Sins of the parents

[rubato]

The parent is very obese and needs classes in nutrition, health and exercise both for herself and her child.

Starvation is a maladaptive reaction to crappy dietary and health habits. A diet shifted to vegetables, fruits, a little protein and limited starch would do wonders for both of them when combined with exercise.

yrs,
rubato

[loCAtek]

The girl was put on the diet at age two, and was diagnosed as anemic at age five- direct coloration: likely.

Tam Fry ...added that any child placed on a diet would find a way to consume extra calories.

That that is what the girl is doing: Also very likely.

She[the Child] is aware her mother gorges on junk food in private, therefore the child is being taught: eat one way in public, and increase your calories another way in private.
Not a healthy lifestyle, physically nor mentally, which the mother has confessed to.

To know you're doing damage to your child's health and continuing to do so because of your selfish desire for control: narcissistic sociopath behavior.

[Gob]

Andrew, how many pounds underweight do you suggest the child is left to reach before intervention takes place.

Should we wait for "osteoporosis, mineral and vita­min deficiency, anorexia" to have taken some toll before action is in place?

Should we wait until the child's perspectives on food, and her self image, are so skewed she will never be able to enjoy eating, and will have a life of emotional and mental problems?

[Joe Guy]

I agree with Andrew.

All we really know is that the mother is overweight and she doesn't want her daughter to be the same as her. We don't know what the daughter actually eats.

There are many parents who overfeed their children and/or give them unhealthy foods. Who knows how that affects each child's mental state? Should the government arrest parents for child abuse or neglect whenever they see an overweight or underweight child?

Should we wait until the child's perspectives on food, and her self image, are so skewed she will never be able to enjoy eating, and will have a life of emotional and mental problems?

Let's see.... a child is very self-conscious about her self image and worries about eating too much.

FRONT PAGE NEWS!!!!!!!

The issue in my opinion is the point at which the government gets involved in a family's life. This article shows a nutty parent and a child that might eventually have problems.

I don't think we have enough government workers to deal with those potential problems.

[Scooter]

I agree with Andrew.

All we really know is that the mother is overweight and she doesn't want her daughter to be the same as her. We don't know what the daughter actually eats.

Yes we do:

Corleigh has been on the regime since the age of two and is allowed just 700 calories a day – 1,000 fewer than recommended.

Reason enough there to yank the kid and charge the mother with neglect. Feeding her child only 40% of what she should be eating? Concentration camp inmates got more than that.

Let's see.... a child is very self-conscious about her self image and worries about eating too much.

FRONT PAGE NEWS!!!!!!!

At the age of EIGHT?? When she is already underweight? Yeah, BIIIIGGGGG problem.

The issue in my opinion is the point at which the government gets involved in a family's life. This article shows a nutty parent and a child that might eventually have problems.

The child is already malnourished to the tune of 60% of the recommended caloric intake.

[Jarlaxle]

If my wife's best friend eats 1000 calories a day, I'd be stunned. She is in no way malnourished despite a fairly physical job (she's a nurse).

[Scooter]

Your wife's friend doesn't have to eat enough to grow 3-4 inches per year, or to nourish a brain which will continue to develop for another 12 or so years, or to feed an immune system still under construction.

[loCAtek]

This is going to sound very unscientific, but the ladies will understand-

There something instinctively satisfying about feeding your children and family. Whether it's snacks or meals; when they're enjoying good food- you feel good about it.

That's why parents who over feed their kids don't seem so bad, they're only (over)doing what comes naturally.


If this women doesn't enjoy feeding her daughter, there's something seriously wrong with her.

[Joe Guy]

The child is already malnourished to the tune of 60% of the recommended caloric intake.

And because you accept that as fact explains why she is... FIVE POUNDS UNDERWEIGHT!!!

What a tragedy!

Send the police!!!

[Jarlaxle]

Your wife's friend doesn't have to eat enough to grow 3-4 inches per year, or to nourish a brain which will continue to develop for another 12 or so years, or to feed an immune system still under construction.

No, she just has to be on her feet 10-16 hours/day, often in very high-stress situations.

[Scooter]

The child is already malnourished to the tune of 60% of the recommended caloric intake.

And because you accept that as fact explains why she is... FIVE POUNDS UNDERWEIGHT!!!

What a tragedy!

Send the police!!!

Weight is not the only marker for malnutrition. The human body is highly adaptive. Her metabolism has probably slowed to a crawl in order to compensate for the persistent malnutrition. And she probably isn't anywhere near as active as a child of her age ought to be, because what she consumes doesn't give her sufficient energy. That doesn't mean other bodily processes aren't suffering as a result.

And at her age, five pounds means she is about 10% underweight. That is not insignificant.

Your wife's friend doesn't have to eat enough to grow 3-4 inches per year, or to nourish a brain which will continue to develop for another 12 or so years, or to feed an immune system still under construction.

No, she just has to be on her feet 10-16 hours/day, often in very high-stress situations.

And by your own account she's doing it on 40% more calories than this child.

[Jarlaxle]

I suspect she's also LARGER than this child...she's about 90lbs. And please read my post carefully...she eats LESS THAN 1000 calories/day.

[Scooter]

So she's a runtish, nevertheless already fully developed adult, vs. a growing (hopefully, given how underfed she is), still developing child. Their energy needs are not the same.

The consensus of experts is that a child of this age requires approximately 1,700 calories per day. Sure, there are going to be some individual variations, a
couple hundred calories plus or minus, but a deficiency of 1000 calories? You truly don't see any problem with that?

[Andrew D]

If the kid has actually consumed only 700 calories per day since age two, how is it that at age eight she is only five pounds underweight? How is it that she is "otherwise healthy"?

Concentration camp inmates got more than that.

And concentration camp inmates were emaciated. And they were not "otherwise healthy".

This kid is quite obviously not emaciated. And, except for being 5 pounds underweight, she is "otherwise healthy".

What is it about this sensationalized story that leads to such flights of fancy as:

Her metabolism has probably slowed to a crawl in order to compensate for the persistent malnutrition. And she probably isn't anywhere near as active as a child of her age ought to be, because what she consumes doesn't give her sufficient energy.

Come on. If her metabolism has slowed to a crawl, how is it that she is only five pounds underweight and is "otherwise healthy"? We have not seen a shred of evidence that there is anything wrong with her metabolism or her level of activity. In this case, "probably" is just a convenient dodge for "making shit up".

Look, I'm not saying that this kid's mother is doing the right thing. On the contrary, it seems pretty clear that (by her own admission even) she has issues, and she's working them out on this kid.

But there just isn't any evidence that there is anything seriously wrong with the kid. There just isn't.

People who have never laid eyes on her can talk until their faces are blue about how her metabolism has "probably" slowed to a crawl, but there isn't any evidence that it has. How she "probably" isn't as active as she should be, but there isn't any evidence that she's not. How "her immune system will suffer," but there isn't any evidence that her immune system is at all compromised. (A compromised immune system hardly comports with her being "otherwise healthy".) How "her growth may be affected," but there isn't any evidence that her growth has been affected. How maybe sometime down the road, she might develop a vitamin deficiency. (She evidently has no such deficiency now, because if she did, she would not be "otherwise healthy".)

If we let our imaginations run wild, maybe the mother has Munchausen-by-Proxy Syndrome. Maybe the mother has Toxic Parent Syndrome. Maybe the mother is a sociopath.

But where is the evidence?

You know, the observable facts that would actually support any of those claims?

The observable facts are that other than being 5 pounds underweight, she's a healthy kid. The observable and observed fact that she is only 5 pounds underweight makes hash of the notion that she has actually been consuming only 700 calories per day for six of her eight years. This is not rocket science: If she had been consuming only 700 calories per day for six of her eight years, she would (if she were still alive at all) be grossly malnourished, to the point of emaciation. But she isn't. Therefore, she has self-evidently not been consuming only 700 calories per day for six of her eight years.

And that's pretty much it: What we have here is a kid (a) whose mother has wacky ideas about food, (b) whose only health problem, if it even is a problem, is that she is a few pounds underweight, and (c) who has become, at the tender age of eight, the center of a media circus.

Should we wait for "osteoporosis, mineral and vita­min deficiency, anorexia" to have taken some toll before action is in place?

We should at least wait until some evidence -- you know, observable facts rather than rank speculation -- indicates that there is actually some problem with her bones, that she is actually suffering some mineral or vitamin deficiency, or that she is actually suffering from some sort of eating disorder.

Interestingly, according to the article, the kid used to be anemic but is not anemic any more. How does the fact that she no longer has a nutritional problem which she used to have demonstrate that she is being abused? Doesn't it indicate exactly the opposite -- that her mother took successful steps to remedy that problem?

Should we wait until the child's perspectives on food, and her self image, are so skewed she will never be able to enjoy eating, and will have a life of emotional and mental problems?

Should we intervene in every case of parents' raising their children on Happy Meals? How about traditional Southern cuisine? How about every eating lifestyle that is not as healthy as it could be?

The bottom line remains that there is simply no evidence that there is anything seriously, if at all, wrong with this kid.

Sure, she is growing up on a diet that is less than ideal. So is every kid who regularly gets a Whopper for dinner. Or something from KFC. So is every kid whose parents daily feed her or him a traditional breakfast (made at home) of eggs, bacon, and fried potatoes.

Given the evidence -- the uncontroverted evidence that the only thing "wrong" with this kid is that she is a few pounds underweight -- the accusations of child abuse are a wild stretch.

(It's probably not an accident that the article linked in the opening posting does not indicate that the relevant authorities -- you know, people who, unlike us, have actually been able to examine the kid rather than just engaging in free-for-all-and-the-facts-don't-matter speculation about her -- have accused the mother of any wrongdoing or taken (or even considered taking) any steps to remove the child from her mother's care.)

The suggestions that the evidence shows that the mother has Munchausen-by-Proxy Syndrome take that wild stretch to another level: The rubber band of reality is at least in danger of snapping, if it hasn't already.

And the notion that, based on the evidence before us, we should even tentatively conclude that the mother is a sociopath is leaving nothing but shreds of the rubber band of reality and retromingent traces of reason's having slunk away in shame.

The kid is 5 pounds underweight -- not starving, not emaciated, not malnourished, just 5 pounds underweight -- and is otherwise healthy. That's it. No child abuse, no serious medical problems, no evidence of MBPS, no sociopathy. Just a kid who is 5 pounds underweight, because her mother has wacky ideas about food.

All over the world, there are serious problems involving children and food -- in the time it took you to read this, at least one child and probably several children died of starvation -- but this is not one of them.

[Scooter]

No matter how you slice it, this

Typically, Corleigh eats Weeta­bix for breakfast, salad and half a roll for lunch, and a jacket potato for dinner.

is nowhere near a sufficient quantity nor variety of food to sustain a child. Now, if she is sneaking food on her own, if a neighbour takes pity on her and feeds her on the sly, or if she is getting food by some other means so that she hasn't come to look like an Auschwitz inmate, is completely irrelevant. This

Typically, Corleigh eats Weeta­bix for breakfast, salad and half a roll for lunch, and a jacket potato for dinner.

is child abuse, pure and simple.

I repeat, however the girl, others around her, or own body, has chosen to adapt to the circumstance to ensure she does not die, is completely irrelevant. It is her mother's actions which are at issue, and this

Typically, Corleigh eats Weeta­bix for breakfast, salad and half a roll for lunch, and a jacket potato for dinner.

demonstrates that the mother is starving this girl.

Perhaps her mother is giving her vitamin and mineral supplements to make up for the obvious deficiencies posed by the girl's diet, but nothing will make up for the protein and basic caloric deficiencies that this

Typically, Corleigh eats Weeta­bix for breakfast, salad and half a roll for lunch, and a jacket potato for dinner.

poses for a child of eight.

ETA: Of course, this could all be yet another Daily Mail put up job. Which would explain why the facts simply do not hang together the way they should.

[loCAtek]

It's called circumstantial evidence; the mother is a binge eater; therefore the child is probably a binge eater.

And, scientific fact;

Two doctors have testified to the fact that, ‘Calorie restricting a normal-weight child is unnecessary and detrimental to her health.
Yes, she is normal now, but that doesn't change the fact that her health will be damaged.

[loCAtek]

As for Jarlaxle's fit friend, I have a friend like that too, a nurse also in fact. I met her at the gym, where we took crossfit classes together. She was so healthy and doing so well in that class, that the coach made her an assistant coach. Later, as we got know each other and became friends, she confided to me that she was a binge eater. She ate small, healthy meals during the day, going as far as not eating processed grains; but then at the end of day she'd start snacking on sugary treats, and couldn't stop herself until late at night. All her exercise and a fast metabolism were why that didn't show. Appearances can be deceiving.

[loCAtek]

...wait.

Are AndrewD and Jarlaxle actually agreeing about something!?


There was a full moon last night, was it blue?

[Jarlaxle]

As for Jarlaxle's fit friend, I have a friend like that too, a nurse also in fact. I met her at the gym, where we took crossfit classes together. She was so healthy and doing so well in that class, that the coach made her an assistant coach. Later, as we got know each other and became friends, she confided to me that she was a binge eater. She ate small, healthy meals during the day, going as far as not eating processed grains; but then at the end of day she'd start snacking on sugary treats, and couldn't stop herself until late at night. All her exercise and a fast metabolism were why that didn't show. Appearances can be deceiving.

Tina is not a binge eater...she just doesn't eat that much. Liz has known her for 20 years & I've known her husband for 15+.

[Joe Guy]

ETA: Of course, this could all be yet another Daily Mail put up job. Which would explain why the facts simply do not hang together the way they should.

There's the point. You have nothing that is conclusive in that article to prove child abuse or neglect. There is no way Child Protective Services could remove a child from a parent's home based on her being 5 or 10 pounds underweight with no obvious health problems. Based on the article, the mother might be a bit flakey but that doesn't mean she is endangering her child.

Also, if that child were actually taking in only 700 calories per day, she would be much more underweight.

If the parent were forcing her to eat under 700 calories per day, the child would have physical & mental problems that would be very obvious.