The International Food Information Council (IFIC) Foundation and the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (NIDDK) have released a new resource to help the parents of overweight children.
Helping Your Overweight Child is a four-page fact sheet written to assist parents in promoting a healthy weight for every member of the family. It encourages removing the focus from a child's weight and encouraging all members of the family to adopt lifelong healthful eating and physical activity habits for life. Suggestions for improving dietary habits include eating together as a family, trying not to use food as a reward, and seeking to avoid controlling the amount of food that a child eats. It also includes useful and practical advice on how to cut down on the amount of time spent in front of the television and how to get the whole family physically active.
The brochure also helps parents meet the emotional issues that their overweight child may face. Suggestions include telling a child that he or she is loved, accepting a child at any weight, and listening to a child's concerns about his or her weight. Ultimately, children who are overweight need support, acceptance, and encouragement from their parents and other loved ones.
Copies of Helping Your Overweight Child may be viewed and downloaded online at on the IFIC Foundation site at http://ific.org/publications/brochures/overweightkidbroch.cfm or http://win.niddk.nih.gov/publications/over_child.htm. Print copies of the brochure are
available from the Weight-Control Information Network (WIN), 1-877-946-4627.
