Watch this short montage I created to help parents think about making better and healthier changes for their family. Comments are welcome and appreciated!

Childhood Obesity is an epidemic and the cereal companies along with their marketing departments are adding fuel to this issue.

A study from Yale University said the average preschooler sees 642 cereal ads a year. The vast majority of these ads are the sugary cereals. These cereals with the least nutritional value get the biggest market push. If you have seen them they are amazingly entertaining for the children and do a wonderful sales job. There is a “Marketing Tsunami” going on that is helping to fuel the childhood obesity epidemic.

Kelly Brownell PhD, Director, Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity, told ABC News, “You could use the word ‘assault’ to talk about the way the marketing is going on”. Children are just blitzed by marketing for the least healthy food products, and there’s very little marketing for healthy ones to offset it.”
Brownell says this only adds to the growing childhood obesity problem and calls today’s food environment “toxic” for children. Many of the least nutritional cereals qualify as “better for you” food. Dr Brownell says, “It’s a demonstrable failure”.

Yale University’s new research showed that children will eat the healthier cereals when offered. It all boils down to what they are exposed to. We can train our children to make better choices and eat the better cereals.

Three years ago, the industry announced with some fanfare that it would police itself by setting new standards for the way it markets food for kids. Have you read any of these cereal labels recently?
I spent some time reading labels in the store and that is not what I read. Making a sugar coated cereal out of wheat doesn’t make it healthy. Being fortified with synthetic vitamins isn’t helping either. (If you have watched any of my videos you will understand the difference between synthetic and food sourced vitamins.)

The FTC is setting tougher marketing and nutrition standards however and this is the KEY, these new standards will not be mandatory they will be optional.
Food companies get to choose whether or not to meet these standards.
What can parents do? We have to be role models for our children in everything. Are you being a good role model?

Top ten advertised cereals to children with poorest nutrition rating, according to the Cereal F.A.C.T.S report:
1. Reese’s Puffs
2. Corn Pops
3. Lucky Charms
4. Cinnamon Toast Crunch (tied)
4. Cap’n Crunch (tied)
6. Trix (tied)
6. Froot Loops (tied)
6. Fruity and Cocoa Pebbles (tied)
9. Cocoa Puffs
10. Cookie Crisp

Many kids are spending less time exercising and more time in front of the TV, computer, or video-game console. The busy family’s lifestyles have fewer free moments to prepare nutritious, home-cooked meals. From fast food to electronics, quick and easy is the reality for many people in the new millennium.
The percentage of overweight children in the United States is growing at an alarming rate, with 1 out of 3 kids now considered overweight or obese.

Preventing children from becoming overweight means adapting the way your family eats and exercises, and how you spend time together. Getting the parents to make wiser choices and decisions for the family’s well being needs to be handled first. Helping children lead healthy lifestyles begins with parents who lead by example.

Let’s talk about BMI, Body Mass Index. To calculate BMI, divide weight in kg by height in meters squared; for pounds and inches, divide weight by height squared and multiply the result by the conversion factor 703.

Once you know your child’s BMI, it can be plotted on a standard BMI chart. Kids fall into one of four categories:
1.underweight: BMI below the 5th percentile
2.normal weight: BMI at the 5th and less than the 85th percentile
3.overweight: BMI at the 85th and below 95th percentiles
4.obese: BMI at or above 95th percentile

BMI is not a perfect measure of body fat and can be misleading in some situations. For example, a muscular person may have a high BMI without being overweight (because extra muscle adds to a body weight — but not fatness). In addition, BMI may be difficult to interpret during puberty when kids are experiencing periods of rapid growth. It’s important to remember that BMI is usually a good indicator — but is not a direct measurement — of body fat.

The Effects of Obesity

Obesity increases the risk for serious health conditions like type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, and high cholesterol — all once considered exclusively adult diseases. Obese kids also may be prone to low self-esteem that stems from being teased, bullied, or rejected by peers.
These children are at risk for developing medical problems that affect their present and future health and quality of life.

Cardiovascular risk factors present in childhood (including high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and diabetes) can lead to serious medical problems like heart disease, heart failure, and stroke as adults. Preventing or treating overweight and obesity in children may reduce the risk of developing cardiovascular disease as they get older.

Genetics also play a role — genes help determine body type and how your body stores and burns fat just like they help determine other traits. Genes alone, however, cannot explain the current obesity crisis. Because both genes and habits can be passed down from one generation to the next, multiple members of a family may struggle with weight.

People in the same family tend to have similar eating patterns, maintain the same levels of physical activity, and adopt the same attitudes toward being overweight. Studies have shown that a child’s risk of obesity greatly increases if one or more parent is overweight or obese. Again children follow their parents example. If you are obese and are reading this now, decide to stop being a poor example for your child.

The key to keeping kids of all ages at a healthy weight is taking a whole-family approach. It’s the “practice what you preach” mentality. Make healthy eating and exercise a family affair. Get your kids involved by letting them help you plan and prepare healthy meals, and take them along when you go grocery shopping so they can learn how to make good food choices.

 Don’t reward kids for good behavior or try to stop bad behavior with sweets or treats. Come up with other solutions to modify their behavior.
 Don’t maintain a clean-plate policy. Be aware of kids’ hunger cues. Even babies who turn away from the bottle or breast send signals that they’re full. If kids are satisfied, don’t force them to continue eating. Reinforce the idea that they should only eat when they’re hungry.
 Don’t talk about “bad foods” or completely eliminate all sweets and favorite snacks from kids’ diets. Kids may rebel and overeat these forbidden foods outside the home or sneak them in on their own

This is not new information but yet the rise of obesity in children is alarming. Parents must be proactive about their own health and their children will follow by example. Are you making good choices for your family. Let’s turn around this trend and stop Childhood Obesity today.

This might be the first generation of American children to be less healthy than their parents.

In the course of a few decades, children have come to dwarf the size of their parents at the same age. The numbers are staggering.

The average 10 year old in the US weighs 10 pounds more than the average child in the 1960’s according to the Centers of Disease Control. And that translates into adult obesity. The average adult now weighs roughly 25 pounds more than his or her 1960’s counterpart.

Over the past 2 decades, the obesity rate for children has doubled, according to the American Academy of Pediatrics. For adolescents, the picture is even worse: More than THREE times as many are obese.The causes are many: The suburban lifestyle, in which driving is king and walking is unpleasant. A boat load of subsidized calories that has made unhealthful foods ever-cheaper and portion sizes inflated. Activity levels have decreased due to TV and games that all you need are your thumbs to play.

Some people believe the country is producing a “lost generation” of children who will struggle with obesity their whole lives.

What we Eat

The diet of the average American child has been supersized in recent decades. A hamburger, fries and drink combo contains hundreds more calories than it did decades ago.

Temptation is everywhere. The marketing departments make the fast food restaurants look like the Gardens of Eden but all they offer is a bounty of empty calories.

How do we change?

Many say a solution must include national policy-level steps, such as taxing unhealthful food or ending farming subsides that create cheap calories.

Foods such as corn that goes into many high calorie products are heavily subsidized; fruits and many other vegetables are not.

It has to start in the home. Parents have to make the changes for the children to make the changes. After all they acquire their habits from their parents.

One Body, One Life, Choose Wisely, otherwise things will just continue to get worse.