5 Top Tips for Weight Control in Children

5 Top Tips for Weight Control in Children
By Rosie Peters

With weight control for kids, prevention is far better than cure. If you can begin with your children as you mean to continue in regard to food and exercise, the effort you put in will be much more quickly rewarded than if you are faced with attempting to change bad habits.

Either way, controlling weight in children is a challenge, but you have to keep in mind - you are the adult, the one calling the shots. It's not easy, but nothing worth doing is easy.

Top Tip for weight control in children #1

You have to be a role model. You can't expect your children to eat sensibly and exercise regularly if you are lolling on the couch, glued to the TV, waving the kids out the door with a jumbo sized packet of corn chips clutched in your fist. Eat with your children and show clear enjoyment of the good food you eat. Exercise with your children and share the natural high that physical effort gives you.

#2

Speaking of the TV - turn it off. The world as we know it will not cease if we ban the mass media from our lives for a few hours a day. Eat as many of your meals as possible together at the dining table with no distractions. Talk to each other. Enjoy your food.

If this will be a big wrench for you or members of your family, you need to discuss this new routine in depth before you begin; both what you intend to do and the good reasons for it. Be prepared to listen to any arguments for turning the TV on, but do not accept them. This strategy allows family members to have their concerns aired, but underlines your position as the adult responsible for good eating habits in your home.

#3

Explain. Why this food is good for our bodies, why we need protein, complex carbs and good fats, why some foods are habit forming but lacking in nutrition. Why our bodies and minds benefit from daily exercise. The more you explain, the more readily kids will accept both a good diet and regular exercise.

#4

Involve your children in decision making and planning. Allow your children to make some of the decisions about the food you will prepare together (what green vegetable are we going to have tonight?).

Give your kids the chance to say where you will cycle or walk this afternoon. There choices should be guided, however. They need to know that a green vegetable of some type will be on the menu, but they can decide which one. They have to know that exercise is on the agenda for the afternoon, but they get a (limited) say in what it will be.

#5

Be firm in relation to your goals. Be determined that your children will have a good diet and regular exercise. Be patient and persistent, with a degree of flexibility in your approach, but do not weaken. The bottom line is that by controlling the weight of your children through proper diet and suitable exercise, you are giving them the gift of a healthy lifestyle. As a parent, you can't do better than that!

Rosie Peters gives straightforward, common sense advice, encouragement and tips for weight loss, sensible diet and lifelong fitness. Sometimes it's not what you want to hear, but it's what you need to know.

Visit Rosie at weight-control-diet-advice.com.

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