The Dos and Don’ts of Raising Healthy Eating Kids

Once a child reaches their ‘tween’ years – around 10-12 years old – and enters their teens their bodies begin to change. The physical changes they go through over the course of these years need to be supported by a healthy, balanced diet, and as a parent it really is up to you to help them understand what that really is and how to stick to it.

Kids Needs are Different

As adults many of us have a tendency to follow fad diets. We read one ‘get fit’ article and the next thing we know we’re cutting out all the carbs from our diets. And when that does not really seem to be helping us shift those stubborn few kilos we want so badly to lose we start a different diet, this time one that supposedly has us eating like cavemen (or something like that)

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There is also the issue of time. We’re too busy to eat a proper breakfast because the kids have to get to school and we have to get to work. Lunch is grabbed off the street and eaten on the go because we had no time to pack a better meal and have no time to enjoy eating it anyway. And dinner? Who has time for that? Once again its probably going to be something fast, frozen and preferably microwaveable.

You should consider changing all of this of course. A healthy diet is key to the well-being of everyone, no matter how young or old. But most importantly you should not pass all your bad eating habits on to your kids. They need a good breakfast before school. They need a good dinner at night. And they need to avoid fad diets at all costs, because their developing bodies cannot afford to be deprived of any of the essentials it needs. Including the energy from carbohydrates by the way.

It’s especially important that tweens and teens get enough of the essential vitamins and minerals they need to help fuel their rapid growth. This includes iron, calcium and vitamins like A, C and D.

What Kids Don’t Need to Eat

What kids don’t need is sugar. At all. However, trying to get kids to give it up completely is, to be fair, probably an impossible task (especially as we doubt that you have, even if you eat fairly healthy) However, they need to learn to limit fizzy drinks, cakes, chocolate and chips, and you can help, starting by not buying those things at the supermarket in the first place.

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So what should your kids be eating? Putting it into very basic terms:

  • At least five servings of fruits and vegetables, fruit juices will count towards this “requirement” though.
  • At least two or three servings of starchy foods such as rice, pasta and potatoes. When they do eat pasta and rice try to make sure they eat the wholegrain varieties if possible.
  • Protein rich foods like lean red meat, chicken, fish, beans and pulses. You should also to plan to serve them at least two servings of fish every week especially, one of an oily fish like salmon and one of a white fish such as cod, as both of those are packed with nutrients that growing bodies (and brains) need.

Dairy. low fat yoghurt, milk and cheese all contain plenty of calcium which, as we mentioned, is crucial to your child’s healthy development.

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You should also encourage your child to drink plenty of water. If they balk at the idea of plain water – which is admittedly not very exciting – flavoured waters are OK, as long as they are the no-calorie, no-sugar kind.

Fad Diets and Eating Disorders

Something else we have already touched on here, but needs to be reinforced is how important it is to impress upon children, especially teens, how bad fad diets are for their health. Again, this can be hard to do when there are Kardashians, Jenners and 1,001 ‘Instagram models’ encouraging both girls and boys to try out the latest ways to ‘look hot’ to ‘be cool’. A healthy, balanced diet is better than any juice cleanse or soup diet – or whatever the latest trend is – for both a teens health and their figure and encouraging them to believe that is a must.

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Another disturbing fact about tween and teen diets is that the incidence of eating disorders is rapidly increasing across Asia. In Singapore alone The Singapore General Hospital (SGH) Eating Disorders Programme, the national centre for treating such illnesses, saw 170 new patients last year, up 42% on just three years ago. And 2 in 3 of those patients was under 21.

Most of the patients seen are girls, although the fact that 10% are boys is a disturbing rise on past numbers as well. According to the experts at SGH a lot more needs to be done, especially as they know that the patients they do see are just the tip of the iceberg, as most young eating disorder victims go to great lengths to hide their illness.

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If you should ever be concerned about your child’s eating habits, a long talk, and a visit to a doctor, should not be delayed. There is still something of a taboo for many around this subject, but doctors are working hard to help break that and ensure that those suffering get the help they need. But that all starts with you.

Encourage positive body image in your kids at every possible opportunity and let them know that you are always there to help if they want to talk about body image issues or bad feelings about food.