Obesity is a rising problem amongst our children, but we must realise that obesity doesn't appear overnight. We have to accept that obesity in children is an issue that can arise over time through various unfortunate situations, and parents have the opportunity to make a massive difference in this outcome.

Schools continue to make in-roads into teaching children about the importance of healthy eating; Home life needs to support these teachings, to ensure that the information and the message are clear and consistent to our children. In this world of mass marketing of junk food to children, taking responsibility for the importance parent’s play in this picture is a giant step towards solving the problem. If you feel you may have more to learn to help you support clients with children's healthy eating within the family home - please read on.

Junk alert!

Since junk foods are often loaded with saturated fat and sugar, long-term consumption by children of junk foods is a key factor in kids' weight gain. Junk foods contain minimal nutrients, and are effectively 'dead" foods. Since nutrients are essential for children's growth, junk foods may cause them to gain weight, but still leave children deficient and undernourished. Introduction of children to the wrong foods may start as early as during pregnancy, when the mother may be filling up on cakes, biscuits and chocolates - 'eating for two" - and creating a sweet fuel for her growing child. Whilst this is easily done when pregnancy creates such tiredness, this may sadly give the baby a particularly sweet tooth as soon as it is born. If exposure to the wrong foods continues into weaning, the child may be getting addicted to sweet, refined foods with low nutrient density before he or she even understands what food is. This is a crucial time for parents to influence their children, and not cave in to peer pressure, convenience foods and relentless advertising. Providing wholesome pureed foods selected from fresh fruits and vegetables, as well as protein sources such as lentils, organic meats and fish, will set babies from six months off to a fabulous start Introducing chocolate and other refined sweet foods is not a kindness to a child; it is the start of a ticking obesity time bomb. Here starts the parents' lifelong opportunity for teaching their children the importance of healthy eating, and don't forget the importance of being a good role model! What parents do, speaks volumes more to children than what parents say.

Foods and drinks to reduce:

• Processed foods
• Ready-meals
• Fast food
• Sweet goods, such as chocolates, cakes, biscuits., fizzy pop, sugary desserts
• Refined flour foods, such as white flour baked goods, white rice, while pasta

Foods and drinks to increase:

• Fruit
• Vegetables
• Poultry
• Fish
• Nuts and seeds
• Pulses and legumes, such as peas, beans, lentils
• Whole grains, such as brown rice, whole grain bread, brown pasta or vegetable pasta
• Water, herbal teas, smoothies
• Natural yoghurt

Watch the portion sizes!

Simple overfeeding is another obvious culprit for creating overweight children. Kids have an inbuilt sensitive appetite regulator, which clearly controls the quantities of food they consume, often varying from day to day according to fuel needs. However, if children are pushed to eat more man their appetite dictates, this regulator switch loses its sensitivity, and then, like adults, children are just as capable of stuffing in far more than is healthy.

Believe it or not, underfeeding of nutrient-dense foods, such as fresh fruits and vegetables and whole grains, may lead to excessive appetite, because the children are starved of vitamins, minerals and essential fats. This means children eat much larger portions of junk.
Choosing to buy ready-meals and processed food for children to eat is a sure-fire way of providing them with an imbalance of nutrients, providing an excess of addictive salt and sugar that creates a need to eat far more than they need. It's no joke - parents are key to this, and a parent's fundamental understanding of these issues is paramount. They have the opportunity to provide their children with the right balance of nutrition, teaching them the importance of healthy eating, and showing the way by example, in order to stand a hope of halting the tide of obesity statistics.

So having established the long-term role of food in a child's weight status, with what other challenges are we faced?

Skipping meals

Modern lifestyles can mean we find it difficult to all sit down together for meals these days, with parents working long hours, often skipping breakfast to get to work on time. A common misnomer is that one less meal a day will help you lose weight, but, as with adults, not eating breakfast plays havoc with a child metabolism and Mood sugar regulation The hunger caused by missing breakfast paves the way for a day plagued with cravings for sweet foods, looking for that quick energy fix, leading to inevitable weight gain. Not only are children prone to easy weight gain due to this imbalance in blood sugar regulation, blood sugar fluctuations also lead of course, to poor concentration, behaviour problems, learning difficulties, mood swings, tow energy for physical play and lowered resistance to infection in the long-term, as children reach teen years, the hormonal balance will be thrown into havoc - terrible teens, here we come! All because of skipping breakfast...?!

Make breakfast a priority!

Interestingly, waking up unable to face breakfast is a sign of poor blood sugar balance. So if this is part of me problem, encourage a kick-start to the day with a simple light breakfast before 9am every day. "Go to work on an egg" was a well known advertising catch phrase from the past, which we would be well served to remember as part of a varied diet. Make it a part of the daily routine for all the family to have breakfast whether it includes an egg or not to help rebalance metabolism and reset the appetite for enjoying breakfast. The list of breakfast ideas in the box below may help to inspire you.

No time!

We can all be short on time to get breakfast ready in the mornings. Advise parents to save time by preparing breakfast the right before. Get the whole family involved. Here are some ideas to include the kids:

• by setting the table
• mixing up muesli and soaking it overnight
• cooking porridge and keeping it in a thermos overnight
• preparing pancakes and stacking on greaseproof paper for the fridge or freezer (eat with fruit, nuts and yoghurt at breakfast)
• making omelets or frittata to eat cold next day
• keeping leftovers for breakfast consumption etc

Many recipes can be made m advance - cook rice (or quinoa) with egg, cinnamon and rice milk for a luscious, comforting rice pudding breakfast which could be made in larger quantities, in order to last a few days. Cinnamon is really tasty added to warm milk before using it on cereals. It has the benefits of aiding blood sugar regulation and digestion, whilst being a warning spice for the coming winter months.

Red Quinoa is an interesting and ancient South American grain, available in health-food shops. It can be cooked with coconut milk, pecans, pineapple and raisins for an exotic breakfast when you fancy something special.

Breakfast bars

Now, if all this is too much, the supermarkets can actually be a useful source of ideas, provided you stick to the healthy food aisles. Many healthy snack bars are available these days, to send kids - and their parents! - On their way with a refuelled stomach. Try The Food Doctor's range, which also includes packets of nuts and seeds that can be added to porridge and other cereal breakfasts for a protein punch that aids blood sugar regulation throughout the day.

Breakfast clubs

Many schools run breakfast dubs now. If you don't know whether this exists at your focal schools, phone the schools to check facilities in your area. If you would like to start your own, nutritionists are available to help with food ideas and recipes. Maybe you could start a dub to rotate parents hosting breakfast for several local children once a week.

Here are some more healthy breakfast ideas for kids:

• apple shoes with cinnamon and nuts (if not allergic to nuts)
• wholemeal pitta pocket stuffed with spinach leaves, sliced tomatoes and cottage cheese and for tahini
• chapattis with canned tomatoes or baked beans, and veggie sausage slices
• rice milk whizzed with live yoghurt, vanilla extract, banana and mixed berries
• museli (mixed oats, buckwheat etc) soaked overnight in rice milk with dried fruits, grated apple or berries, chopped nuts, sesame seeds (if not allergic)
• quiche
• com fritters with sweet corn, broccoli, bacon bits and onion
• muffins - add fruit such as berries, or even grated vegetables such as carrot sweet potato or courgette to bump up your veg intake. Add cinnamon, nuts and seeds to increase protein for blood sugar control. Freeze batches.
• fruit salad - berry jumble with grapes and yoghurt
• pineapple cubes, cheese and grapes on sticks

Some ideas may seem a little far out for our conventional British tastes of toast and tea, but many of these ideas take influence from other countries' breakfasts - live a little and experiment with the recipes!

Grow your own!

If some of it is home-grown, all the better for getting the kids involved and aware of how we get food to the table. Organically produced foods taste great but, crucially, they are pesticide-free, lessening the burden on children's immune systems. Even simple gardening, such as growing window boxes of herbs, illustrates how much better really fresh food tastes. Get the kids gardening and cooking with their parents, to see how fruit and veg look before it reaches their plates.

Move it!

And get the whole family on the move! The "Walking Bus" is a concept that has reached various schools nationality. Check cut www.walktoschool.org.uk for information about walk to school campaigns. Ditch the junk, and suggest they cycle to the shops for fresh foods!

Look at labels!

Parents should invest time at the shops checking labels for additives - e - numbers and unpronounceable chemical names are more often than not a no-no for a weight-conscious shopper. Harmful additives are stored in body fat, and contribute to difficult-to-shift flab. Simple rules suggest that if the food doesn't look anything like its original form, then don't buy it! Get them to buy recognisable foods, as close as possible to their natural state to avoid processing additives. For ease, suggest parents buy organic produce, when by law must avoid additives.

Can't change, won't change!

If you experience resistance to changing dietary habits, Flower Remedies may offer a supportive nudge to open up your patient's acceptance of new ideas, helping to break addictives habits, and deal with emotional issues surrounding foods. Practitioners at LCNM's clinic in king's Norton have experience of working with such remedies, to enhance success with new dietary protocol.

Having taken a fresh look at breakfasts in the family household, the next meal to liven up is lunch. Catch our next articles on creating healthy lunch boxes, to give children the nutrition they need and deserve. TT

This article la brought to you by The Nutrition Team at the London College of Naturopathic Medicine in King's Norton, (www.lcnm.co.uk) For further advice on dealing with healthy eating or issues relating to weight loss, book a consultation with the faculty staff at the LCNM Teaching Clinic on 0121 458 2990. We are also happy to come to schools to offer advice, tasks or healthy food tastings for children, parents and teachers.

Reproduced with the kind permission of Today's Therapist