Reply to My teen daughter is overweight but does not care

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]
So what's your advise? Ignore until the weight creeps up into the obese category? As for the walks: it is more important for me that she gets some sun (separate issue, the kids today spend too much time indoors, no fresh air, no sunlight) than for weight loss. And yeah, I do believe they should be "walked" because these habits form when the kids are young and if we, as parents, don't push a little and teach our kids to get out, they would be stuck indoors now and in the future. I noticed that kids resist a lot of things but once they get going, they enjoy them. It is crazy to allow them to just spend all their time on the computer.[/quote]

Why would you assume that a child who is at a healthy weight, and is gaining at a time when most girls gain (look at the BMI graph I linked earlier for evidence) will become obese?  It's possible, of course, but if so there will be opportunities to intervene later.  Right now the OP needs to be focused on handing off control to her daughter, which means backing off.  That doesn't mean "ignoring" anything.  It means acknowledging that this is not her problem to solve.

As far as taking kids outside, the time to build those habits is when kids are toddlers, preschoolers, and early elementary schoolers.  At those ages there's nothing wrong with saying "get your shoes on, we're going to the park" or "actually we're walking to CVS today, it's a beautiful day for it".  In fact those are wonderful things to say to your child.  But we aren't talking about a young child here.  We're talking about a soon to be adult, who needs to be taking over the responsibility for making those choices, which means they need to be able to say "no thank you" so that they can learn how their body feels with and without exercise. This young lady has an appropriate activity level.  With dance and tennis and a school sport she's putting in a bare minimum of 8 hours a week, probably more than that since many schools have 2 hour practicies, and she might have PE class too.  That's a great activity level, and significantly above that of most adults.  The focus right now should be on helping her maintain that level, especially when she goes off to college and time is pressed and there are temptations everywhere.  Turning exercise into a chore, and setting it up as a power struggle is not going to help that goal.

Finally, why do you make the assumption that this young woman is spending all her time on the computer.  The OP has already named 3 afterschool activities, and it's possible she does other that aren't related to weight.  There's no evidence that she's not also doing homework and engaging socially with peers.  Your asusmption seems odd and unfounded.  [/quote]

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