (especially teenagers) is that it is not as simple as the child being ‘uncomfortable at the conversation’, it is more complex than that. It’s entirely possible for a parent to instill life-long self esteem problems and permanently damage a kids feelings of self-worth and belonging - quite a few people in this thread have referred to this. I’m not saying that parents should just sit back and do nothing - providing healthy food and encouraging exercise is obviously good. But even good parents aren’t there every second and some kids will overeat and can be incredibly sneaky. Overall it’s not as easy as just “hey you - you’re awfully fat, why don’t you try being less fat?”.

69

And even if the kid ISN’T overweight, but gets told that s/he needs to lose weight, this can cause lifelong problems.

70

Citizinpained, I think you’re oversimplifying something that’s not clear-cut.

Some of the stories relayed by the folks in this thread carry the same motifs of my own upbringing. But I didn’t grow up fat. And I know parents who make wholesome meals, who are kind and loving and non-critical, and encourage physical activities, and still have kids that get tubby.

It seems to me that nagging parents–the ones who give their kids a complex about their looks–are the ones really not doing their kids any favors. I’m not excusing the deep-fried parenting, especially in this day and age when education on nutrition is widespread, but the emotional stuff can’t be overlooked.

It’s one thing to shape a healthy diet for a small child and be proud of their thinness. But parents have less control over what happens to them when they get to be a teenager and start dealing with the stressors of life. My cousin, a year older than me, was not a fat kid, but she ballooned during her teenaged years. How is a parent supposed to stop that without being one of the naggy bitches mentioned in this thread? I honestly don’t know…this is not a rhetorical question.

I personally think I am blessed with a faster-than-normal metabolism. Once I started driving in high school, you couldn’t stop me. I’d stop by Publix before school and get a giant donut from the bakery for breakfast. I’d eat lunch brought from home plus a school lunch. Then after school, it was “let’s get ice cream sundaes at McDonalds!” On Friday nights, I’d go to work at Six Flags and pig out there for a few hours and then go home and eat a regular dinner. My only exercise was orchestra. Yeah, all that fiddling really burns calories. :rolleyes: It’s amazing I wasn’t fat (though I do look kind of fluffy in the face in pictures from that time…especially compared to now). I didn’t have any emotional problems. I was just a greedy teenager. My parents didn’t say anything because they didn’t know.

If I had been fat, would it have been my parents’ faults? How? I had a damn car and my own spending money. Even if they had raised me as a Jainist, they couldn’t have stopped me from doing what I wanted once I started being more mobile.

I agree that parents have some control, especially in the early years. And that there are ways that they can correct bad habits without shame and wrecking self-esteem. But it’s not easy, and I don’t know if it’s helpful to lay all the blame at parents. Or the kids, for that matter. It just seems too complicated a matter to point fingers at every little wrong thing.

71

Great post, monstro.

Hearing people like CitizenPained actually helps me understand why my parents (my mother, particularly) were so hard on me. They were being judged by people like CP as being crappy uncaring parents, when in actual fact they were doing all they knew how to help me stop gaining weight. Unfortunately, the way they went about it probably caused me more problems in the long-run.

ETA: Just to be clear, I don’t blame/criticise my parents for me being fat as a child, but they definitely played a role in the on-going issues I’ve had with food which have contributed to me being obese as an adult.

72

I didn’t notice this before - but, is this your 6 year old son you’re talking about?

Because you might want to be careful of instilling the “fat people are disgusting and should be stared at and judged in public” idea in him. For one, he will remember it if he ever does struggle with his weight and knowing his own mother is ‘horrified’ probably won’t help matters. And for another, I really think the incredibly negative ‘no fatties’ attitude so many Americans have is hugely counterproductive in addressing the obesity problem. I know there are lots of people who feel that shame and public ridicule are the proper comeuppance for both kids and adults who dare to be fat, but for most people it doesn’t help. It breeds a cycle of self-hatred and depression and avoidance of exercise for fear of looking foolish. It encourages self-medication with food because hey, you’ll always be fat and worthless so you may as well enjoy yourself, right?

I’m not saying everyone feels this way, and maybe for some being shamed really does result in weight loss. But personally I think we could do a lot better by being supportive and positive rather than harsh and judgmental. YMMV, of course.

73

Word to this. My best friend and her sisters were skinny children and are skinny adults, but all of them have unhealthy body image issues because as children their mother made it sound like being fat was the worst possible thing that could happen to them. She would keep them from eating a second helping of dinner by puffing out her cheeks, pretending to cry and wail things like, “Now I’m fat and I’m all alone! You don’t want to be like this, do you?” Bizarre shit.

Now I hear my best friend teasing her 18-month-old daughter for being so chunky, having fat cheeks, etc., and she does it with affection (“aww, look at those fat chipmunk cheeks!”), but I worry that she’s going to keep doing that as her baby grows into girlhood and it’s going to fuck her up.

74

I don’t necessary want to *blame * my parents for anything. But my three brothers and I definitely grew up in an environment where my parents were either working or sitting in front of the tv. There was NO physical activity at all (not that I pursued it, either) and most of the food was stuff that could be prepared as cheaply and as easily as possible. My parents did not have the energy or inclination to argue with us when we didn’t want to eat something, so I often ate junk instead of whatever was prepared for dinner.

Both of my parents were overweight. All of us boys were overweight until we moved out of the house, after which we all lost some weight. I am still at least 20# - 25# overweight, and I struggle every day with food issues… but at least now I exercise regularly, which helps keep me somewhat in check.

75

I really think the key is in how you approach it. My dad always approached it as, “well, you can’t have this, but we can.” He was good on certain things–there was no sugared cereal in the house until I was nine or so, there was very seldom candy around–but there was always dessert, always cake, always cheese and pizza and popcorn. And everyone else could have them, but I was supposed to exercise the self-control not to. Six year olds aren’t exactly big on self-control. Six year olds are smart enough to recognize when parents are being hypocrites.

If a parent is confronted with a child who has a weight problem, then (s)he needs to approach it as a family issue. I think it’d’ve gone a lot better if, instead of me just being on a diet, or my dad harping on me to lose weight, the entire family had decided to eat healthier. Over time, that would become the new normal. It would’ve been easier to adjust.

Also, there’s a fine line between pointing out the weight issue, and being an asshole about it. You don’t make a kid feel like a failure, or worthless. That’s not proper motivation, no matter what the problem is. Yelling isn’t, either; yelling just teaches you not to get caught eating.

76

I wasn’t terribly overweight, though my mom was convinced I was, and sent extremely conflicting messages about food. Mom equated food with love. If I loved her, I’d eat. And eat. And eat. If I didn’t eat, I didn’t love her. Common snacks were chips covered in velveeta and microwaved. Breakfast was often a hot dog bun with chocolate chips poked in and microwaved. (Mom didn’t like to get up to cook, so I had to cobble together whatever was available.) Somehow I stayed somewhat skinny as a young kid, but I was never enough, even after I developed an eating disorder in high school. I still remember all the work it took me - I went to the library and read every book I could find on anorexia and other eating disorders, selected the one I thought would work best and got to work.

At that point, my lunch (really, brunch, because I didn’t eat breakfast) was four triscuits and one slice of fat-free American cheese. I looked forward to that meal all day long, but felt so guilty eating it. I hated having anyone see me eat. Then I’d work it off during volleyball practice, which was 5 hours a day 6 days a week in the summer and 3 hours a day 6 days a week during the school year (excluding games & tournaments).

I ate dinner to keep myself semi-alert, and mom would push me to eat, but when I did eat what she pushed on me, she’s criticize me. “Do you really think you should eat that?” It wasn’t until I graduated college that I started eating without a terrible amount of guilt (though eating in front of other people is still hard).

I’m slightly overweight now, which I’m not happy about. And whenever my mom comes to visit, she insists on cooking fatty, unhealthy foods, then comments on the food on my plate and how much I’ve eaten. She also seems to delight in comparing the food on my plate to hers. “Oh, overly. I can’t believe you at all that. I just couldn’t finish mine! I sure hope you were hungry. A moment on the lips, you know.”

Mom is extremely overweight and has struggled with her weight since I can remember.

77

This seems to be recurring theme throughout this thread. Me and monstro’s parents are the same way: obese and yet overly fond of making comments about other people’s weight. Sometimes to their face (in the form of “jokes”) or behind their backs.

What is the psychology behind this? Sometimes I wonder if my parents lapse into forgetfulness about their own weight problems and see themselves as they were 40 years ago, when they were both thin and in a much better position to be smug about weight.

78

Wise words. I think it’s far from a coincidence that all the people I know with disordered eating and severe body image issues had parents who were quite vocal about how horrified and disgusted by fat people they were. These are people who ranged from naturally underweight to overweight as kids, yet the issues they end up with are very much the same.

I’m afraid I’m not so good at masking my horrified expressions when I hear the fat-phobic comments people think it’s perfectly fine to make in front of children. :frowning: It’s so depressingly prevalent, and I don’t know how I am going to handle adults doing it in front of my own (future) children…

79

I think it is sometimes part of their own self hate. They probably make the same comments to themselves all the time in their self-talk.

And it sort of goes with the idea of if you hate it enough you might not do it or might scare yourself off eating.

80

Sure. I’m talking about parents who aren’t willing to deal with it, aren’t paying attention, or simply don’t care.

You don’t have to give your kid a complex. I think it’s a shame when a parent says, “Well, I know Suzie Q is 50 lbs overweight, but 9 is such a sensitive age!”

I agree - but didn’t you say your nieces were much younger? I was trying to aim this at parents with younger overweight children. (And even if the kids are older, it doesn’t mean you can’t be a responsible and involved parent.)

Again, I think there is a difference between a fat 9 year old and a fat 17 year old. And even with the fat 17 year old, this warrants a convo, a visit the doctor, and some really frank discussion about what your obsession with food is.

There will always be things that parents can’t control…it’s the ‘not involved/can’t be bothered/don’t want to talk about it/overindulgent/I have 10 million excuses’ parents that can shoulder much of the blame.

There are parents that provide well for their kids, help them do their homework every day, love them dearly and feed them into fatness and indulge every candy bar. That is doesn’t mean you’re the ultimate failure as a parent. It means you’re neglecting your child in matters of his/her health.

Yes, and I wrote that because last week I took him out and we saw two kids that looked a bit like this and this. (So sad you can Google “fat kids”…that was the best I could do.) We were at the movie theatre and they were in line for their giant tubs of popcorn, soda and candy. I kid you not. The girl, who was no more than six, was also wearing lip gloss and gaudy bangles around her arms and glittery flats and leggings (ehh…) and her shirt barely fit around her six year old fat boobs and belly. Their parents were, not surprisingly, very obese. Those kids were WADDLING.

At the same theatre, we saw a little boy who was obese and his dad (presumably) was stick thin and his mom a little ‘chubby’, but ‘typical’ for her age.

He said to me (in all seriousness and not meanness) once we were away, “Mom, how come those kids were so fat? That’s not healthy.” When he does see a very fat child, his eyes get huge.

I live in Denver and I don’t know if it’s a regional thing or what, but I see more fat kids here than I did growing up in Iowa.

That’s not the attitude that I have. I am talking about parents who let their kids get that big. No one gets morbidity obese overnight.

My dad is obese. He has heart disease and had a heart attack on my birthday this year. My son and my dad are close and my dad has an addiction to food. It is SO HARD for him. He also ‘loves’ us with food, insisting on sodas, ice cream, dinners out, whatever. It’s hard for me to function when I go visit because I always feel so yucky when I leave if I’m eating the junk and having a sugar crash.

And sometimes my son will say when my dad is not around, “Mom, Grandpa eats too much.”

He can’t compute. In his school, they are only allowed to bring ‘healthy’ snacks, there are no birthday treats, no vending machines, lots of play time and recess and they do health class starting from K.

He has a dessert packed in his lunch every day. But it’s a piece of chocolate, not…chocolate milk, cookies, chips, & PBJ (with a 200 cal. banana thrown in for good measure).

Being the fat kid is no fun, but no one just wakes up one day and discovers they are in a fat suit. Being overweight is often linked to mental and/or genetic issue and that needs to be evaluated by a doctor and parents need to be involved.