Weight for Success

Thankfully getting fat will not make you mature faster because if it did obesity would be fashionable amoung pre-teens.

The study cited in this article uses a flawed assumption: First, more girls are reaching puberty at a younger age. More young girls are obese. Therefore obesity causes girls to mature prematurely. In my college philosophy class that would have earned me a sardonic smile and a humiliating turn as class example.

Reporter Alan Bavley buried the lead of this story. Farther down he hints at what the real problem might be (and yes, we are still dealing with could of and might be) when he says scientists also think that certain chemicals in the environment–like those used in plastics food packaging and dental sealents may be the cause–because some of these act like estrogen in the body. What about sugar?

The environmental impact

I’ve done a lot of thinking about the environmental factor of health issues. My Grandmother, who was a professional cook in the early 20th century, was always a big woman. She cooked with fresh fruits, vegetables, lots of lard and plenty of butter. She died of ovarian cancer at 73 years. In fact all of my grandparents had healthy appetites for sweets and red meat and they all diet in their golden years of some form of cancer. Heart disease wasn’t even on my radar screen until the late 1970s when my Dad suffered from plaque blockages.

What was different in their environment?

The introduction of high fructose corn syrup

High fructose corn syrup (HFCS), the new Satan of diets across America, was invented and introduced into the American diet in 1967. HFCS is what dieticians call a “bad” sugar. It is used as an additive to prepared foods and is a major player in foods that have very little nutritional value, i.e. cookies, baked goods, ice cream and flavored drinks. By the mid 1980s it was the primary ingredient in soft drinks, bottled fruit juices, and most pre-packaged foods. I’m always surprised to find this ingredient in things like peanut butter, crackers, cereal, bread and other items I don’t necessarily think of as “sweet”.

Since sugar in its raw form, and all derivitives of it, has an impact on growth hormones, I’m willing to entertain the idea that the increase in sugar in our diets is what is both making young girls fatter and that increase in sugar may be impacting the immune and hormone systems of children to make them mature faster. But that by itself doesn’t mean that your fat daughter will reach puberty early.

I’m quite sure my Grandmother and my Mother ate their fair share of cakes and cookies. What they didn’t eat or need to account for was an increase in hidden sugars from prepackaged and convenience foods. My Grandmother knew that when she ate a slice of cake with a cup of coffee or a glass a milk that only added sugar was the amount she put into the cake she made from scratch. Grandma also knew that her cake was going to be consumed following a dinner packed with vegetables and grains that would help balance the blood sugar levels. Most families eat their cake after a pizza or after a burger and fries.

The easy answer

I see a lot of articles that say the problem is that Americans are fat. I don’t argue that we don’t need to drop a few pounds as a nation. Ok, we need to drop a lot of pounds. But I think the “obesity” label is used to patronize citizens who don’t really understand that the problem with our national health isn’t our weight — that’s a symptom of a much bigger problem. As a nation we eat poorly, exercise rarely and like to place blame on factors beyond our control. The truth is that Americans are getting fatter because we make bad food choices to save time and because they are easily available. The reprecussions are larger waistlines today. But I don’t believe to simply stamp obesity as the cause for the homone issues of our children and put them all on a diet correctly points us toward the right solution for solving this problem.

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I have to admit I am completely fascinated with the First Lady’s campaign on childhood obesity prevention. If the only interview I’d seen was with Former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee I might be a bigger fan because Michelle Obama portrays grace, eloquence and a real passion for this subject without being preachy and assigning blame.

In the battle of childhood fat there are a lot of potential adversaries and very few heroes, so I welcome Mrs. Obama to the stage as the only vocal opponent to the problem who is looking for a solution instead of a villain. My own opinion, and some research indicates I could be right, is that the shift in American lifestyles after World War II is what created this problem: the expansion of the automotive industry, invention of TV, home refrigeration, computers and video games, and so much more. My grandparents used to walk–yes actually walk–to the produce stand every day to get vegetables for dinner. I drive to the store once a week. I knew every kid within a 3-mile block of my house when I was young. We got together at the community swimming pool (a 1/4-mile bike ride from my house) and we’d meet at other homes for games of tag, dogde ball and four square. My dad did his own yard work every Saturday.

Mrs. Obama points out some of these same issues in her 4-step plan to at least address obesity in our country:

• Help parents make better food choices by making fresh foods more readily available in communities that don’t have access and isn’t that a crime in itself that in parts of the USA we have communities without access to fresh fruits and vegetables?
• Provide healthier foods in the schools. Which should also include the removal of foods that have no nutritional value.
• Making healthier food more available and affordable. That is an entire conversation on its own about our food supply and additives. Mrs. Obama has a fight on her hands here.
• Encouraging more exercise among children. I think this should be among children and families. Our kids learn by example and if Mom and Dad sit in front of the TV all weekend long, I don’t care how much encouragement you do, the kids will grow up to be like Mom and Dad in most cases. I know, I am a product of some of this.

In the interview with Mrs. Obama I learned that Arkansas was the ONLY state in the US to reverse the childhood obesity trend during Governor Huckabee’s term. There were no statistics that indicated whether the trend continued down after he left office and no discussion of exactly how they accomplished this, but all by itself an interesting statistic.

One other interesting comment was that both Mrs. Obama and Governor Huckabee agreed that the success of this campaign is based upon personal responsibility. While I hope the campaign will raise awareness about the problem of overweight kids and the plight of the overweight adults in our country, personal responsibility is not something our adult communities embrace. We prefer to always blame someone else — even for fat.

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