The Production Line of Childhood Obesity

Tools to help keep your Family Healthy

Do you know how much screen time your child had today? How about what size portions they should have given their age? How much physical activity did my family do today? The National Heart Lung and Blood Institute has put together a nice site full of tools to use to assist in keeping your family healthy.

 

Tool parents can use to help keep your family healthy

10 tips to Live by or Heart-Healthy Families

Fitness for Aging

Fitness as we age

It is important to work on physical fitness life long.

Physical fitness benefits include reduction of heart disease, reduction in Alzheimer’s and most importantly independence.  A recent study showed Finnish men who lost more than 15% of their cardiorespiratory fitness over a 10-year period faced a near doubling of their risk of acute MI over the subsequent decade and more than twice the risk of dying of any cause, a new study shows. But as we age fitness programs change. It isn’t realistic to ask the very elderly to jog, participate in spinning classes, hit the elliptical or rowing machine like those who are younger. The issues with mobility and frailty prevent such activities for most. So what does one do for fitness as they age?

Walking, stationary biking, water aerobics, swimming laps with a kick board, recumbent bike or  recumbent steppers are some of my favorite means of obtaining aerobic exercise. Also programs such as Sit and Be Fit. http://www.sitandbefit.org/   Any is exercise is better than no exercise. If exercise is done in a group or a class you also get the additional benefits of socialization. As we age socialization is vital. The more socially isolated a person becomes the worse the predictors for health. I found over the years many adhered to light continuous aerobic exercise because of the socialization of the classes more than the physical benefits of the exercise. New interns would come aboard and roll their eyes when they noted the workloads of many of the elderly, then I would point out the ages of many of my clients being in upper 80′s to mid 90′s and regularly attending classes 2-3 times per week, aerobically exercising, resistance training, stretching and socializing.

Resistance training is very important as we age as well as I am frequently promoting the following:

Your Strength is your Independence

This is what allows you to live in your own home, to care for yourself, to get up off the floor if you fall, to carry in the groceries.  It is your ability to cope with emergencies, to interact with the grandkids by walking up the bleachers, or across the soccer field, to lift up the two-year old, to get to their musicals across a long parking lot, to walk the hills at the nature center etc.

Here are a few simple strengthening exercise that most can perform. Wall squat

Wall Squats

With feet 8-12 inches apart and approximately 6 inches from the wall, slide down the wall a few inches. Hold this position as long as able. Push back up to standing. Repeat as many times as possible. Don’t go down to far, and if you fear not being able to stand all the way back up, keep a chair next to you for assistance. Breath out as you push back  up.

Toe Raises

This exercise is surprisingly hard for many of the elderly to perform. Go up on tip toes and back down as many times as possible. To make harder try on a stair step or try doing on only one leg.

Wall push ups

Just like the old-fashioned push up but do against a wall. Breath out as you are pushing yourself back from the wall. Exhale on Exertion! I say this because many hold their breath which is hard on the heart and blood pressure.

Lateral leg exercises

These are really important for maintaining a good gait when we walk as we get older. Lying on side – do in bed – as easier than getting up from the floor. Lift leg out and back down. Do as many as possible.

Be a mentor, assist to make it happen

As most blog readers tend to be younger, pass this advice on to your elders, work out with them, purchase and arrange for transportation to fitness classes, make a big deal out of wanting them to stay fit and healthy to participate in life with you. We all need encouragement at times. Don’t assume being old means sitting in the recliner all day. Keep those in your live vital through physical activity. And have a great day!

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The unhappy meal

Childhood Obesity

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Fast Food Facts

Ideas for increasing vegetables in you family

Increasing your families vegetable consumption can be challenging.

I have had to work to keep my family eating  veggies. It doesn't just happen. Buying vegetables doesn't necessarily mean the family will eat them. I have always pushed vegetables for my family, but when they are in charge of meal preparation, veggies aren't usually part of the preparation. They will naturally head towards carbohydrates, breads, immediate gratification foods. The following are a few ideas of how I work them in to my families diet.

1. If hubby is cooking and you are around remind him to use the fresh produce. If that doesn't work, get it out and assist in cleaning and preparing it. His cooking has a tendency to be light on veggies. Hubby's famous chili tends to consist of onions as the only veggie besides tomato sauce.  I assisted him in adding: tomotillo's, celeriac, green peppers,  hot peppers, tomatoes.

2. In lunches pack the freshest veggies you can find. Carrots, cherry and green peppers work well, a small dish of hummus too. Always add lettuce to sandwiches, or parsley, cilantro, etc. Cucumbers and feta cheese with a little dill packs well for lunches.

3. Kale Chips! Keep them available, add them to lunches, store in containers and bring out a couple of times a week. I have enjoyed  making with spice/herb infused oils, Tuscan blend is our favorite,and/or a locally blended seasoning salt.  Use very little oil. Dehydrated at 100 degrees for two hours is best. They can be made in the oven however my family thinks prefers dehydrated. I think the tend to cook and become a little more bitter if go to long in oven. It is a timing thing.

4. Buy local produce every week. Budget yourself the time and money to purchase fresh produce. Visit your farm markets or join CSA. A CSA is community sustained agriculture programs in which you purchase shares for. Yes can be expensive, so split it with a friend or extended family. This was our first year in a CSA. I loved it and can't wait for it to start up again next year.

The CSA produce was more than my family would eat, and that was after splitting it. To get through the produce was challenging. Every week  there was another share coming and to manage the produce was work! I dehydrated some for the winter, especially dill. I think I have a lifetime supply. We learned to use a great variety of vegetables. That was fun, kind of like on the show Chopped. You are given this box and you have to come up with a tasty recipe. Can anyone give me a suggestion for two foot long daikon radish?

 The menu planning centered on what was in need of using first and building the meal or dish around it. My son's comment "I can't wait for this CSA to be over." Too bad for him that means farmers market, as I am budgeting the same expense on veggies year round. Make your own spaghetti sauce, salsa, slopppy joe sauce, anything that comes from a can or bottle, challenge yourself to make your own. You can find any recipe on the computer now a days, just type in and wallah...all kinds of ideas.

How balanced is your life?

 No one expects you to be perfect other than yourself. As often heard we are our own worse critic. However when you reflect on your family think about the wellness wheel. If you were to assess your family how much do you give to each of these domains. For many their wheel isn't round as they devote more time and energy to certain areas such as work, then tend to neglect things like the physical and emotional health. How balanced is your wheel?

Does your family devote time to physical exercise? Do you address the emotional components? A great time to do this is at a family meal. Discuss the struggles, the challenges incurred during the day.

 "Wellness is first and foremost a choice to assume responsibility for the quality of your life. It begins with a conscious decision to shape a healthy lifestyle. Wellness is a mindset, a predisposition to adopt a series of key principles in varied life areas that lead to high levels of well-being and life satisfaction.

A consequence of this focus is that a wellness mindset will protect you against temptations to blame someone else, make excuses, shirk accountability, or collapse in the face of adversity.

Walking for health

 Walking is a great family health activity. 

If you feel your family isn't active enough try to add in a walk each day. A great time to do it is after the evening meal. Gather the family, don't forget to include the grandparents. Stroll around the block or a local path, don't make it hard, just make it enjoyable. This is a time to talk, the relax, to stretch your legs, to enjoy the sights. Exercise doesn't have to always be high intensity either. Make a goal to get your family to walk 3-5 times a week. 

Be patient

If your children are young, you may be tempted to just push them in the stroller, but if they can walk get them out and let them walk part of it. When my daughter was young a normal 15-20 minute walk for me could take 45 minutes or more for her to dawdle, explore and partake in the walk. I found if I pushed her in the stroller she slept, and then I didn't get the down time necessary, but if I moved her then she would sleep on return...bonus!

As the children get older it becomes a time to chat about the days events, about concerns, strengths and challenges. It is hard to get teens out, but if you make it into a regular activity they just might surprise you and engage in it regularly. Try not to put too much pressure on them. If they don't then it is time for you and your spouse to reconnect and enjoy each others company.

Include family and friends in the walking activity

Bring the grandparents along, or a neighbour. Again adjust the pace and route according to their abilities. Keep it fun and light, don't start in to politics or issues that are stressful. Take time to watch the wildlife, enjoy nature, watch the sun set, view the clouds, smell the air, and relax. 

By establishing routine exercise in the family studies show children more likely to be more physically active in adulthood.

Start your family off with healthy lifestyle sooner rather than later. Your family will likely maintain healthy lifestyles throughout their lives. Be the role model!

Fast Food Challenges

Meal times can be tough when family obligations allow you limited time for preparation. 

Some people are always thinking ahead and can plan by preparing early, either a crock pot meal, or cook something ahead of time and just warm it up. But any family can tell you there are days that you just don't have the time so you succumb to the ever inviting, immediate gratification of fast food. We all know we should not eat it, but it happens. The more often we eat it, the easier it gets to go back again and again. By doing this often you are mentoring your children to accept this as normal behaviour and also teaching there taste buds to crave the unhealthy food choices.

My family prided themselves on avoiding fast food. I am ever grateful to a seventh grade home economics teacher who thoroughly investigated with her class the fast food industry. They watched movies like Food Inc, Supersize Me, etc. After this the two children decided to be vegetarians. This lasted a couple of months, then they gradually added meat back into the diet, but limited the number of days per week of eating it. They kept to the no fast food for quite some time, my daughter avoided it for a few years. When we had an exchange student from Japan living with us, who spoke very little English, I asked her on her final few days what else she wanted to do in the US.  She stuttered and stumbled trying to tell me something that I couldn't comprehend. Then as if a lightbulb went off, her eyes brightened, she ran to get paper, and began sorting through the crayons. Finally she finds a yellow crayon and draws....you guessed it ....the golden arches.  She proceeded to show me with her hands a BIG Mac. I think she was greatly disappointed with the Big Mac, as it really isn't so big as she had envisioned. We then proceeded to take her to Burger King. My daughter who spent 3 years avoiding fast food was mortified. She and I can now say though since that experience we have not eaten fast food since.

How do you not eat fast food?

 Our sports teams now stop at grocery stores instead of fast food restaurants. Kids can then select their own food choices. I hope the coaches mentor them to choose healthy choices instead of junk food or processed foods like Lunchables.

 I once worked as an athletic trainer to a class A division one football team. The coach was morbidly obese, tipping the scales near 450 lbs. He had numerous operations for stomach stapling (back in the day that what it was called) and yet continued to put the weight right back on. Well when we travelled his rule was to go no more than two hours without stopping for food. I wonder now how many of his former football players are obese. He would have done better to mentor the kids with a stop for an apple, or a water break, which could have easily been taken with the team. 

Grab and Go Food Choices

Think about the time it takes to stop for fast food, could you run into a grocery and get foods like:

•  bag of grapes, apples, oranges
• box of graham crackers and jar of peanut butter
• string cheese
• jerky
• bottled water
• pretzels
• cut up veggies and dip
• bean dip and torillas

It would be less expensive, healthier and you would be showing the kids by example how to avoid the feeling that fast food is the only way to go. 

How to get your family to eat healthy

Teaching your family to eat healthy nutrition foods for a lifestyle

Raising a family can be particularly trying when it comes to meals. From early on children start to exert their independence and it often start with food. The "NO" when it comes to getting them to eat something. I know of many parents who simply gave up and fed their children nothing but chicken nuggets and hot dogs because "that is all they will eat". As parents we must role model healthy eating, make it fun and Be a parent!!!

 Young children should be started early with healthy eating, choose fruits instead of ice cream. If highly refined sugary foods are introduced early of course your child will choose the sweets over the healthy fruit choices. Hold off as long as possible with sweets.

Make eating fun

A favorite story of mine is when my son was about three I would read to him every night and a favorite story was about the Incredible Hulk. So when I introduced split pea soup I told him it was Hulk soup and if he ate it he would be as big and strong as Hulk. He promptly wolfed down the soup and expected to see changes immediately. I told him it would take several days for it to work and the more he ate the better the effects. He bought it! It took over a year before he caught on, but to this day loves Hulk soup.

Veggies - make them fun! 

Allow them to be finger foods, build towers with carrot sticks, be ravenous dinosaurs eating the tops off all the trees (broccoli), count how many leaves to get to the middle of a brussel sprout, see who can pull the longest string out of celery.

Expect to hear "No thanks, they aren't my favorite." Be ready to reply "Of course they aren't your favorite, we don't all get to eat our favorite foods every day." Just because they reject it one day keep offering it, insist on at least one bite to see if you still don't like it. Yes mine still don't like summer squash or cooked sweet potatoes - I think they ate these all their early formative years. Role model eating these foods anyway, don't eliminate them from your diet.

Soda is the exception

Too many kids go straight to the fridge and look for soda or juice. Encourage water! Water with every meal, water when thirsty, water with snacks. Get them used to drinking water. Keep a pitcher in the fridge, use ice cubes, have water bottles ready to just pull from the fridge and go. Stock up on your favorite ones so we can reduce the plastics from store bought water. Add a twist of lemon or a small amount of juice for the treat. If you already have a soda addict. Have them measure out the amount of sugar that is in the drink, it is a good visual experiment, then continue to measure out the most they have had in one day, then add it in the approximate sugar from the rest of their daily intake - ice cream, cookies etc.  Let them decide if it is healthy or not.

Don't be a short order cook.

Cook a healthy meal for everyone, have healthy snacks out instead of letting the children rummage through the refrigerator or kitchen. My children always come home to a bowl of fruit on the table, and maybe some whole grain cracker or hummus and vegetables. If the kids are demanding and complaining about the food choices have them help plan and prepare. Nothing better than getting them to cook as prepares them for the future, teaches how food is produced, like how much butter really goes into cookies. What fruit combinations work in smoothies, how to hide kale in a recipe, these are good challenges for teens.

Mentoring families in physical activity

 

Families should work together to mentor one another in healthy lifestyles.

 We can all learn from one another. Today the goal was to get the teens outdoors more. The plan to get them outdoors involved watching their mother attempt to balance on a slack line. With wobbly and I do mean wobbly legs, a few shrieks from fear while falling, they were suddenly off the computer and the Wii and engaged, proving how much more adept they could be on the slack line. This lasted for a while but then they were lured back in by their media sources. Next plan water skiing. Once again they can't let mom show them up, so after taking turns we all got skiing in.


It worked that way with getting them involved in running too. I was planning to run a 5k when they wanted to know what all the fuss was about, next thing I knew I had them registered at ages 5 and 7 for their first 5k. Now I had been planning for a personal best time, and ended up with a personal worse time, but I sparked a passion for them.

It doesn't have to be a competition, maybe an evening walk, a swim, a game of badminton, a yoga pose. If you make it seem fun, a contest, or be silly with it, they are likely to try it. If you promote physical activity as a chore, a burden or an all consuming necessity, I guarantee your kids won't participate. Entice the family by setting up the activity, or playing with your spouse first, then others will want to join in. Keep it light and fun. Enjoy!!!

Family Health

Health care tends to focus only on the individual and not the family units. When prevention is discussed it is usually in the context of secondary prevention, meaning that the main health event has already occurred and the goal is to prevent a secondary health issue. It is kind of a day late and a dollar short approach. When a health care professional counsels one on health and wellness, it should encompass the whole family.

We are all responsible to work towards not only our own health, but that of those around us. It starts with personal health goals, then progresses to family health goals, including parents mentoring kids, kids mentoring parents. Grandparents too play a role, the idea of the grandparent spoiling the children can be detrimental to the future of the child if the spoiling occurs through inviting and encouraging unhealthy behaviours.

Family health and wellness should include:

• Healthy Eating
• Exercise
• Healthy responses to stress
• Emotional support
• Social support
• Sharing of information of family risks, health issues, histories

This is the inaugural blog in which I hope to share my knowledge and experience with you. Topics I plan to discuss include:

• Keeping your family moving
• Eating healthy on the run
• Teenagers nutritional issues
• Mentoring 
• Leading health issues such as cholesterol, blood pressure, weight, smoking, risk factor reduction

A little about me though. I have worked in healthcare in the fields of emergency medicine, sports medicine, cardiac rehabilitation and exercise physiology for over twenty years. I too am raising teenagers. I strive to be as active as possible but profess am not a master of any particular sports. My activities include jogging, biking, cross country skiing, down hill skiing, kayaking, hiking, swimming, stand up paddle boarding, yoga and probably a few others I forgot to mention. I strive to teach healthy eating to my family and friends. I am proud to say my two teens eat quite healthy, but of course like any person have a few foods they just won't do...yet
.

I look forward to meeting and sharing information with you! For reference I have another blog entirely on recovering from heart disease http://rehabilitateyourheart.wordpress.com/