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Kids and their eating…..The Future of Health.
By Keith | July 4, 2009
I had just heard on a talk radio station [96.9 WTKK] that adults in Massachusetts rank 5th best overall in ranking all 50 states in terms of their obesity. Meaning that only 4 other states are less fat than we are. Pretty good job I thought. Obesity in this instance is calculated by BMI [Body Max Index]. BMI is your height to weight ratio.
However with the same study our children ranked 30th. Meaning our kids are fatter than over half of the country. Why? Why if the parents are healthy, are the kids not?
I guess most of us would like to blame it on someone else. First of all blame it on the schools. Not enough good choices for lunches. Candy and soda in the school lunchrooms. Easy one.
Or we would like to blame it on video games or some other ‘non-active’ activity. I can’t get them away from the TV. Let’s just chalk it up to “times are different than they were when we were kids.”
However, some part of the answer was evident to me as soon as I heard it. Parents don’t feed their children the same way they feed themselves. That’s a problem.
Since some of us have started the Paleo challenge, the education that we have been given and the gains we have made in our health have been very apparent. But our kids are still eating that crap. I have heard parents tell me that their kids won’t eat if they don’t have sugary choices. They have to buy these kids processed, engineered “foods” in order for them to eat something.
On the surface this is probably true if we give into our children’s whims. But should we? We try to keep our kids safe and do what is right for them. We don’t let they cross the street until they are ready. They have to be home before the street lights come on. Eating is no different. They need to create good eating habits when they are young.
It isn’t easy though. Marketing for Kids foods is a multi-billion $ industry that is far reaching. It is the same misconceptions that we find everywhere in the fitness world. We have actually had kids come to our home and bring their own food because we “don’t have anything for them to eat.”
The reality is that kids will eat whatever you give them. If not now, in time. Kids need training with their food, just like they do with their dead lifts and power cleans. Real food that is better for them will taste better to them, over time. Just like it did you.
I guess the message here is to just ask yourself [if you have children or babysit from time to time] What are my kids eating? Why do I buy this crap? and Would I eat it? Probably not. There are many things that we can do to keep our kids safe. And eating properly is one of them.
Topics: Articles, Community, Cynergy Central, Cynergy Kids, Nutrition | No Comments »