My daughter is 11 years old. I read an editorial a while ago entitled "Why I don't care if my daughter grows up fat" or something, and I found she made some good (and surprising) points. I decided that unless my daughter approaches me about her weight herself, I wouldn't bother her about it. I love her, and I just don't want to see her stress too much on what might not even be a big deal. But now I'm kind of treading in uncharted waters. See, since she was about 4 she's been walking around the house wearing nothing but blue jeans. No shirt, no shoes, just jeans. We don't really mind her doing that so we kind of just let her have her way since she fully understands she can't do that in public. Anyway, I guess when I made that resolution it was easier because she's always been quite skinny. But just last year we had to buy her some new clothes because she grew to 4'10", so her 'little girl' clothes won't fit anymore. That was no surprise, but she hasn't gotten any taller since then and I'm starting to see her clothes are getting much too tight in a, um, different way. Sometimes in the morning I'll see her in her room struggling to button her jeans, and some nights it looks like she's literally trying to stuff her belly into her pajamas (she looks like she's pushing it down while zipping it up). She still can get into her clothes, but when she does they only make her look chubbier. She still walks around the house the same way, and since she doesn't wear her jeans over her stomach but rather below her belly... I don't know... it just looks so prominent, because she basically carries all of her weight in her belly. It would almost look like she was 5 months pregnant if she had stretch marks... And wasn't 11.Anyway, the reason I'm saying all this is because I want advice on how to best approach this. I've already said I don't want her to worry about her weight, so I don't want to just walk up to her and say "Hey fatty you're too big for your clothes we're gonna go get some new ones." But at the same time, I know she's not oblivious... I've seen her look at herself in her mirror, gauging her belly and occasionally standing straight and looking down (if I were to guess, it looks like she's trying to see if she can still see her feet). Here's the weird part, though. She doesn't start crying her insulting herself or freaking out or, well, anything. She'll just stare for a while and then usually make a half grin or some other dismissive gesture and go about her business. But it's because she's obviously aware she's gained weight that I don't want to just buy a bunch of new clothes and give them to her. Or is that what I should do? Or would that seem like I was passive aggressively insulting her? Try to answer from her perspective, please.For the record, I'm not really worried about her health. We've had her check-up recently and apparently she's perfectly healthy. I asked the doctor if the weight gain was due to puberty and he said "Likely not, because it happened after her growth spurt, which usually follows it (the gain)." But since she's actually pretty healthy and popular at school, I'm just not worried about it. I just want to address the fact that she's getting too plump to fit in her pajamas and what not without offending her (she's getting noticeably close to not being able to completely cover her belly with her shirts).Here's that article, by the way:http://powderroom.jezebel.com/why-i-dont-care-if-my-daughter-gets-fat-473602421
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Next time your at the shops with her why don't you just walk into a clothing store and ask her is she'd like to get some new clothes, just say I notice you've been wearing the same clothes a lot lately or we haven't got you any new clothes for a while, I think its really good that your not pressuring her about her wait because I was chubby when I was younger and everyone constantly picked it at it, whether it was my brother telling me how fat I was or kids at school and my parents encouraging me to lose wait and its just led to really bad self esteem issues, when she's ready to lose weight she will, she may even just even out when she grows a bit more, but I think you should definitely get some new clothes for her because kids may start to pick on her if they notice, good luck :)Other Answers:
- watch her diet... no sodas... just water.
- If she gets overweight you should be worried. Every child has to watch their weight at any age! Many kids die from obesity nowadays because their parents don't watch what they eat. She will have health problems if she is overweight when she is older. There are children who die around ages 10-12 from obesity.
