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Saturday, January 06, 2007

Overweight Preschoolers?

I just read this article about overweight preschoolers. It seems some hispanics are overfeeding their toddlers and letting them have a bottle until they are three years old! And these kids will have a lifetime of medical problems because of their early obesity. Obesity at three!

Now I find all this way too unbelievable based on my own preschooler. First of all I must admit that I let Jack have candy and ice cream about 2 or 3 times a week, or more. He also knows the golden arches very well, I am ashamed to say. And when asked what he wants to eat, 99% of the time he will say french fries. But he is so far from being obese, it isn't even funny. In fact, he has sprouted an inch or so in the last month and has actually lost a couple of pounds. And this is making putting a pair of 3T pants on the kid very very difficult because they just will not stay up. We used to have one good pair of jeans that fit him really well. Now those jeans are getting too short and fall off his little body. He now owns two pair of toddler belts just to keep the pants from falling to the floor.

So my question is what are those parents doing? I know Jack's diet could be better, but he still does get a lot of fruit and some veggies. And milk? The kid can go through a half a gallon a day in 2% milk EASILY. I do tend to believe that Jack is more active than some kids just based on watching him play and the fact that he doesn't sit still for more than 0.5 seconds at a time. But aren't all toddlers active to some degree? I just don't understand HOW you can produce an obese toddler. It is criminal in my opinion.

1 comment:

Claire said...

Yeah, I'm with you there. Isaac's diet is far from perfect, but he, like I would imagine many toddlers, refuses to eat many meals. It drives me to drinkin', but he sure isn't getting obese that way.