A forum post I've read has really gotten me thinking about something. Really got me feeling - very sad.
The forum post talked about a kid who had been overweight since he was little, but whilst being away on some kind of camp for a month, away from his family, and whatever he usually ate - he has lost 10kg. That is mind-blowing! It speaks very loudly to what his diet was like at home.
Gosh, I'm not making any kind of personal judgements here - I know, every parent is just doing the best they can for their kids. The best they know how to do. That's all we can all do. What I'm wondering is - how is it that as a society we've neglected to pass on what healthful eating looks like? Why is it that it takes people like Jamie Oliver to open people's eyes to what they are putting on their plates. How did we end up in this place, where for some people, the only things they eat in a day, come from a packet?
Is it that we are so busy doing, that we've traded off preparing food from scratch for earning money, buying things? I feel sad every day that I work. I work in a school canteen/cafe. I estimate that nearly a third of the kids that come to the canteen, are overweight, if not obese. I don't know about you, but when I was in high school (about 20 years ago - cringe), there were only a handful of kids that were overweight. What has happened in the past 20 years? I feel so sad for the struggle ahead of them - the struggle to lose weight; the struggle to keep their health; the struggle to move; the struggle to fit-in that so often accompanies being overweight. So many kids come to the canteen with their recess or lunch in their hands, with nothing fresh, or homemade or not out of a packet to be seen. Why do we do this to our kids? To their future?
Recently, in my husband's work, a mother was given $50 and sent into the supermarket to buy lunch and snacks for herself and her 5 children for the next day, when they were going to an aquatic centre. She came out with 5 litres of Coke, and packets of chips.
Is it that we are ignorant? When we buy our kids a bright blue coloured iceblock, do we actually think it is food we are giving them? When we eat a burger from a fast food chain - I'm sure we've all heard the story about the person that kept a cheeseburger on their fridge for five years, and it looked the same after five years as the day it was bought - do we really think we are nourishing our bodies?
Don't get me wrong - my kids eat junk food from time to time. They're kids. For some reason they're drawn to brightly coloured non-food substances! I can't and don't want to be some kind of control freak who monitors every morsel that goes into their mouths. But I do give them the information about what exactly happens in their body if they drink a glass of soft drink or whatever. But, for the most part, I do everything I can to make sure I'm feeding them food that will help them learn and grow and play. I try not to feed them food that will just add more complications to a life, that will already have its share of complications.
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