Diet Book for Pre-Teen Girls?
grabbing cookies
Let’s say your 8-year-old daughter is overweight. You are a frustrated parent. You would like her to lose some weight and be within the normal range for her age group. Well, now there is a diet book aimed at prepubescent girls, ages 6-12. The book, “Maggie Goes on a Diet,” is self-published by author Paul M. Kramer.
Would you buy this book?
What do you think about encouraging such young girls to start learning the “D” word? Dieting…
There’s a quip on Food52.com about an article featured on Jezebel.com, “New Children’s Book Encourages Young Girls to Diet.” This headline struck me as quite disturbing, but I was intrigued to read more. With the continuing problem of childhood obesity, it’s no wonder that someone has written a diet book dealing with weight, children, and the unhealthy manner in which many of them eat.
But is a diet book the answer for young girls struggling with their weight? Young girls who have yet to grow into their own bodies or have yet to mature, yet to understand what food and eating and feeding yourself to thrive really means? Can dieting even be taught to a 6-year-old?!
I personally do not like this idea at all. My soap box.
But I want to hear what you moms out there think! Please share in the comments!
I think that instead of teaching young girls to restrict what they eat, focus on teaching them about how to eat well and feed their bodies to thrive and grow. The joys of fruits and veggies. The happiness that comes from exercise and using your body and breaking a sweat. Get them involved in cooking. Allow them to bake healthy muffins, toss their own salad, shop at a Farmer’s Market with their parents. Instead of promoting dieting, guilt and self-hate, encourage body love and self esteem.
The last thing you want to do to a young pre-teen girl is give her anxiety about her weight. The truth is, you don’t know if the weight fluctuations are just a part of her growing process. Maybe she will learn to adjust her food and exercise as needed, naturally. I say, encourage healthy eating and cooking. Not dieting.
I always tell my readers when they ask me what I think of diets: “Diets teach you to live to eat. I prefer to eat to live.”
The Other Side. Now I know there is another side to this story. The side where young kids may be eating, quite frankly, a lot of junk food and large portion sizes with no restraint. Teaching restraint can be a positive thing, right? Perhaps. Every child will be different. But instead of teaching restriction at such a young age – again, start by encouraging healthy eating habits. And loving your body no matter what. Teaching these values will encourage self esteem. And self esteem will come in handy as these girls mature into their teenage years.
What do you think?
You can learn more about the book (and see book art) over at Food52.com and Jezebel.com
More on healthy eating: How do we raise girls without eating disorders?
Wow touchy subject… My mother started taking me to Weight Watchers to weigh in when I was 11, before that she had me eating her diet foods… I was not a “fat” child, or terribly over weight, maybe a bit chunky but considering I had a paranoia about food what does one expect? It wasn’t till I moved out, started eating my own foods and and realizing Dieting is about the dumbest thing a person can do to control their weight that I started losing weight and having a better body image. Parents should set an example. They should cook with their kids and they should never pass judgement, ever!
As for teaching restrain- the parents have to set the example and show restraint themselves. My Soap Box. Parents are killing their children by buying them fast food meals, putting sugar snacks in their lunch boxes, using meal replacements as food.
I wish I could put angry faces in my response to this post.
Teach my child to diet? No way!
We are working on developing healthy eating habits in my house. My step-daughter still prefers fast food but I am sure that in time she will see the benefits of leafy greens, vegetables, fruit and exercise as this is now the norm for her father and I.
On top of that, we reinforce that she doesn’t have to look a certain way for us to love her. Our love is not based on anything about her appearance. We love her because she is our daughter.
Well said Koreen!
It’s sick to just thinking of putting kids on diet if they’re not having serious health issue like obesity… and that’s should be with doctor advice! Instead… we should taught them to appreciate food and live free.
A soapbox of mine as well! Our children do not need to learn the words fat and diet! We as parents have a responsibility to teach them to eat healthy and to be active. They need to learn that everything is OK in moderation. We use the Canada’s Food Guide to help know how many fruits and vegetables (that’s the one we, in our family, need the most reminders on!) we should be eating in a day. (http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/fn-an/food-guide-aliment/index-eng.php) That means we need to eat them with every meal and for snacks in between. When we pack lunches for school there can be one treat in there, but lunch doesn’t need to be granola bars and pudding and chips and for highschoolers, it shouldn’t just be a vending machine lunch! We are not perfect, and on some days everything is not perfectly balanced, but I don’t believe that diet is the answer! I didn’t mention much about activity but this was in response to the d-word, diet.
)
My sister-in-law has been getting my 11-year-old niece to watch her food and has taken her to a dietitian to try to get her to lose weight. She doesn’t want her daughter to be chubby in any way and I am so uncomfortable and sad when I hear my niece say she has to measure out her food, can’t eat after 7pm, etc. just because my sister-in-law instilled these crazy values on her.
I hate dieting and what it’s done to our culture. My mom and her friends tried every new diet in the ’00s, from South Beach to Atkins, and spent all their time talking about food within the context of dieting programs. Girls in my high school had personal trainers at 15.
I developed an unhealthy relationship with food that persisted through my college years because especially for women, worth is placed on appearance. I spent all my time on calorie counting sites and in eating disorder communities online when I should have been pursuing friendships and my other interests. It took years for my self-esteem to stop being tied to food. On occasion I’ll still feel a tad guilty, but that’s usually just because eating junky food makes me feel physically gross, not because I hate myself for eating it.
Like you said, girls need to learn how to make healthy choices. While my parents tried to do this, I think incentivizing healthy eating with the reward of junk food (“eat your vegetables or you won’t get dessert”) creates the same unhealthy value system that leads to binge eating, as it did for me. I think presenting kids with choices and coming up with different ways to cook things they usually won’t eat is a better way for them to learn to make decisions and develop more adventurous taste buds. With that outlook, they will learn to appreciate food for what it is – energy-providing & enjoyable – rather than demonizing their meals. I still get frustrated listening to friends obsessing over food choices – what a waste of mental energy!
I delayed years of my life and reinforced self-esteem issues by isolating myself focusing on weight and food. I thought to myself, “Once I lose x lbs, people will like me and I’ll be happier.” But that never came from a particular number on the scale.
his ebook has nothing to do with weight loss. This is about adding foods to your life that have been shown to help heal or prevent disease. The ebook has helped people to:
Learn which foods contain beneficial qualities.
Understand what those qualities are.
Make choices that might prevent illness.
A little information can go a long way when it comes to proper nutrition. This quick guide should do the trick.
For Buy Now Link
http://tiny.cc/vkckc
I personally put on a lot of weight pre-puberty (ages 10-12) and then my body used it during all those changes and I slimmed down/redistributed it during puberty. From this experience I would not put anyone that has not gone through puberty on a diet! Their body might need the nutrients, you can’t just look at someone and tell if they are needlessly overweight.