Busy Parents: Cause of Childhood Obesity

[shodan]

http://www.newsrealblog.com/2010/03/30/busy-parents-the-real-cause-of-childhood-obesity/

food drive-thru ordering for a family of four. The typical excuse when asked is, “Dinner takes too long to make, and there is no time before the soccer game, Girl Scout meeting, swim class, and then work.” America lives for the ‘go’ lifestyle, and companies have adapted their products for families on the go. We as Americans constantly rush through life never looking back at what we are doing to our bodies. Americans have transitioned from being overweight to being morbidly obese as a result of advances in technology, our lazy habits, and our poor diets. We as a nation have seen an increase in many chronic illnesses that are correlated with obesity such as diabetes, cardiovascular disease, certain cancers, and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (Ogden, Carroll, Curtin, Lamb, & Flegal, 2010, p.245). Additionally, more orthopedic joint replacements are needed by obese individuals due to increased strain from weight. This epidemic of obesity and its adverse effects are not only hurting the adult population, these diseases and injuries are overtaking the youth as well. Do we realize what is happening to ourselves and our children? Western culture has allowed us to be overly comfortable, cheap, lazy, and unhealthy, and in turn has created an epidemic of obese children that are indeed victims of child neglect....

 

[Gina B]

The "laziness" excuse bugs me because when I first put on extra pounds, I was working 16 hour shifts. After travel time, that left me with 7 hours to sleep, do laundry, prepare meals, and live life. I rarely cooked, stopping instead at Taco Bell or the like cuz I passed it on the way home. I kept TV dinners stocked. We ate out of vending machines. Plus you don't clean human messes and wash up dead bodies and still want to look at raw food. After a while you live off coffee, cigarettes, and vending machines on the job and you really don't have much desire to cook once you get home and scrub the ick off.
I wasn't lazy. I was busy taking care of people that families either couldn't or wouldn't care for at home and then preparing their bodies for viewing when they passed on.

Of five kids, one is overweight. It isn't her diet at home, because while I and my husband are overweight, we still provide decent, balanced meals for the kids. (both of us have had thyroid issues and we both eat junk during lunchtime at my work, which we know is bad) The overweight child has issues with walking over to the vending machines in school on a very regular basis. She's old enough to make her own decisions and has a hard time avoiding them when she's at school and hunger hits and they're right there all over the building. We're working on it. She's working on it. She is NOT a victim of child neglect.