50 Pounds for 50 Years

A journey from fat and unhealthy to lean and fabulous!

Friday, February 26, 2010

On track!

I am looking at today as if it were day 1 all over again. What's that Yogi Berra saying?: "It's like Deja Vu all over again!" That's me
I am remotivated and recharged to keep going on with this. Many of the program rules are already habit : I eat every 2-3 hrs; I have 3 fatloss plates daily; I upped my water to 12 glasses a day. All good.
Now that the rules are habits, I need to get the MIND into the habit as well. Blogging helps considerably, so let's talk about something near and dear to me today: Obesity. Namely, childhood obesity.
Luckily, I was never classified as an obese child, but I was certainly more than chubby and pleasingly plump. Probably by today's insurance standards I would have been considered obese.
Our first Lady, Michelle Obama, has made fighting childhood obesity one of her causes and I am standing up applauding her. It's about time. Working at the clinic I see way too many fat kids, and I don't view that word as discriminary. They are FAT!. If you did a body mass index, many of the kids I see walking around this clinic and in town, in schools and at the Mall are probably anywhere from 45-50 percent fat. The younger a kid is when they are fat, the greater their risk to a whole slew of chronic diseases down the road. We know all this. How many times do we as a society need to hear how we are killing our kids with food? When a ten year old has a fatty liver and a fasting blood glucose of 200, there's something wrong there, and it's not with the kid. It's with the parent. Parents are the ones who feed their kids. If the parent gives the kid lots of junk food and crap to eat, the kids' body is going to go to fat. How hard is this to understand?? It's not rocket science and yet I know people in my very town who eat McDonald's 3-4 times a week and I always see the kids with something in their hands heading to their mouths.
As I've mentioned before, my Clinic has this goal called 20/20 where we hope to be the healthiest community in America by 2020. We've instituted family Wellness seminars that teach parents and children how to eat healthier, and with an eye towards the economic crisis. We understand that not all people can afford organic food. We have exercise programs free of charge for them to learn how to move their bodies and take care of them.
And still, people resist. The reasons are varied, but my feeling is just this: these people do not want to change because they see nothing wrong. They don't care that they have to take insulin, or are losing their eyesight from diabetes; they don't care that they should eat 5 servings of fruits and veges minumum per day. Cake and candy just taste better and if they have to give themselves a little more insulin, well, then they will.
We need to protect and save our kids, that's the bottom line. I'm proud of my clinic that they have adopted this goal. I just wish more people who really need it would take advantage of it and listen.
Spread the word and save a kids' future life. Eradicate obesity and especially childhood obesity now. It's never been more imperative that we try. We are talking about the actual future of this country.

1 comment:

  1. I've heard about Vision 2020 and hope to soon learn about ways to get involved in the initiative. It's a worthwhile goal and I appreciate the leadership team of the Clinic committing to it and taking steps toward achieving it.

    You sound like you're doing well. Keep up the good work!

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