Parents take a stand on obesity

Some parents who are concerned about the food being served to their children in daycare centers are taking action. The April 12 issue of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution described their efforts in an article headlined “Fresh start for kids” by reporter Helen Oliviero.

Aaron Parks of Decatur got involved when he saw his 4-year-old son eating pizza for breakfast at his daycare. Besides “breakfast pizza,” children were eating donuts and cookies.

Parks shot photos with his camera phone, complained to school administrators and joined a new “school nutrition committee.” He and other parents sold cookbooks and raised money to plant a garden at the child care center, and he helped center staff order broccoli and other vegetables in bulk from Sam’s Club.

“You just can’t take no for an answer,” Parks said. “You have to be tenacious.”

His son’s school responded positively. Principal Suzanne Kennedy explained, “We took a look at the menu and made some changes. We took out the not-so-nutritious things and replaced them with things like oatmeal for breakfast.” The parents really jumped in, she added. “They even installed an irrigation system.”

The newspaper reported that another Atlanta parent, Laura Laszlo, was so disappointed by the food choices at her children’s daycare – “chicken nuggets, french fries and juice that really wasn’t juice” -- that she opened her own center.

“A treat is a treat and not a meal,” Laszlo said. “I think we’ve lost that in society today. You don’t eat french fries every day for lunch and ice cream every day. It’s like in ‘Sesame Street,’ they call them ‘sometimes foods.’”

Poor eating habits are taking a toll on Georgia’s children. They rank as some of the heaviest in the nation, with about 37 percent of children ages 10 to 17 overweight or obese, according to a 2009 Robert Wood Johnson study. The Atlanta-based Centers for Disease Control reports that nationally the obesity rate for children has tripled since the 1980s.

Extra weight puts children at risk for obesity-related diseases such as Type 2 diabetes and heart disease, which used to affect mainly adults.

First lady Michelle Obama has drawn attention to such issues with her recently launched “Let’s Move” campaign, which calls for more exercise and slashing fat and salt in school lunches. Mrs. Obama has discussed her own struggles in helping her daughters maintain a healthy weight.

The article also quotes an Atlanta psychologist, Dina Zeckhausen, who says more children these days are “emotional eaters” – those who repeat a pattern of their parents and turn to food for comfort. She contends that there are better ways of dealing with stress than turning to food.