About once a week, maybe less often, I get an email from Babycenter.com that lets me know whereabouts Gabe should be when it comes to socialization and other things. Today's main entry focused on body image. Honestly, my first reaction was "Oh boy, this should be good." And it was pretty good until about 3/4 of the way through. Then there was this: If you're worried about your child's weight, ask your doctor where she
falls on the growth charts compared with her peers and in relation to
her own past growth pattern. Look at her BMI, or body mass index, a
number that reflects the relationship between weight and height. It's an
indicator of chubbiness, skinniness, or "just right." It's available
now in most doctor's offices and is the number that's most indicative of
health and good growth.
If your child tends toward the chubby
end of the spectrum, rather than harping about what she's doing wrong
(eating junk food, acting like a couch potato), set up an environment
that helps her live right. Limit computer and TV time. If she has a TV
in her room, getting it out of there is a good start. Plan active
outings as a family. Exercise helps kids appreciate their bodies for how
they work rather than how they look. Put healthy meals on the table and
stock your pantry with nutritious snacks. Nix sodas as an option."
Really? What about if your child falls towards the skinnier end of the spectrum, like my son does? Am I supposed to start fattening him up with junk food and put a tv in his room? Plan evenings of tv and game time? Oh wait a minute! That's right! Noone knows how to make a fat person thin anymore than they know how to make a thin person fat. Bodies just don't work that way. So, on that thinking, I sent the following comment to the website. I'm hoping to hear back from them.
Good afternoon,
I was happy to see the article on Body Image for my 4 3/4 year old appear in my inbox today. My son is quite thin and bony and many of your suggestions make perfect sense. I'm familiar with body image issues and eating disorders in young children and know what to do to avoid them. However, many other parents are not, and will take your 'talk to your doctor about their BMI' advice to heart.
BMI is not meant for children or teenagers. BMI has repeatedly come under attack lately by many health experts (including Dr. Sharma, Canada's leading obesity expert) for being an inexact measurement, and a misleading one. Children are still growing and need all the nourishment and play they can get to grow healthy bodies. Some kids are naturally going to end up chubbier, or in my son's case, skinnier, than other kids. This message of body diversity is one of the most important things we can be giving to children, not that they (or their parents) need to be worried about an arbitrary number that doesn't apply to them.
Thank you for reading and I look forward to your reply.
Jennifer Rowe
Nanaimo, British Columbia
Author: Fat and Not Afraid
I would be curious to know if the pronouns in the rest of the piece were gendered female...because it's a smack in the face to see it so blatantly gendered like this, and reads to me like the preschool primer on *giving* your daughter body image issues. "Why wait for adolescence to start punishing her for inevitably failing to live up to an impossible standard of beauty? Start early!"
Great response, Jen!
Jadelyn: Yes, the entire peice uses 'she' as in, the child we're talking about being worried about is a girl. That's partially why I made sure to mention that my SON is THIN. You can find the whole peice at a link in the second sentence of my post. :)
NewMe: Thank you!
Hi Jen,
Thanks for sending that letter, and posting it! I'm reminded daily that being built more like Shrek's princess than Karen Kain is just fine by my husband and strangers among the public who I met at work who never could believe how much I weighed. They would ask me to recommend outdoor clothes for their wife 'about my size' and weighing 130, and laugh in disbelief to hear that I'm 180 lbs. BMI only really applies to the subjects it was developed from: young army recruits, at the thinnest they will be in their lives (not built up yet, about 18 to 22 years old), excercising more than it will ever be possible for them to exercise again, living 50 years ago when people were smaller in stature and more malnourished in general, especially among the poorer classes who would be most likely to volunteer in the US army. Normal population samples would lead to a different statistical result. My thin grandmother had pernicious anemia from years of malnutrition accepted as a normal diet, requiring blood transfusions to lead a normal life after having two children in her late twenties put her into a state of physical exhaustion. She was close to BMI's ideal, but ate little more than toast, dripping and some boiled veg many days. It takes me weeks of running for hours a day (basic training) to reach the BMI average level, where my period stops. I also have veins that stick out, feel cold, and am ravenous all the time at 140, the high end of my BMI ideal...
As a kid, I was quite sturdy, a little chubby, and able to walk for miles and lift heavy objects easily. My frail pixieish thin brother was left in the dust. Kids go through many awkward phases, and should not be held to BMI for aesthetic reasons as the article suggests with its emphasis on appearances. My brother is now quite chubby and never tried to be fit, and I'm about the same, 180 and way off the BMI charts but not terribly visibly so, and able to go for a long hike if I like. We shouldn't be shamed into being overly athletic as kids to fit an aesthetic. Diversity should be much better accepted.
Wow, great comment Karen! And thanks for sharing. Diversity SHOULD be much better accepted and that's what I'm working on.
Still no reply back from BabyCenter yet!