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Fit or Fat?
Self-esteem and "Big" Preteens
By Kelly Burgess
Courtney Wright is 10 years old, 4 foot 11 inches tall and weighs 140 pounds. Last year, at her yearly well-child check-up, her mother, Rennie Davidson, got a look at Courtney's chart and saw that the doctor had noted that she was obese. Davidson was furious.
"I confronted him and asked what he meant by obese," says Davidson. "I explained that Courtney is very active; she can ride her bike for 2 miles, swim 1 mile and walk 2 miles. He just said she'd probably grow out of it, but I could tell he thought I was feeding her a bunch of junk and letting her lay around and watch television, and that simply isn't the case."
In fact, there's very little TV watching in Davidson's house. Junk food and candy are a rare treat, and Davidson is careful about serving the entire family a healthful diet. What Courtney does have that Davidson can't do anything about is a father who is 6 foot 5 inches and went through a chubby period as a youngster himself.
According to Gail Woodward-Lopez, associate director of the Center for Weight and Health at the University of Berkley, the primary component of what we, as a society, perceive as overweight is a result of genetics. In other words, parents who are large will have large children, regardless of the eating and exercise habits of those children.
"Our whole society needs to recognize that our size has a very significant genetic component," says Woodward-Lopez. "We can never assume that the bigger child has worse eating or exercise habits than a smaller or thinner child."
In addition, Woodward-Lopez adds, society needs to become more accepting of the difference in people's shapes and sizes. Because the images a person sees from a very young age are primarily thin and beautiful, we are imprinted with these images as what our culture defines as beauty. Therefore, any deviation from that imprint is perceived as unattractive.
