I think of myself as oftentimes irked, sometimes indignant, and rarely livid. Today, you are going to be finding me downright furious. What a way to come back from a vacation, huh?
I’m confident that after you read this post, you’ll be angry as well, one way or another. Or, any other synonym of your choosing. It deals with our children, after all.
In the news today is an article on placing obese children in foster care. I read it on CNN, but their commentary comes from an article recently released in JAMA. In this article, the authors state that, “in severe instances of childhood obesity, removal from the home may be justifiable from a legal standpoint because of imminent health risks and the parents' chronic failure to address medical problems.” They are defining severe obesity as the 99th percentile on pediatric weight charts. This will become important later on, so remember it.
And yes, that’s right—your inability to assist your child in losing weight may warrant your child’s removal from the home and a transition to foster care. What a wonderful message of self-esteem and confidence for our children: You’re too fat to live with your parents.
This leaves me irate for a number of reasons. First- the dire straits foster care has found itself in recently. In a nation where one in three children are overweight or obese, and the average case worker in foster care is already responsible for 60-75 children, how in the world can anyone recommend a further increase in foster children? How will the system handle this?
Another consideration—involvement of non-parents. In a society where PE and recess are extravagances, in an education system which receives less and less funding each year to provide items like healthy lunch options, in a world where advertisements during children’s programming are filled with McDonald’s, and finally, an economic structure that requires most families to have two working adults (who happen to be working more hours each year), how can parents be the only ones found culpable?
You can see how angry I am by the number of run-on sentences I am refusing to fix.
Then let’s discuss parent’s recent decrease in spending power. In recent years we’ve seen large jumps in childhood obesity. We’ve also seen lots of people lose jobs, homes, or even just cut back. This means less healthy food and less extracurricular activities. This means less doing things and more TV. So even if parents are controlling the fast food, etc. how do they control for what they can afford to put on the table?
There are some detractors who like to argue that healthy foods (fruits and vegetables) are cheaper than processed foods, and in the suburbs (aka high volume grocery stores), this may be the case. In my experience however I have found the opposite to be true. There are many times where a bag of chips costs significantly less than a small bag of potatoes; fruit snacks cost less than apples; a side dish of mac and cheese is much less than a bagged salad. Soda always costs less than juice and milk. This doesn’t even get into the topic of how accessible fresh, healthy foods may be in particular areas. Lack of healthy options in grocery shopping plague urban centers as well as small towns.
This really hits home for me, because I have a child who could be considered obese. I use the word ‘could’ because we just don’t see him that way, and thankfully, neither has his pediatricians. Ant was born in what his pediatrician termed the 125% percentile for both height and weight. He’s stayed there ever since. In fact, at eight years old, Ant is five foot tall, wears men’s sized shoes, and now junior men’s clothes. He’s four inches taller than the 99th percentile. Yes, he’s also well over 120 pounds, and according to the charts, he should only be 90 (99th percentile). My child may be head and shoulders over his peers (literally) when it comes to height and weight, but the height-weight chart has its own issues. Originally issued in 1977 (on early 1960s data), these charts were revamped in 2000, but the CDC has determined that they, once again, need revision, and are currently collecting data sets for a large revamp.
Ant is also a foodie. He loves food—all food. In fact, his plan is to be a food critic as his cover for his secret agent status. He also loves to exercise. Currently, he attends swim lessons twice a week, goes to the pool on off days, and walks with me. He’s not likely to avoid a good roughhousing. He does all of the things that an eight year old boy would do, including playing with Legos, watching TV, and Jonesing for the soda, cookies, and candy that I never buy.
While Ant has chunked up in recent years (and I attribute this partly to the impending massive growth spurt I witnessed in other boys, like my lanky older son), I can tell you exactly when the chunking up began to occur: when he headed off to kindergarten. He began to sit there, after five years of damn-near never sitting.
Sitting still 7 to 8 hours a day, despite the whole, whopping 25 minutes of activity each school day (a luxury, compared to most), does a number on your metabolism. We talk about this all the time in weight loss articles for adults, but never mention it with our children. Then, let’s talk about what is on the lunch menu—all prepackaged, and despite the salad bar (of which my child partakes) pizza, chips, cookies, chicken nuggets and the like are always going to win.
Also, let’s talk about free breakfast. Ant’s school has free breakfast (many schools are utilizing this federal program) for everyone, regardless of ability to pay. While I approve of breakfast at school, and I approve of snacking throughout the day for kids as well, the pop-tarts, muffins, sugary cereals, and DONUTS! are not doing our children any favors. An added perk? I cannot control what he does at breakfast at school! I can feed him breakfast at home, but he will pick up additional breakfast at school. Since there’s no charge, there’s nothing stopping him from doing so. Walking him to the classroom does not work—because the teachers will let them leave to run and get free breakfast as soon after they put away their bags.
Don’t get me started on the average four to five hours of homework each week (for elementary children?) that prevent him from spending more time outside. When I was a child his age, my afternoons and evenings were spent on a bike, not doing worksheets, spelling, reading and math.
So what is a parent to do? I am not certain, but I have some ideas. First, I think I’ll tell the world how pissed off I am about this issue. Next, I think I’ll tell my son’s school. In my non-medical opinion, I think our children need better food and more recess. I’m trying to provide better food at home (even going to the trouble of growing it to offset costs) and I want to see my children’s schools do the same. I try to get my kids active, and I think our whole society should make this a priority. On a more radical note, I think food commercials—especially on children’s programming—should be banned.
Whatever the solution may be, I seriously doubt the threat of a child’s removal from the home will work. His daily routine, my limitations as a parent, our genes, etc. should not cause a child to be punished in one of the most extreme forms imagined. Can you just envision how a child in foster care for their weight must feel? If we are going to take an extreme and life-altering action, why don’t we dedicate our resources to something that may actually work? How about we try supporting parents and children, instead of punishing them?
