Overcoming the problem of weight gain after Tet for children

Nutrition consultants often give nutritional advice to children during Tet, but with the bustling atmosphere of welcoming the new year, it is difficult to control children's eating and weight during these festive days.

To identify overweight and obese children, it is necessary to monitor the child's height and weight every month and compare it with the height-weight chart for children under 5 years old according to the standards of the World Health Organization (WHO). For children over 5 years old, calculate the BMI and compare it with the BMI chart for children 5-19 years old. With the above height and weight, your child is obese.

Illustration: Health.

The cause of childhood obesity is the state of providing excess energy through eating and drinking for a long time. Tet is the time when children easily consume too much energy and lose control with a series of high-energy foods such as candy, cakes, soft drinks, banh chung, banh tet, spring rolls, meat jelly, fried and roasted dishes that can be nibbled on all day.

Overweight and obese children have excessive fat accumulation in their bodies, which affects their health and leads to the risk of many chronic diseases such as diabetes, cardiovascular disease, endocrine disease, and musculoskeletal disease. Especially school-age children are susceptible to psychological and academic effects. You need to take your child to a nutritionist for full advice from a doctor to help your child develop well and escape from being overweight or obese.

Regarding your child's current diet, you need to pay attention to choosing foods that are low in energy and nutritious, helping your child grow taller but not gain weight or gain very little weight, only less than 1-2 kg per year. You need to feed your child a variety of foods, balancing the proportions of carbohydrates, protein, fat, vitamins and minerals in each meal.

Obese children need to reduce the amount of carbohydrates in their meals compared to the present, that is, eat less rice or noodles, pho, noodles, and pasta. Limit the use of fatty, sweet, and salty foods. Do not eat bone broth, meat broth, fatty meat, skin, animal organs, cakes, candies, sweet soups, ice cream, soft drinks, etc.

Children should eat more fish and seafood than meat. Food should be boiled, steamed, braised, and limited to roasting, frying, stir-frying, or eating fast food. Eat lots of vegetables, low-sugar fruits, and foods high in fiber. Drink enough water and milk. Drink milk for overweight and obese children, skim milk (skimmed milk powder), and low-fat, low-energy milk. Do not drink regular milk or sweetened condensed milk.

Pay attention to feeding your baby regularly, do not skip meals, especially breakfast, and do not eat after 8pm. Eat slowly, chew thoroughly, do not eat too much in one meal, and divide meals evenly.

In addition, children need to exercise as much as possible to help burn excess fat, increase muscle development, and increase height such as running, aerobics, jogging, playing basketball, handball, swinging on a horizontal bar, swimming, etc. Getting enough sleep, before 10pm, will help children increase their height well and contribute to limiting obesity.

According to VnExpress