The Balanced "Activity" Diet

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By Russell Turner

Published:
1-June 2006

 

These days we are all too familiar with "health experts" telling us to feed our children properly. They tell us things like "by the age of eight your child is already affecting their adult life expectancy by what they eat and how much they exercise." We are constantly being bombarded with orders to reduce their dependence on sugar and fat and instead give them a more balanced diet to include vegetables, fruits, carbohydrates and proteins.

Our kids are diabetic for crying out loud. We know this stuff inside and out. How much time do we spend with nutritionists and dieticians? How much time have we spent juggling and adjusting our children's meals to get that perfect combination that will keep their blood sugar stable? Or, as stable as it will ever get. Please. Give me some information on balance for my children that I can really use.

Get a group of "activity experts" together to tell us how our children should spend their time. Give us charts and graphs that indicate the greater variety of things our kids do and enjoy doing, the better they will know themselves, discover talents and be able to use their time better, and the more well-rounded and fulfilled they will be.

They need to come up with the "balanced activity diet". They can tell us it will have an important impact on self-esteem as well. The more spheres of influence our children pass through the more chances they have to find something they are good at, can do well, and feel proud about. A child who watches TV all the time is likely to have no idea about the full range of her capabilities. At the same time they need to show us statistics like a child who is gifted at music and spends all of their time practicing and does little else will likewise have little idea about what else they are capable of.

What we need the "experts" to help us understand is that pastimes that are generally approved of as well as those sometimes frowned upon (like TV and video games) generate only a single interest in our children and they begin to rely on those narrow interests for their sense of security because they are familiar and safe. The "experts" should also tell us these safe single areas of interest do not encourage the degree of social flexibility and confidence that takes a lot of the anxiety out of new situations that our children will face.

What constitutes a balanced activity diet you might ask? Our "experts might say it looks like this.

Outdoor things - walks, tree climbing, visits to the park, playing anything outside.

Creative things - drawing painting, Playdoh, cooking, music

Social things - visiting friends and relatives

Imaginative things - playing indoors "tents" with blankets, "lets pretend" games

Ball - skills and games

Unstructured play - let their thought wander at will

Bookish things - reading or writing, trips to the library

Number things - counting, math

I'm sure some "expert" would warn us against implementing a contrived "balanced activity diet" because it would be pretty controlling. But I think I like the idea of a "balanced activity diet" to round out our children's experiences and allow them to grow in some different directions than we, as their parents might imagine for them. It will also make it much more difficult to label someone that "diabetic" child.