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Weight issues in kids
“Mom, I’ve gained weight,” the Taz told me with a forlorn look on his face after weighing himself on the upstairs scale.
It’s true. Over the past year the Taz has packed on a bit of baby pudge on his once trim body. It probably has to do with the way he helps himself to thirds for every meal. It may have something to do with the obsessive snacking he does in between meals. Maybe it’s his need to sneak some money outside whenever he hears the jangle of the ice cream man riding by on his bike. It’s all of those things, but it’s also the normal weight shift that kids go through around the age of 9 when their bodies slow down for a second in growing before shooting up like a weed. His sister went through the same battle at his age, and only lost the weight this last year when she went through a growth spurt. But she had also helped along the process when she became aware of her own body for the first time, and decided that eating more healthy foods and fewer proportions was a better answer than constant snacking.
The Taz had finally noticed his body, and now wanted to make a change.
Weight issues in kids are a very slippery slope. You want your child to be fit, trim, and healthy. But you don’t want them so obsessed with their body that they develop self esteem issues or an unhealthy relationship with food that goes from love to hate. Somehow, as parents, we must help our kids to be healthy, but not give them impulses to starve themselves (which later turns to more bingeing, which then turns into more weight gain) to “fit in”.
“Am I fat?” the Taz asked me. (more...)
Guest Blog by Wine Country Daughter
A new addition to our family
Hi. Remember me? I’m the girl who decided that she didn’t want to grow up to be a cat lady. I try to like cats. I really do. But when their hair is all over me, or they are whining to want to be fed or cuddled, or when they poop outside of the litter box and then spread the litter all over the bathroom, it all comes down to the fact that I am just not a cat person.
I mean, isn’t that what kids are for?
So knowing that about myself, and radiating that negative energy to all cats that come within 20 feet of me, tell me please why this was found in my backyard, crying more pitifully than anything I had ever heard in my life:
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6th grade right of passage
It is a 6th grade right of passage to attend 6th grade camp before the end of the school year. It’s a way to celebrate the end of elementary school, and a way to make new friends from other schools before being bunched together in the big, scary halls of Jr. High.
At 12 years old, I went with my class to our own 6th grade camp. I was excited to leave my parents and sisters behind and have the opportunity to hang out with all my friends for a whole week. And the best part? No school work! We spent the days playing games out in the field, going through “ice breaker” games that helped us to get to know our future classmates from other schools. We ate in the cafeteria, food that was just as good as cafeteria food can get, but decent enough to eat. And we’d stay up way later than the obligatory “lights out” call mandated. About 6 of us were crammed into a cabin with bunk beds. I got the top bunk, and shared the room with some of my closer friends from school. Our parent chaperone was very lenient, allowing us to hang out on each other’s bunks after the last call was given as long as we kept it down to a low roar. I think this was also to encourage us to stay in the cabin and not sneak out. And for the most part, it worked. (more...)
Santa Rosa Mom Recap For April 1st
There's a lot of activity going on over at Santa Rosa Mom. Have you visited the site yet? In case you haven't, here's a recap of what's been posted this past week.
When kids drive you crazy
Yesterday was a busy day of laundry and cleaning. Not only did it need to be done, but I am expecting the landlord to come by today for our annual inspection to make sure that our apartment is still intact and that we aren’t housing any pets like dogs or the regular city sewage rat. Thankfully, we have neither. Children are enough of a necessary hassle to be tended to without adding an animal to the mix. And this was even more apparent when I heard something drop to the floor in the bathroom, and an “oops” out of my daughter. She rushed into the kitchen and grabbed some paper towels, and then disappeared around the corner.
“Everything ok?” I asked her.
“Um, fine,” she said. “Except I might have spilled some nail polish on the floor…” Engrossed in my work, I told her to just use some of the nail polish remover on the linoleum. “Uh, ok,” she said. “But it’s not coming out of the carpet.” (more...)
Fuzzy Legs
When I was a kid, I was so embarrassed about my hairy legs. It wasn’t like the blonde, almost invisible body hair of my friends. I had thick, dark, Italian hair. And it was very noticeable. As a young tween, I was at an age when every single blemish on anyone’s body was noticed and made fun of, and my hairy legs had already been pointed out to me. There really was no question about it. I couldn’t wear pants in the heat of summer for the rest of my life.
It was time to shave.
Of course, I was afraid of shaving. I had been told that if I started shaving, I’d never be able to stop. What if I decided afterwards that I really wasn’t ready to shave? I’d be a prisoner to the razor for the rest of my life! I was told that the hair that would grow back would be even thicker and darker. I imagined my legs covered in big, black polka dots of hair that I would have to chisel off to keep my legs looking bare. And then there was the question of how MUCH to shave. Do women shave their legs AND their arms? When shaving their legs, do they shave all the way up to the hip? Is a woman’s body supposed to be completely free of hair altogether? (more...)
No Kids Allowed
“They just lifted the ban on kids in hospital,” my friend, a local nurse, informed me. “And let me tell you, it’s madness.” She went on to describe situations where people were crowding hospital rooms, bringing the whole family to visit their loved one who had the misfortune to end up in the hospital. “With this economy, there are no private rooms,” she went on. “Families are coming into a shared hospital room, crowding up the whole place. And that person’s neighbor has to also share a room with all these strangers. People are trying to get better, attempting to get some rest, and there are screaming children in the rooms.” Just this past week, a mother had left her crying baby in the hallway while she visited. A patient in another room pulled my friend aside, pleading with her, “I just need to get some rest.” (more...)
Representing the Family
When my sisters and I were small, my dad was adamant that appearances went hand in hand with being considered a good kid.
“You’re representing our family,” my dad would say to us gruffly whenever we were out of line, or when we decided that the wrinkled clothes on our bedroom floor were perfectly acceptable to wear to school. I still remember the look on my dad’s face, and the way he couldn’t speak to me for days, when I shaved the bottom of my head for a more punk look. I was only trying to find myself, to separate myself from the drones of prep students who I didn’t fit in with anyway. My mother was irritated at the action I chose to took, but decided that it was just hair, and that it would grow back. My dad, on the other hand… “You look like a butt,” my dad said when he could finally talk to me. (more...)
Wine Country Mom 