Hi David–

Best of luck with it all.  You’d better start gearing up for battle because it isn’t easy.

Best–

MRE

I guess I was lucky in that I took home ec with a teacher that taught us to cook from scratch.

Hi Esther–

I love your line about your mother being “dedicated to eating as many carbs as she can get away with and still have normal blood sugar readings.”  How well that describes so many people.  Unfortunately, excess insulin is working behind the scene to store fat, increase fluid retention, thicken arterial walls, deposit fat in the liver, and slowly but surely chip away at good health, and all the while these people go blissfully along patting themselves on the back for having normal blood sugars.

Best–

MRE 

They consider ‘lunch’ something like, green beans from a gigantic can, ‘fruit salad in syrup’ from a gigantic can, tater tots, and often something fried or in bread as the main course, plus milk and some kind of dessert. If I WANTED to set up an experiment to ensure diabetes I couldn’t do much better. It’s just so horrifying. And all this is set up by a nutritionist of course, HA HA HA.

They don’t have much recess anymore. And they canceled half the things they did at recess that were the most energetic, like soccer for example — if one kid complains, “the others are being mean!” it doesn’t matter if it’s true or not, or what the detail, they just don’t want to deal with supervising it so they say no more of that.

So how can I complain when she comes home from school at 3:30 and insists she is starving? She’s had nothing but carbs since 7:30am for the most part, of course she’s starving. And yet she’s getting chubby. And then she feels guilty – she asked me if she had an eating disorder because it feels like she’s always hungry. For godssakes.

Her father and I are divorcing (the best benefit of my 100lb recent weight loss) and when he leaves in two weeks, this house is lowcarb, including all her food and her lunch. I’ll let her have LC bread and any fruit/veg she wants, but the starchy BS the school (and her dad, who doesn’t work and manages her food) feeds her is a thing of the past. Some of my family think I am being ‘unreasonable’ and ‘forcing my diet on my kid’ but I think I’m just finally taking the responsibility to feed her properly.

Hi PJ–

I think you’re doing the right thing for both you and your daughter by getting the junk out of the house.  See today’s most recent post on how our kids are making us fat and not doing themselves a lot of good either.

Cheers–

MRE

As for the food pyramid, I tried to follow the low fat, high carb food pyramid for several years. I just got fatter & fatter and ended up diabetic. Low carb has turned things around for me.

Hi Dan–

You’re right.  BMI is technobabble for height and weight.  The old height and weight tables had an advantage, though, because they listed body frame along with height and weight, adding an extra variable.  The more variables, the more accuracy.

Glad to hear that low-carb has done the trick for you.

Best–

MRE

Hi Scott–

I’m not familiar with the term ‘at risk for overweight’ as a function of what a person’s weight already is.  I would assume that you’re right, and that they call obese kids overweight and the merely overweight ‘at risk for overweight.’

Pitiful.

Best–

MRE

I was inadvertently thinking of “The Bear” (not a convicted killer), who typically traded his carbs for real protein and fat whilst in prison. Interestingly enough, he traded his carbs for pork, with the Muslims.

I guess he was smarter than the average bear.   I couldn’t resist.

Cheers–

MRE 

Hi Jay–

Your grandmother probably knows more about nutrition than most medical professionals.

Cheers–

MRE 

I already knew how to sew quite well (which didn’t win me any points with the teacher), but even at that young age I was appalled that they were teaching us to “cook” with Bisquick and other boxed mixes (I’m sure I didn’t keep my opinions to myself, either). It was one of the biggest wastes of time I ever had in school and I think I got a fairly lousy grade (a C ?) because I couldn’t stop saying “this isn’t cooking”. I had been baking cakes from scratch since I was in grade school, even winning a local contest twice, so I’m sure I was a royal pain to that teacher.

More recently, for K & 1st grade I packed my son’s lunch every day. Now in 2nd grade he has been asking for school lunch and about once a month I relent and let him (he always chooses the Domino’s pizza, I’m sure). It amazes me that some parents think the school lunch is great (and it *is* much better than some of the “home packed” lunches I have seen on my volunteer days – - plastic sacks of “warehouse” fare like Lunchables, chips, fruit leather candy, etc., usually eaten by some of the chubbiest, most hyper, or chronically unhealthy kids.

This year the school has initiated a lot of diet and food related programs for all grade levels (to combat increasing childhood obesity) and it is making me crazy – low fat everything and no mention of the junk carbs! My son told me I used too much butter and it was dangerous. They were looking for parents to volunteer for the district and school food committees but I knew that I would be facing all the federal and CA state mandate/guidelines that adhere to the pyramid, so I didn’t do it. If I thought I could truly make a difference in the school lunch program I would in a heartbeat, but I think I would just be a thorn in the committee’s side. Even if I could convince the local folks of the misguised wisdom in following the lopsided food pyramid, I don’t think they would have the guts to do anything about it unless they were willing to break with the federal school lunch program, which I doubt would happen. It all comes down to the garbage food being cheaper.

BTW, I had a great thing happen tonight. My son has finally started to eat salad but only without dressing (he doesn’t yet like tart or spicy foods very much). He asked for Ranch dressing recently, because he has had it at friends’ houses. I usually make vinaigrette-type dressings, but I looked up a recipe and made Ranch with home-cultured raw cream instead of buttermilk (no envelope!). I was surprised at how easy and good it was. He loves it and says it is better than the squeeze bottle kind. I’m making headway.

Cheers,
Anna

Hi Anna–

Your child told you that you were using too much butter and that it was dangerous?  God help us all.

Keep fighting the good fight.  Seems like we are never going to get out of the nutritional dark ages.

Cheers–

MRE 

Hi Beth–

I agree.  The BMI is worthless, but many, many people use it as a standard without ever knowing what it really is or what it means.

Cheers–

MRE 

First, I thought the fried twinkee kid was a girl too….and wasn’t convinced otherwise until I watched a few more of his videos on UTube!!

Second…..on this article, I feel soooo bad for that little girl!!! Like her mom said, she’s afraid to eat, afraid she’s doing something wrong!!! I can see my daughter reacting that way!!! I can also see the comments about making fun of the thin kids as much as the overweight ones….my daughter was always very thin (90th percentile on height, 10th on weight!!) and she was constantly being harassed!! The favorite, was “beanpole”, which to this day she hates! When she was just under 5 yrs old I was actually threatened with DSS if she didn’t gain weight! Yep, she was in the WIC program, and I was told to give her pudding, ice cream, frappes, etc when she wouldn’t eat her regular meals….luckily my doc stood up for us and called the WIC office and blasted them!

My son was overweight “mildly obese” until he hit 18, my daughter was always thin. Today, at ages 24 and 22, they’re both tall and very thin. Funny, they’re both considered “perfect weight” according to the charts, but people always comment on how thin they are. DD is, at 24, 5′9″ and about 135#, DS is, at 22, 6′3″ and about 160#.

DD works at a steak house and she’s amazed at the way people feed their kids! She especially gets upset when the kids don’t eat their meal, but mom and dad still insist they be given their “free” desert! (some of these kids eat NOTHING, but still get their ice cream!)

I think the thing that really bothers me is the low fat mantra with toddlers. Past the age of 2 you’re supposed to feed your kid low fat!!! Don’t they know brain development in children is dependent on fat in the diet??? They knew it 30 yrs ago, so what happened?!?!?!

Hi Cindy–

I guess we unlearned it.

Cheers–

MRE