Teen Obesity

Teen Obesity is one the main problems faced by the teens. Today’s teens face not only the challenge of acquiring an education, learning to interact with their peers, and surviving their parents, but they must also escape the national epidemic of obesity.

Factors Contributing To Teen Obesity

Thanks to better medicine and foods supplemented with vitamins and minerals our teens overall health has never been better. The problem they now face is in controlling their overeating habits and developing good eating habits, which is leading to teen obesity.

It’s no wonder that our youth are facing the problem of teen obesity. We demand less of them physically than ever before. If they have any household responsibilities, they aren’t physically demanding.

If they are hungry or thirsty, we have cabinets stocked to the brim with sugary snacks, sugary cereals, and sodas packed with calories. Mealtime is a trip to the local burger or pizza store.

All the free time is spent in front of the television or the video game. These activities require no physical exertion. The only physical activity, taking place here is moves of the finger or thumb. We haven’t consciously set out to ruin our children’s health.

In fact, we were trying to accomplish just the opposite. As parents, we wanted our children to have better lives, to have an easier time of it. We just didn’t stop to think about the consequences of these desires.

To most parents, making life easier meant less hard work for our children. We didn’t realize in eliminating many of the physical demands of hard work, we would arrive at the obesity clinic.

The thing we should note here is that you don’t have to take this route. As parents, we have a real responsibility to teach our children good habits. Good work habits, good parenting habits, and good eating habits to avoid teen obesity.

We often fall short in our efforts to teach good eating habits to avoid teen obesity because we don’t have them ourselves. We work late and then don’t’ have time to cook. We work all week, why not a night out for pizza on Friday?

These are good ideas, but they fail to take into account that we aren’t fulfilling our role as healthy eaters, if we skip health for convenience. Our children have learned well. They too, skip breakfast and then eat large lunches or dinners.

They eat in between meals. They do not exercise regularly, and they often make bad food choices. They watch television while they consume sodas and sweets. They choose to play the video game rather than go outside and play ball.

Consequences of Teen Obesity

Now, we have over half of our people facing the problem of teen obesity. Many face self-esteem issues, health issues, and simply give up before there lives are ever begun.

We have teenagers committing suicide because they don’t know how to cope with teen obesity issues that have spiraled out of control. Somehow, we must come together as a nation and provide a solution for so many of our teens.

Measures to be taken to avoid Teen Obesity

If we give them the means, they can provide the desire. First thing to be done to avoid teen obesity is to search for alternatives to television and video games. We should find ways to provide healthy snacking choices and encourage their participation in school sports.

Sports are a solution for not only increased physical activity, but also a tremendous boost to their self-esteem. We were the leaders in reaching this place we must be the leaders in seeking a solution. These things can help to solve the problem of teen obesity.