I hate to admit this but I do worry, especially about DD2. My daughter's have different fathers - DD1's father is the skinniest thing in the world, fastest metabolism and I can tell DD1 takes after him (she was nightfeeding till almost 3 and wakes up starving, tiny little thing but eating constantly) and I'm pretty small myself, never been out of healthy ranges and although am curvy, I don't imagine DD1 will be. My curves (breasts and hips) were something I was SO self concious of as a teen but have grown to appreciate as I've grown older, if DD2 ends up like me then I hope I can help her to appreciate it sooner... her dad was overweight for his entire childhood and most of his adult life, he is now within healthy ranges but is a solid person. DD2 is a huge baby, 99th percentile (8.2kg at 4m)... I feel awful for worrying about how she will go but especially am concerned with how different my two girls seem to process food... I can imagine DD1 eating anything but maintaining a slender petite figure while DD2 will probably always have curves and have to work a lot harder... I will always try to focus on health but I know teen girls can focus on the other side...
I can imagine DD2 being jealous of DD1 as a teen but as they grow older it will probably flip... or before... or both... I don't know, you always want what you don't have so I just hope I can help them to see that beauty comes in so many shapes and being healthy is what is important.
I don't worry about my DDs weight because they're naturally tall and slim.
However, that doesn't mean they'll never be overweight. I used to be slim but stacked on weight in my early thirties and then lost it in my late thirties.
DD1 especially is very active so even if I fed her lots of crap, I doubt she'd be overweight.
So from a weight point of view, I could be a lot more relaxed about her diet but I do make sure that she eats lots of healthy stuff and I also make sure she knows that treats (I hate that word as it sends the wrong message but still ...) are things that you only have sometimes. I never talk about food in terms of making you fat, infact I don't think she would even understand the word fat as she's never heard me say it, but I do talk about food that makes you strong/run fast (a high priority for DD1). Today, for instance, she asked me if she could have a packet of Tiny Teddies in her kinder lunchbox because another kid had one. I said absolutely not. I knew who she was talking about so asked her if the kid that had them was a fast runner. She said no.
I especially like asking her whether she would like toast or Breakfast of Champions (Weetbix) for breakfast. Surprise, she normally chooses the latter.
I worry about it too. Both Dh and I are overweight by about 8-10kg each. DD1 is really tall but is also alot heavier than her contemporaries. She has always been in clothes sizing 2 years above her age due to her height. She does however look in proportion for this height but is not the bean pole other people have described.
We are trying here to focus on moving as much as we can, so outside wlaking, swimming and hitting the park as much as we can as a family. I walk her to school and back on my days at home. I walk/run and got to the gym approx 3 times a week to keep fit and healthy so hopefully they see this as a positive role model. I also am trying to get both kids (and myself) to conciously note when we are full. Although we eat fairly well I think we definitely eat more than we should. I am consicous of consuming empty calories so we don't drink juice here as a regular drink it is water only. Having said that I do let them have sometimes foods on occasions - so we don't have kids that binge when they are available.
I also hope that a healthy self worth and methods of dealing with crisis and emotion will help as certainly this is an area that when I am struggling I tend to use as a crutch.
I think being a good role model with eating and activity is the best thing you can do. You can't change genetics unfortunately (unfortunately we all have genetic things we'd prefer we didn't). It's also important not to teach them to have body image issues, which I think is the trickiest part of all these days. A friend of mine lost a heap of weight, completely changing her lifestyle and diet, even to the point of doing serious athletic events, and never, ever talked about losing weight in front of her daughter.
Reply With Quote
Bookmarks