There is a story from England that has been making news the last few days about an eight-year-old boy that weighs a whopping (no other way to put it) 218 pounds. The authorities wanted to possibly remove the child from his home, putting forth that the child's mother was abusing him by letting him get that big. Read about it here.
A couple of things bother me about this story. Yes, I believe that the mother probably is facilitating a lot of the eating this kid is doing, and the type of food he is eating in the story is the typical meat and potatoes type meals, and those certainly do not help weight loss. But to say that the mother is abusing the child, in my opinion, is off base. Responsibility has to fall somewhat onto the child himself. Sure, he's young, but at eight years old a child has enough self-awareness to see how big he is and whether he needs to try to slim down. However, he gushes about all of the stuff he loves to eat, so he's a happy participant in his own largess. Abuse is doing something mean and cruel to a child against their will, but that is clearly not the case here.
Another concern is that possible medical conditions for the boy's obesity haven't been fully explored. That should be a priority. After all, if there is a medical contributing factor here, maybe with a physicians care the kid can lose a lot of weight. And again, medical abnormalities aren't abuse.
In the end, I believe that they made the right decision to keep the child at home. The mother is probably someone who loves that boy with all her heart, but she needs educating as to what is good for him. Let her go to nutritional classes and get him off of so many sweets and heavy carbs. I truly wish the best for this family, that they will get people helping them. Then, maybe there will be a happily-ever-after story for them.
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3 comments:
As a mother myself, I hope I would never let my children get that bad. I would hope that my concern for their health would intercede at some point. I would pray that I would take action long before my child made it into the papers.
I think instead of abuse I would call it 'neglect' or 'endangerment.' Call it what you will, the majority of the responsibility falls on the parents. I know eight year old boys. They don't care enough to tie their shoes, much less go on a diet. They need structure and help and cannot do it alone.
Thanks for posting that article! It was quite interesting. :)
Thanks for reading my blog! Feel free to contribute anytime! Yeah, I agree the mother is largely responsible, but I just don't think they needed to consider taking a child away from her just because she's not that great at feeding her son. It seems to me that would create a frightening precedent.
Yeah, it's a sad story all around, but I think the blame has to be placed completely on the parents. It's true that an eight year old is not an infant, but eight years old is not nearly mature enough to manage his own life, and he should never been allowed to get this fat.
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