Well, here I am again with some further thoughts on something with which I am very familiar…childhood obesity. Having been extremely overweight up until the age of 21, I have always been conscious of how I would deal with weight issues with my own children, especially if I had a daughter, which I did, and she is now about to turn 10. When I was growing up, I was literally the only overweight child in my elementary school.  Childhood obesity was far from being considered an epidemic back then and my weight continued to be an issue throughout high school and then college until I was able to take control of my weight and of my eating issues. I have been able to maintain a healthy weight since then, but it is a struggle that will continue throughout my life. Since weight issues have affected both my family and my husband’s family, I had to assume that it would be something I had to be aware of with my own children. I am certainly armed with all of the proper information about exercise and nutrition but as we all know, there is so much more to it than that. It is crucial that we help our children develop self-esteem and confidence and that we teach them to express what they are feeling so that they don’t develop the need to soothe themselves with food or worse yet, drugs or alcohol. When our children, and particularly our daughters, do struggle with weight issues, we need to address the issues before the problem gets out of hand. It can be a painful subject, but we have to approach it in an honest and direct yet supportive way. I have done my fair share of reading on the subject but take a look at this article by Evelyn Resh on Oparah.com and I think you’ll find she has provided some real tools that we can all benefit from…. really good stuff