Why are toddlers gaining too much weight too fast?

Many parents try to help a child who is gaining too much weight quickly and fail. Worrying, nagging, nudging, food policing, and screen time monitoring usually end in arguments and hurt feelings. Often times we are worried about our own weight too. We may feel guilt, shame, a sense of unworthiness because of the shape of our body. Everywhere we turn we are told too much weight will cause diseases like diabetes and hypertension. As we try to make the right choices for ourselves and our children there is always a lingering feeling that we haven’t done enough, or that we are not good enough, or simply there is not enough time—another day has ended and we have failed again to live up to the ideal of providing three healthy meals and clean house, having a productive work day, and going to the gym or exercising with our children.

The way I see it is if you are trying to parent in this childhood obesity crisis, you are probably overwhelmed. Childhood obesity was on the decline. However, recent studies are reporting that researchers are now seeing spikes in obesity among children 2-5 years of age. It is rare now to meet a family in the U.S. that has not been affected by this epidemic. What the heck is happening? Why are children getting so big? And even though we know people are talking or are worried about their weight all the time, we as researchers are not coming up with many good ideas to help families.

What we have done well is develop ring the bell programs—but that was 10 years ago. We told people, hey, there is an obesity epidemic. So for new parents of children 0-5 try to do XYZ so that they don’t become part of the epidemic. XYZ were things like switch babies from whole milk to 2% at age two; limit fruit juice and soda; get kids active for at least 60 minutes per day, etc. This did help after a few years to keep obesity rates in children from increasing. However, as the children aged we began focusing our resources on schools and after school care and the parents of toddlers got left behind. So it looks like we may be back where we started with a new generation of children facing a lifetime struggle of too much weight.

Yet despite what seems like conflicting advice coming from many different sources, we do know that some childhood obesity prevention efforts are promising, but many are not working.

In a recent study (2018), published in the British Medical Journal, researchers studied 1,169 first graders in 53 schools for 30 months in British primary schools that were part of a program to help children and their families live a healthier lifestyle. The families participated in healthy cooking classes, and healthy eating and their children even had 30 minutes more during school to play. But nothing changed. No significant change in weight occurred despite families loving the program, and children getting to play more, and everyone eating healthier. That is the bad news.

The good news is that hopefully learning healthier behaviors will decrease their risk for other weight-related diseases like type 2 diabetes or hypertension. We can also think about this study in another way—we now know what doesn’t work—so we need to try something different to solve this complex problem of children gaining too much weight and keeping it on despite our best efforts. We need new strategies and ideas. And while we all are trying to figure this out—let’s be kind to one another—let’s support one another—let’s hope for solutions. There is hope. There is a new day, the next day, to keep trying.