Life is About Making it Count

           As a child I was fortunate enough to have parents that cared about my future health so much to prepare home cooked meals for the majority of my childhood. I never had to experience first hand the struggle that overweight children dealt with; I did however have close friends who lived a life of obesity. When I used to live in Chattanooga, Tennessee I would always hang out with my friends from school: Jonathan (best friend), Damon, Casey, and Josh. We would always play games together and make fun of each other just because we were kids. 

             However, Josh was the kid that was overweight and we were smart enough kids to realize that you can’t make fun of someone who has a physical disability. So whenever a topic about obesity or the fact it would relate to Josh being overweight; we would just omit it from our frame of mind. We would notice the struggle that Josh went through physically and mentally; it made things uncomfortable at times because we never knew how to react. However, that experience with Josh brought all of us to an understanding the importance of childhood obesity.

Photo by Foodcoat

The Issue

           About one in three kids in the U.S. is obese, which carries not only current health problems but a greater risk of issues like diabetes and heart disease later in life. Early intervention is key, particularly as kids are less set in their ways than adults, so it’s easier to change their behaviors and teach them new concepts.

          Yet children don’t have the power over their lives, decisions, and lifestyles that adults have (parents and adults make many decisions for them and have the power to enforce certain behaviors).

          Social institutions have more impact on kids than on adults (like church, television, and especially school — including school lunch programs, mandatory gym classes, possible nutritional education, etc.).

          Given all the factors, what’s the best way to go about reducing childhood obesity?  Who should lead the charge? Have you seen strategies that work, first-hand?

 

This represents the scale of how the body type has changed one the decades.
Photo by Runnerdude

The Research

I conducted a survey of the college students that I live with in my dorm, so that I could compare the nutritional habits they had as kids to what the kids today. What I discovered was that a lot of the habits they had as children were close to the ones that children have now.

The purpose of the survey was to find a correlation between nutritional food habits and the content of kid’s television shows. For example some of the questions were “Did you ever watch Boomerang, PBS kids, or Nicktoons?” “How many days a week did you have home cooked dinner?” and “How often did you bring a packed lunch to school?” All these questions were to be centered around when the subjects were from the ages of 3-7.

The survey was random so in order to not know who filled out which one I had them put their survey under my door when they were completed. However, I did know each person's physique somewhat because I have been around them for so long, hardly any of them were overweight. So then if their habits were similar then why weren’t the subjects overweight?

The answer is the subjects watched programs like Boomerang, PBS kids, and Nicktoons; which have become forgotten in the childhood lifestyle. There were 23 responses to the survey and all 23 said yes to have watched these show before. Even something as small a television could change the outcome of a child. Also a high percentage of them used to watch Sesame Street for about four hours each week.

Another factor that might have changed the outcome of their health was on average 20 of the subjects had at least 6 days a week of a home cooked meal. And 16 subjects brought a packed lunch to school almost everyday. Those are good methods to stay in control of health. Although, one of the factors that was the same for the subjects and children today was that neither paid too much attention to what was healthy and what was not. For the most part the subject did have healthier childhoods

The Solution

          In today’s society it has moved passed the point where a child can just change what he/she watches and that will reduce his/her unhealthy eating habits. But now obesity has become a severe disease and with all diseases there needs to be a treatment. 

          For one, kids don’t like being overweight but that doesn’t always mean they help themselves. For such an illness, children would need therapy to overcome the physical struggle but more importantly the mental behavior that has brought them to becoming overweight. A process in therapy will help children over a long term period; this involves first a healthy education on behavioral habits and nutrition, then change their media exposure to educational shows, next have them train to lose the weight,  and then establish their behavioral modifications.

Sesame Street: Eat Your Colors is one of the sources for educating on nutrition.

          The people who should lead this therapy forward cannot be the children because they don’t have the ability to establish these rules effectively for themselves. The best option would be parents, they give the inspiration to children to perform better and do what their parents tell them to do. 

          Another group of people to help lead the fight in childhood obesity are the faculty staff at schools. They need to be that authority figure for the parent while their kids are away from home. The specific faculties that have the most influence on children at school are the cafeteria staff. The reason is because there is the study called correspondence training and what that is an authoritative person (cafeteria staff) will ask them if they want a nutritious snack and then they will hand it to them when they say yes, because it has them think healthier when they are asked and if they really afford to not have that nutritious snack. The training has been extremely effective when getting children to eat healthy.

          If you have someone who you care about a lot and is struggling with obesity, this therapy can be effective to anyone of any age. Obesity is a serious disease effecting millions people everywhere and it can be avoided by the help and encouragement of loved ones.