Footprints into the future
I had an interesting conversation with a client today about parenting and even though we had very different views, we agreed on a few fundamentals. One area we definitely agreed on is that parents need to take more responsibility as parents. The client was quite hesitant to talk about these things as in their experience, they have been attacked in the past for having different views as they clashed with what other parents believes or more importantly, did.
Parenting and how to parent is a very touchy subject as there is a wide range of variance and the idea that parents know best hold quite true. When I discuss with people, I know I come across as very judgemental of parents based on what they feed their kids or the activities they choose for them but, none of the parents I discuss these things with should feel attacked over it as if they believe what they are doing is correct, why would it matter what I think.
Keep in mind that I don't actually judge them, I just talk about various aspects of child development or what I think may or may not happen in the future. The problem of feeling judged isn't through what I say, it is through parents identifying themselves in some of what I would consider detrimental to a child, any child.
For example, excess dietary sugar, especially in young life. I have mentioned before that 85% of the brain is developed in the first three years and diet plays a large role in how the brain grows and the connections it makes. Have you ever overloaded on sugar? How do you feel, how well do you think, what about the sugar high and the subsequent lows? What happens when a child has the same highs and lows repeatedly while their brain is developing? Do you know?
Me either, but my assumption based on personal experience and observing small children who eat and don't eat sugar like this (my daughter is yet to eat any added sugar) indicates to me that there are behavioural mood changes and, cravings created. Creating additional cravings for sugar whilst the brain develops in an already hardwired brain that favours sugar, seems a pretty slippery slope.
The brain already wants sugar because it requires a small amount to grow and function but it is relatively difficult to find in the natural environment. Introducing it artificially at a young age in quantities that are far above any natural consumption is like continually injecting heroin and then expecting they won't become addicts.
Sugar has been linked to heart disease, Alzheimers and of course diabetes as well as changing the way the brain functions and develops in other ways. Changing the way a brain functions in the negative is called brain damage. Of course, the argument is for moderation but what does that mean for a child? Or an adult for that matter.
We live in a world of increasing child obesity rates, increasing rates of depression, addictions and mood related disorders and increases in a host of health problems. How much of it is related to those first 3 years as a child's brain develops or early childhood in general? I would suggest a lot more than there is conclusive evidence for yet.
These kids are going to most likely be carrying the way we raised them and the food we fed them for life and how they experience that life is going to depend heavily upon it. People seem to focus on the visible effects of diet on children, not the mental and emotional. I see that the physical is both a problem and symptomatic of larger, much harder to deal with issues that lay hidden and are hard to treat.
Parents who feel judged when anyone raises these types of questions or topics should spend less time thinking about their own emotional harms and more time investigating what might affect the lives of their children. Of course, it is entirely possible that the reason people get so triggered and upset now is because of what they ate as children so, it might not be their fault they take everything so personally.
Who knows, perhaps eating sugary, highly processed and refined food is like being bitten by a radioactive spider, and all of these kids will turn into superheroes.
Taraz
[ a Steemit original ]
I feel judged.. my wife and I gave our son a few bites of ice cream when we were at a festival this weekend.. now we just caused him to have diabetes and heart disease!! (just kidding)
I think that anything in moderation is OK. That's what life is all about. Moderation. Too many people don't understand, or were never taught / don't have the self control to act in moderation.
Also, when these studies "link" a certain item, like Coffee, to something else, like let's say Cancer... the studies are more often than not flawed. Scientists are injecting larger quantities than humanly consumable into lab rats, every day, for an extended period of time, and they are then stating that there is a direct link between Coffee and Cancer (look it up, it's a real thing -- ask California about their Coffee Packaging Labels... ).
Anyway.. I think what it comes down to at the end of the day is Common Sense. Unfortunately, Common Sense is the biggest oxymoron in the English language because it has become extremely rare and is not a "sense" by definition.
So now we are finding groups of random scientists performing various "useless" studies because there was one person on the internet somewhere who said that when they looked at the sun for half a second, then spun around with one arm pointed up to the sky and the other arm extended away from their body, after they took a sip of unsweetened iced tea, while standing in the middle of a park, and jumping on one foot ... experienced an out-of-the-body experience ... and someone else with lots of money and a desire to have the same experience, decided to fund a panel of scientists to test if this person's theory had merit ...
Or we could always go with the big government theory and say that the government is trying to control the lives of their subjects by reducing joy of their subjects one food item at a time...
Since I've gone on so many tangents, let me circle back. Common Sense and Moderation are the key to a happy and "healthy" life (barring genetic disorders that you have no control over). [Insert Food Item Here] by itself is not bad for you. Consuming considerable amounts of it on a daily basis because it's inexpensive and/or tastes great is not intelligent.
I think it is all over. What is the equivalent of 'powering down' for a child?
When it comes to lots of things, I think common sense and moderation should prevail but as you said, not so common or easy.
No one really knows where it all leads but from a health perspective, I predict nowhere good. Most foods are pushed like iphones and computer games, for profit, not health.
I mean... you kind of just said, parents are bad for feeding high sugar diets, and if you don't like hearing that, too bad. Which while not wrong, is not really all that helpful. Keep in mind many people who feed their kids poorly are probably not 1) reading your blog, 2) deeply educated, 3) affluent, 4) responsible with their own eating habits.
For education to be helpful it needs to be geared at arming the student, your post doesnt, IMO, seem to do this.
How might parents who feed high sugar diets take 5 small steps toward better dietary choices? That might be helpful.
What science have you read, that convinced you? Perhaps sharing that might help others.
Anyways, have a nice day.
What if it arms you, so you can arm the students, since you like the educative part more?
There is a good book called 'Life without Bread'
https://www.amazon.com/Life-Without-Bread-Low-Carbohydrate-Diet/dp/0658001701
I have ulcerative colitis and this is the only thing that helped.
5 step plans are BS in my opinion as they do not create the cognitive dissonance associated with habit breaking.
Keep in mind that the average age of Steemit is likely mid 20s and most have not had children yet so like any education, it should be pre-emptive not corrective.
Fair point. And again i dont disagree. Im trying to cut wheat and gluten now. Also processed sugars and packaged foods. So thanks
Like you it seems common sense to limit/avoid bad foods as much as possible especially when nurturing young children. There are plenty of healthy substitutes for things such as fizzy drinks etc - I used to give my son a dash of fresh juice topped up with carbonated water as a treat; most of the time he was happy with water.
I never bought jarred baby food but blended our well balanced meals for him instead.
I guess it is all about awareness, education and taking responsibility for ourselves and our own.
If someone feels judged it is probably because somewhere/somehow, subconsciously, they realise that they are falling short on their responsibilities. It can be irksome to have the light shone on our failings!
Happy munching.
xox
This is generally the issue when people react badly to being judged. If they are judged positively though, the judgement is always welcomed.
Everyone has different views on parenting. I think you can't over shield as a child needs to be able to build up resistance so playing in the mud etc is normal. As long as the parent is thinking and having the child's best interest at heart no one is really wrong. Everyone has to be different so I have never heard of a child not having any sugar and you may be totally correct. You must give her a substitute like honey then? I think the dietary requirements and the parent worrying about it has changed a lot from when I had my kids over 20 years ago so am a little clueless right now.
It is because of her allergies that it has to be this way. She eats some meats and vegetables and wild berries. I call it the baby cave girl diet. She gets sugar from the vegetables and berries she eats so there is plenty for her brain to develop and her energy levels are constant and high due to the amounts of fats. There is actually more energy in fats than sugars and without sugar present, the fats pass through and are healthy. Our bodies aren't designed for constant high sugar levels.
I know there are lots of sugar in fruits and berries. I suppose you have to be very careful especially with allergies. it becomes a way of life and has to be that way. Maybe she will grow out of them as she gets older. My son is lactose intolerant and milk affects him.
I think it would make a lot of sense to simply tax foods that contain particularly high amounts of refined sugars more heavily than healthier alternatives. Overall, the value added tax on food or food ingredients could be the same as now but those harmful ingredients taxed more heavily that we consume excessively.
Finland almost had the right idea with the sugar tax except, every dollar it raised should have been subtracted from raw food ingredients. Incentivize healthy eating while disincentivizing low quality.
That's exactly what I was talking about. Was there some political reason that could not be done?
Another idea that has potential, in my opinion, would be paying people to exercise. It would probably not be too complicated to develop smartphone app capable of detecting whether the carrier of the phone was walking, running, cycling, rowing or whatever based on how the phone was moving based on accelometer data. The same app could identify the carrier from patters of motion. The GPS tracker of the phone could be used to record the route traveled. From the time elapsed it could easily be calculated how strenuous the exercise was. The data could be stored on a blockchain and tokens would earned by exercising. To motivate people of all ages and backgrounds, the users could be identified to account for the background variables. Privacy concerns could be alleviated using zero-knowledge-proofs to verify that the correct amount of tokens be distributed without anybody being capable of deciphering any of the exercise geolocation or time data.
The idea would be to distribute the tokens on the basis of how much each person could save tax euros by remaining healthier through exercise. State and municipal governments could give the tokens monetary value by spending healthcare cost savings on purchasing the tokens. I don't see any downsides to this.
I actually think it was PS that killed it. Same with the wine in supermarkets.
It seemed to have positive effects overall at Pekka Niska but it does tend to lead into the social scoring system in time perhaps. Rebates on tax for healthy living?
Did PS really kill wine in supermarkets?
Interesting. So it was tried at Pekka Niska. Most interesting.
It is pretty certain that someone would suggest the system include factors other than exercise and thus begin to resemble a social scoring system. That's why using a zero-knowledge-proofs would be essential. I'm not sure the Finns would be willing to go along with anything resembling a fully-fledged social scoring system.
Superheroes? I doubt it. It's not just refined sugar but also refined food too. Those factory made food items that are made like army rations. Just toss into water to boil for some minutes and ready to eat. They are also a danger to growing kids.
Kids in my country eating a lot of noodles. It's just sad because it has replaced the really rich diet they could have been having. There are kids who won't eat anything g except noodles and eggs.
I eat noodles sometimes so I know how empty it is but tell parents and their children that.
We really need to watch what kids eat. It doesn't have to become a source of addiction before parents should take responsibility for their children's mentorship, health and growth.
Actually, eating noodles can be very very satisfying. I know that first hand (not that I'm addicted to it but sometimes, I give myself that treat!)
We cannot control everything about our kids but we can control what they eat at an early stage and ensure proper development. Every parent should take those formative years like an examination. I totally agree with this wonderful insight
Wow, you just gave me the right sense of parenting, I mean for we parents to be reading this is a great insight into what are expected of us. I don’t want to be a failed parent when I become one and this post is an eye opener. Thanks for the health tips my friend , you’re awesome
According to my research
Now i dont know how much sugar is too much but i guess with what ive written above, it is called for serious caution. My father is not a fan of sugar, infact he detests it, and consistently discourages it, since i was little, but i still find my way to it, sometimes, its sugar i mean!though the craving was not as much as an average young kid. But i believe greatly in things being done with moderation.
This is true just as my analogy above, i crave for sugar less because of my upbringing so that too contributes a lot
If I remember correctly, the brain needs about 20 grams a day, 4-5 teaspoons.
Facinating and educative health information you just taught me the adverse effect of sugar intake in children of within 3 years of age. I never knew that sugar intake affect the brain development of children. You just safe my family from making some parental blunder in feeding our kid who is now 18 months old. Thanks for this helpful health advice @tarazkp