Diet Buddies: A Weight Loss Plan for the Whole Family

Diet Buddies: A Weight Loss Plan for the Whole Family

Rescue Your Children Today from the Obesity Epidemic

Richard L. Lipman M.D.

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Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2012 by Richard Lipman M.D.

All Rights Reserved

No part of this book may be reproduced by any mechanical, photographic or electronic process, or in the form of phonographic recording, scanning or otherwise, except as permitted under section 107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act, without prior written permission of the author.

Disclaimer

The reading of this book does not establish a doctor-patient relationship between the reader and Dr Lipman. As discussed numerous times in this book, successful weight loss requires a personal relationship with an understanding physician. This book does not substitute for professional or medical advice. The author and the publisher specifically disclaim any liability, loss, or risk, personal or otherwise that might be incurred, directly or indirectly, as a result of the use and application of any of the contents of this book. All matters regarding your health and those of your children require the medical consultation and supervision of a physician.

The names and identifying characteristics of the individuals referred to in anecdotes in this book have been changed to protect the identities of the individuals.

Other Books by Richard L. Lipman M.D.

The 100 Calorie Secret

New Pounds and Inches

La Dieta HCG

Restuarants and Recipes on the HCG Diet

The New 800 Calorie HCG Diet

Acknowledgements

This book is dedicated to all my children and grandchildren, who through the years have listened to my stories and put up with all of my experiments. To my children, Jeffrey, Andrea, Melissa and David who heard the talk for forty years, and to my grandchildren, Chelsea, Samantha, Jason and Jessica and Savannah who are just beginning to hear it—thanks for being there.

You are truly my encouragement. To my wife Jacqueline for her listening and her suggestions. Most of all, I want to thank the thousands of children and teens I have talked with over the years, who always seem to be one step ahead of me—you are my source of inspiration.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Preface: I Was a Fat Kid, Too

Part 1: Facing The Overeating Problem as a Family

Chapter 1: Is Your Child or Teen Developing Obesity-Related Problems?

Chapter 2: Why So Many Children and Teens Are Overweight—and Why Parents Don't Recognize It

Chapter 3: Who is Normal, Overeating or overweight in the Family?

Chapter 4: Psychological Complications for Children Outweigh Fears of Bulimia

Chapter 5: Kids and Teens Talk to Each Other. Parents Listen.

Part 2: Arm Yourself With The Right Information

Chapter 6: Diet Mythbusters

Chapter 7: Good Sweets Vs. Bad Sweets

Chapter 8: School Lunches and Vending Machines: Where Good Parents Often Fail

Chapter 9: Hidden Saboteurs

Chapter 10: How to Eat at Fast Food Restaurants—If You Have to Do It

Chapter 11: Helping Your Children Control Hunger

Chapter 12: Portion Control on Autopilot

Part 3: Parents Take Control

Chapter 13: Parent-Child Interventions Proven to Work

Chapter 14: Small Changes in Food, Beverages and Moving Produce Big Results

Chapter 15: Discovering Your Diet Secrets

Chapter 16: What Are We Having To Eat?

Chapter 17: Get Moving!

Chapter 18: Let’s Put It All Together

Appendix:

Diet Secret Table for Adults

Examples of Adults Finding Their Secrets

Four Food Menus for Adults and Teens Over 17

Calculating the Normal and Overweight Child using the BMI

How Many Calories Should a Child and Teen Eat?

Daily Protein Requirements of Kids and Teens

Figuring Out Fiber

Glossary of Medical Terms

Soft Drink Consumption and Obesity: A Review

About the Author

References

PREFACE

I Was A Fat Kid, Too

Husky, pretty-plus, baby fat, butter balls, that’s the way we described overweight and obese kids in the 1950s. Yes, there were overweight kids then, just not as many as today. Maybe that’s why it seemed harder. Or maybe there are so many of us overweight now that it has become the norm.

I was one of those overweight kids; I struggled then and all throughout my life with being fat, even when the scale said I was thin. In my recent book, The 100 Calorie Secret, I wrote about my last 15 years of struggle with my weight, how it affected my professional life as a weight loss doctor, and how I gradually learned the secrets to losing weight and keeping it off through my patients.

There is nothing wrong with the term fat or obese, yet there is still resistance in society, even in the fat-acceptance societies, to the term being used. Let’s face it, the moon face, flabby arms, the big butts, the ankles the size of piano legs and the floppy bellies are fat. One of the problems in talking with parents and children about obesity is their sensitivity to the words. Parents and kids have such a hard time talking about the problem, I have used the terms overeating and overweight rather than fat or obese in this book whenever possible.

I want to tell you how it was for me as an overweight kid, and show you how much better it might have been if my parents could have read this book. When I compare how overweight children struggle with their weight today compared to how it was then, it becomes easier for me to recognize how we are wasting our knowledge and opportunities today. We know so much more now and we knew so little then. When was then? It was the 1950s; some call it the age of America’s innocence.

I don’t know when I first realized I was fat. Looking back at home movies, I was overweight at 7-8 years old. My flabby belly and boy boobs were so evident while running on the beach. Every summer I felt dread at the prospect of going to the beach. I would try to disguise my fat with a shirt, or drape a towel over my shoulders.

There is a special shame that only fat kids know. In the 1950s it was worse, maybe because so few of us were fat. We really stuck out. Children struggle through all kinds of adversities as they grow up, but being among the fat children in the 1950s was so much more difficult. We could not ever escape it. It was there every moment of the day—at home, at the beach, at kiddy rides at amusement parks (where often I could not fit into the tiny seats), in the school hall, at physical education. On the baseball team, the boys were divided into shirts and skins. Somehow, I always ended up on the skins team. Being the only one bouncing around shirtless with pre-pubertal, fatty male breasts and a flabby belly was the worst humiliation.

My dad, a food chemist, used to bring dozens of glazed donuts home, almost every day. What we did not eat went to family and friends. The whole neighborhood must have become fat eating his donuts. I remember one day that my mother said I could only have half a donut for breakfast because I was getting a little chubby. I watched as my thin brother devoured 2 or 3. My father was fat, and my mother was not exactly thin. Why my father brought home dozen of donuts is beyond me now. Maybe it was just because he could not face throwing the extras away, having grown up during the Great Depression of the 1930s. We had to clean up our plates; after all, people were starving in China.

A year later I had one of those basal metabolism tests that were so popular back then, to see if my weight problem was due to my thyroid. I remember laying on a table breathing through a machine for what seemed like forever and thinking about the donuts at home. What did the test show? normal, as you might expect. My pediatrician told my parents that I was fat because I ate too much, and I would never be thin.

My parents began to limit my meals, smaller portions for me and no desserts. So began my period of hiding food. I had a million great hiding places. No one knew where. It was my secret; it seemed to make the food taste even better. I learned how to sneak a few things out of the cabinets while my parents were out on a shopping trip. Sometimes I would take a cookie or piece of candy out of a bag by making a tiny opening, removing only one or two so as not to make it appear that any were gone and then resealing it.

I can remember the day after Halloween in the early 1950s. Ms. Lemmon, one of my teachers was skinny as a rail, with a face like a prune and one of those bobs on her hair. She saw me eating several chocolate bars right before class started. Are you hungry Richard? Did you skip breakfast? You are devouring those bars as fast as you can open them. Of course I wasn't hungry; I just couldn't eat them at home.

Embarrassment was the best way to describe how I felt then. I think my parents simply ignored what I looked like, and they certainly ignored how I felt. It was all so hush-hush in those days. Maybe they did think I had a thyroid problem, because it appeared I ate no more than the rest of the family. Each year I ended up a little fatter than the year before.

I have two normal brothers, and I think I embarrassed them, too. I never really was involved in the same activities and things that they were involved in. I remember reading and studying a lot when I was young and doing a lot of solitary things. My siblings sometimes made fun of me, but not too much. First I was going to be a Phi Beta Kappa, and then a doctor. I would show my parents, brothers and even my pediatrician. Through the years I gained and lost, but I was always fat, no matter what the scale said.

Where did my parents go wrong? Little was understood about eating and there was certainly nothing out there about the health consequences of overeating back then. Both of my parents had graduate degrees, so their lack of awareness had nothing to do with a lack of education or poverty. They had tiny glimmers of recognition, but just thought I might grow out of it. At 15 years old I weighed 180 lbs. Were they dreaming? They didn’t change the eating habits of the family. They could not understand how I was gaining weight; after all, it appeared that I ate what everyone else ate. Attacking the weight, without understanding the food, and exposing me to bad food, hoping that I just could say no.—maybe that’s where they went wrong.

My parents were just about as involved in their children’s’ weight loss as most of the parents I see today: a few days spent a year on some kind of new diet if the child is lucky, with a rare trip to the doctor who shyly might say, Well, he is a little overweight, or He will grow out of it. The doctor will label it as baby fat, or say, He’s got big bones. The doctor might give a thyroid test every few years. The doctor might give them a 1,200 calorie diet on a piece of paper. There is never much of an ongoing discussion about good and bad foods, or how the whole family needs to participate. Most pediatricians today are reluctant to talk to parents and children about obesity for fear of singling them out, hurting their feelings, damaging their self-esteem or making food a big issue. At the same time, physicians fear that telling the parents their kid is fat will anger or upset them.

The lack of perception is not much different than it was 60 years ago. Today, 63% of the parents of obese children do not identify their children as obese. For the most part, parents are unable or unwilling to acknowledge that their children today are fat. Parents often convey love and care to children by feeding them. In some cultures, an overweight child is considered to be one who has been loved and cared for. Some parents, who are veterans of the weight loss wars, do not want to make food a big issue, fearing they too will enter the diet wars. Other parents do not want to use disparaging terms about their children, especially if they were hurled at the parents themselves by playground bullies years ago. In a society were obesity is becoming the norm, a little overweight is ignored by parents. Let’s face it: it’s a sensitive subject for parents and children alike.

Once today’s parents recognize overeating in their children, they are unsure of how to go about changing it without causing massive family disruptions. They don’t recognize how the whole family needs to be involved. My parents may not have recognized the problem, but parents today should know and do better. As you will see, there are many reasons for this. Parents are geared to provide nourishment for their kids and teens, not to limit their eating. I hope the next few chapters will help break down any barriers you have to recognizing your child or teen is overeating, and will help you learn to make smarter food and drink choices for everyone in the family.

Part One

Facing The Overeating Problem as a Family

Chapter 1

Is Your Child or Teen Developing-Obesity Related Problems?

Jack C., 13 years old: I was so excited to find out that my new school has a lunch party every day. I could pick anything I like, especially the mac and cheese, pizza or fried chicken. They even have a real soda fountain and I can drink all the juice or soda I want. My mother doesn’t let me drink soda or juice at home. It is like when I went on that cruise boat last year.

Becky F.: I am 15 years old and so fat and ugly. Suddenly I developed black hair on my arms and face like my brother. The last time I got weighed I was 160 lb. I am so worried, I used to be regular and now I can go for months without a period. I find every excuse to avoid PE and I can’t make friends. My junior prom is coming and I want to lose weight, but my mom who owns a gym only feeds me health foods, no carbs, lots of nuts and oils. I am so tired of salads. I am going to grow white fur like a bunny. I trade my lunch at school for foods that make me feel full. What should I do? I want to be thin like my mom and the rest of the kids.

Jack C. is a 13-year-old African-American boy who I first saw when he was rejected for the football team by his private school sports coach. The coach found very high blood pressure and a weight of 123 lb. His waist was 33 inches. His mother stated that Jack was tired all day, frequently yawning and falling asleep in the classroom (signs of sleep apnea). His mother is my patient, a school teacher who is overweight and has high blood pressure and diabetes. She had no idea why Jack had sleep apnea, high blood pressure, or why he was so overweight. After all, he only eats healthy food and drinks at home.

Becky F’s mother, an owner of a gym, also has no idea why Becky is so unhappy and gaining weight. She only prepares healthy foods.

Thirteen-year-old Jack has developed daytime sleepiness and high blood pressure, just like his mother, due to his weight gain. It began at 13 years of age, not at the more typical age of 35. The extra pounds can also cause Jack to develop diabetes or even high cholesterol, strokes, and cancer. Even more troublesome is the fact that being overweight as a child may cause him to become overweight as an adult, especially since his mother is overweight. Overeating in your child or teen leads to weight gain which can cause serious medical problems NOW, not in fifteen or twenty years. Parents of overweight children are seeing the same complications of weight gain at 12 or 13, not at 30 or 40 as we saw in the past.

Fifteen-year-old Becky has psychological problems, with a loss of self-esteem. She is more than likely suffering from polycystic ovaries (due to her weight gain) along with her facial hair and irregular menses. Having a thin mother often makes things even more difficult for some teen girls.

Overweight Children Dramatically Increase Their Risk for Heart Disease and Diabetes

60% of overweight children have at least one risk factor for heart disease. Jack already has three risk factors for heart disease—his sleep apnea, high blood pressure and his weight. The famous Bogalusa Heart Study followed more than 9,000 children from 1973 to 2001 and found:

* 77% of children who were obese in the early 1970s became obese adults.

* 87% of children who were obese at age 6 or younger became obese adults.

* There was