Sins of the parents

[loCAtek]

I t would be extreme to have her daughter removed, but with all the fuss this is generating, the mother is going to have tons of nutritionists and personal trainers knocking down her door. Shoot, she might even get a visit from Dr. Phil!

Which was probably the point; flaunt her daughter to draw attention to herself.

At least, she didn't turn her into a little tramp to do it.

[Scooter]

You have nothing that is conclusive in that article to prove child abuse or neglect.

I have this:

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

which constitutes a starvation diet for a child.

Based on the article, the mother might be a bit flakey but that doesn't mean she is endangering her child.

This:

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

means she is endangering her child.

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

I am less interested in what the child might be able to scrounge elsewhere, away from her mother's psychotic gaze, and more interested in what her mother has deigned to feed her, being this:

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

which constitutes a starvation diet for a child.

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.

The mother has chosen to feed her only this:

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

which makes her an abuser.

[Joe Guy]

I'm guessing, based on the content of your post, that you believe that typically, Corleigh eats Weeta­bix for breakfast, salad and half a roll for lunch, and a jacket potato for dinner.

And you believe that constitutes a starvation diet and child abuse.

But the fact that the child is not displaying the symptoms of someone who is starving and not claiming to be abused makes your accusation difficult to accept.

So, based on the evidence, it would be difficult to make a case for child abuse.

It is likely to be impossible to convince a judge to sign an order to remove a child from her mother based on the information in the article we're discussing.

Therefore, whether or not what you believe is true, until the child shows obvious signs of neglect there is nothing that CPS or the police can do other than to attempt to educate the mother and child about nutrition.

[loCAtek]

It's cause for concern if a mother is that controlling, fortunately she raised a red flag on herself, by agreeing to this article. Hopefully this will lead to an investigation and/or guidance in healthier eating.

Another anecdote; you may recall I had a foster-son a few years back? He was raised malnourished, because his mother was often neglectful of how he ate. There was food in the house, but she let him eat whatever he wanted, so it was mostly chips and soda. They were calories, but mostly empty calories. When he came to us at age 13, you could say he was healthy, but he was about the size of a ten-year old. The crucial development stage at puberty had been greatly slowed.
He wasn't removed from the home just for that. However, this is an illustration of how diet can affect growth later and why I'd be concerned that there were other problems within that household. It could be a symptom of something greater, I'm glad there will be folks looking into this.

[Scooter]

I'm guessing, based on the content of your post, that you believe that typically, Corleigh eats Weeta­bix for breakfast, salad and half a roll for lunch, and a jacket potato for dinner.

And you believe that constitutes a starvation diet and child abuse.

But the fact that the child is not displaying the symptoms of someone who is starving and not claiming to be abused makes your accusation difficult to accept.

It might make it difficult to believe that that is all that the child is eating, but it is not at all difficult to believe that that is all her mother is feeding her, because her mother herself has told us so.

Do you see the difference?

By your logic, if her mother were not giving her any food at all, but she was eating all she needed by going door to door begging from the neighbours for scraps, then that would not constitute abuse.

And I use "abuse" rather than "neglect" quite deliberately. Neglect reflects a failure to carry out the necessary duties of a parent with indifference to a child's welfare. This is abuse because she has willfully chosen a course of action which she knows will bring harm to her child (better she turn out anorexic than fat, etc.)

[Joe Guy]

And I use "abuse" rather than "neglect" quite deliberately. Neglect reflects a failure to carry out the necessary duties of a parent with indifference to a child's welfare. This is abuse because she has willfully chosen a course of action which she knows will bring harm to her child (better she turn out anorexic than fat, etc.)

Actually, if this were to become a legal action, 'neglect' would be the most appropriate charge.

The mother obviously (to me) believes that she is doing the right thing by attempting to keep her child thin. She is not trying to keep her on a low calorie diet in order to punish or hurt her. She is attempting to make her child's life better than her own.

The only result that I think could ever come out of this would be that the mother is 'unfit' to be a mother. But that wouldn't be easy to prove given the state of this child's current health.

[Scooter]

The only result that I think could ever come out of this would be that the mother is 'unfit' to be a mother.

Could we hear an AMEN, brothers and sisters?

But that wouldn't be easy to prove given the state of this child's current health.

Why wouldn't it be easy to prove? Her mother has just told the entire world what she feeds her daughter. Why is her so obviously egregious conduct insufficient to take action, regardless of whether her daughter or some well-meaning bystanders have taken action to mitigate the consequences of that obviously egregious conduct? I repeat, if we knew her mother were not feeding her anything, should we take no action if her daughter is healthy only because a neighbour has chosen to feed her out of pity for the poor girl? Why does her mother get a pass on feeding her daughter a starvation diet simply because her daughter has found a way behind her mother's back to avoid starving?

ETA:

Actually, if this were to become a legal action, 'neglect' would be the most appropriate charge.

The mother obviously (to me) believes that she is doing the right thing by attempting to keep her child thin. She is not trying to keep her on a low calorie diet in order to punish or hurt her. She is attempting to make her child's life better than her own.

Choosing between anorexia and obesity for her daughter is no different than choosing between cigarette burns and boiling water scalding - they are all harms which a responsible parent should not take action to precipitate; to do so is abusive, not simply neglectful.

[Andrew D]

Actually, the child's "mother herself" has not "told us so." The article includes several direct quotations from the mother. (They're in quotation marks.) Neither the reference to 700 calories nor the description of the child's allegedly typical diet is a direct quotation from the mother. For all we know, the Daily Mail asked the child what she typically eats, took the child's word for it, made a whole bunch of assumptions about the quantities and ingredients of the child's typical diet, and computed the calorie content itself.

We do not know which of the many Weetabix cereals the child eats. Nor do we know how much cereal she has for breakfast. We are completely in the dark about both the size and the ingredients of the salad, both the size and the kind of roll that accompanies the salad, and both the size and the ingredients of the jacket potato. (A search for jacket potato recipes yields a wide variety of ingredients.)

We do not know what "typically" means here: Is this what the child allegedly eats four days a week? Five? Six? We do not know what the child eats on non-typical days.

In short, we know almost nothing specific about the child's diet. And we do not know that it actually amounts to only 700 calories per day.

But we do know this:

A recent visit to a nurse showed Corleigh is 5lb underweight but otherwise healthy.

That fact trumps everthing else. There is no evidence the child has had to turn to other sources of food to maintain her (slightly below average) weight. There is no evidence of child abuse, no evidence of Munchausen-by-Proxy Syndrome, no evidence of Toxic Parent Syndrome, and no evidence of sociopathy.

[Scooter]

But we do know this:

A recent visit to a nurse showed Corleigh is 5lb underweight but otherwise healthy.

That fact trumps everthing else.

In short, any fact supporting an opposing point of view must be viewed with suspicion, but this one unattributed statement, that happens to support your conclusions, must be accepted as gospel.

If we're going to say that we can be sure of virtually none of the facts in this case, and that discussion is therefore pointless, that is fine.

If we're going to say that certain statements presented as facts appear to be incongruous, which could lead to divergent conclusions about what is really going on, that is also fine.

But to say that we must accept one unattributed statement as holy writ and thereby dismiss anything which contradicts it, because so engraveth Andrew on a stone tablet and solely his opinion counteth, is a game I cannot be bothered to waste keystrokes playing.

[Gob]

She admits her daughter, who was anaemic until she was five, is now afraid of being fat: ‘She’s always looking in mirrors. I feel guilty – but it’s how I want her to be

That shows the child is being abused. To be "afraid" and "always looking in mirrors" shows the child's psyche is being damaged.

“She’s not so underweight she’s going to die next week,” insists Aly.

“With an eating disorder you can get through it with therapy. But when you’re fat, you’re fat for life.

Again, that shows how damaged the mother is, that she sees her child anorexic and in therapy as a way of countering being fat.

[Andrew D]

In short, any fact supporting an opposing point of view must be viewed with suspicion, but this one unattributed statement, that happens to support your conclusions, must be accepted as gospel.

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

That's rich. Try looking in a mirror.

You have taken the description of the child's allegedly typical diet as gospel, even though it is unattributed, because it supports your conclusions. You have misdescribed it as being attributed to the mother, even though it is not, because it supports your conclusions.

The problem is not about "any fact supporting an opposing point of view". The problem is that your opposing point of view is not supported by the facts. Because we do not know that the mother has told us either the child's caloric intake or typical diet, we must look for other evidence to support the assertions that the child is fed only 700 calories per day and that her typical diet is what it is described as being. Where is that evidence?

The finding made by the unnamed nurse, on the other hand, is corroborated by evidence available to all of us: We can see the child clearly in the picture that accompanies the article, and it is self-evident that the child is not starving.

What the actual evidence points to as the most obvious conclusion is that the 700-calories-per-day assertion and the typical-diet description are simply wrong. And I have pointed out an entirely plausible way in which that could have occurred: The Daily Mail asked the child what she typically eats, made assumptions about what she said, and calculated her caloric intake based on those assumptions.

But that does not accord with your desired conclusions. So instead, you wander off into pure fantasies about "what the child might be able to scrounge elsewhere, away from her mother's psychotic gaze". (And, of course, none of the people from whom this eight-year-old starving child has been scrounging food has thought to alert the authorities.)

Before complaining about the treatment of "any fact supporting an opposing point of view," you should try finding some facts that actually support your point of view.

[loCAtek]

Um, no. The overall consensus is: if this mother is putting her normal weight child on a strict diet, it will be detrimental to the child's health. It may not be apparent now, but in the long-term the child will suffer. This has been proven to be a medical fact.

The only way this child could be surviving at this point is by secretly binging, or begging for food.
Circumstantial evidence that has a scientific, medical basis.

[Andrew D]

The only way this child could be surviving at this point is by secretly binging, or begging for food.

Or the child is not actually restricted to 700 calories per day; her allegedly typical diet is not her actual diet. That is the hypothesis that best fits the observable facts.

[rubato]

"...

It's so sad that a woman in her late 70's is STILL so obsessed with dieting. ... "

Maybe its a pastime for her, like following sports is for others.

Both can be deadly boring to those unafflicted with interest in them.


yrs,
rubato

[loCAtek]

What the actual evidence points to as the most obvious conclusion is that the 700-calories-per-day assertion and the typical-diet description are simply wrong. And I have pointed out an entirely plausible way in which that could have occurred: The Daily Mail asked the child what she typically eats, made assumptions about what she said, and calculated her caloric intake based on those assumptions.

...except that no where in that article does it state that the child was interviewed, whereas they (The Daily Mail) say that the mother and two doctors were interviewed, so we can assume this calorie figure came from one or more of those sources.

I don't know how it is in the UK, but in the US, quotes have to be accurately assigned to who gave them. Also, if the mother or the doctors gave different information than what was reported, then they have good grounds to sue for libel. I haven't found anything to suggest Aly Gilardoni (the mother) denies any statements made by the Daily Mail.

[The Hen]

"...

It's so sad that a woman in her late 70's is STILL so obsessed with dieting. ... "

Maybe its a pastime for her, like following sports is for others.

Both can be deadly boring to those unafflicted with interest in them.


yrs,
rubato

I think is has something to do with her Presbyterian upbringing during World War II.

She just doesn't think anything is doing her good unless she has a hair-shirt on and is flogging herself and putting salt into the wounds. She has to feel like she is deprived in order for her to achieve something.

She drives me fucking nuts most of the time and I can get a bit short with her. Luckily the Hatch reminds me of how rude I am and I apologise for my behaviour.

I just wish she would learn to be happy. Personally I think that is most of her problem. Unless she is miserable, she doesn't feel worthy ... or something like that.

[Big RR]

What the actual evidence points to as the most obvious conclusion is that the 700-calories-per-day assertion and the typical-diet description are simply wrong. And I have pointed out an entirely plausible way in which that could have occurred: The Daily Mail asked the child what she typically eats, made assumptions about what she said, and calculated her caloric intake based on those assumptions.

...except that no where in that article does it state that the child was interviewed, whereas they (The Daily Mail) say that the mother and two doctors were interviewed, so we can assume this calorie figure came from one or more of those sources.

I don't know how it is in the UK, but in the US, quotes have to be accurately assigned to who gave them. Also, if the mother or the doctors gave different information than what was reported, then they have good grounds to sue for libel. I haven't found anything to suggest Aly Gilardoni (the mother) denies any statements made by the Daily Mail.

Lo--if you reject the inference that she is eating well more than the 700 calories a day mentioned in the article, then the only other logical conclusion is that, for some unknown reason, 700 calories a day is sufficient to keep this girl at a somewhat healthy weight (which is apparent both from the picture and the statement that her current weight is 5 lbs below what it should be). Which do you find more plausible?

[rubato]

"...

It's so sad that a woman in her late 70's is STILL so obsessed with dieting. ... "

Maybe its a pastime for her, like following sports is for others.

Both can be deadly boring to those unafflicted with interest in them.


yrs,
rubato

I think is has something to do with her Presbyterian upbringing during World War II.

She just doesn't think anything is doing her good unless she has a hair-shirt on and is flogging herself and putting salt into the wounds. She has to feel like she is deprived in order for her to achieve something.

She drives me fucking nuts most of the time and I can get a bit short with her. Luckily the Hatch reminds me of how rude I am and I apologise for my behaviour.

I just wish she would learn to be happy. Personally I think that is most of her problem. Unless she is miserable, she doesn't feel worthy ... or something like that.

Strange, but even more strange, its not rare.

I have co-workers who prefer to wallow in misery complaining about things rather than admit that they are comfortably off and have few real problems. Still, its deadly boring to listen to that shit.


yrs,
rubato

[loCAtek]

BigRR, She may be sneaking food in private like she's been taught by example by her mother and/or getting hand-outs from friends at school or from concerned neighbors. This isn't uncommon to hear from foster children: that if mom was gone too long away from home, or 'didn't want to be bothered' they would just wander down the street and ask for food.

In one case, a toddler was living in an apartment complex and luckily just a few doors down was a kindly gay couple who responded to the boy's pleas of "I'm hungry". The child was over so often, they decided to make it legal and were applying for a full foster parent license.

[oldr_n_wsr]

In one case, a toddler was living in an apartment complex and luckily just a few doors down was a kindly gay couple who responded to the boy's pleas of "I'm hungry". The child was over so often, they decided to make it legal and were applying for a full foster parent license.

What kind of result happened in that case?