 “Healthy Weight" vs. "Overweight" vs. "Obese" (and BMI confusion) |
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=> Am i overweight i am 5'7foot and 12 stone i want to be thin
=> Ummmmm....I am almost 13 and I am 110lbs and only 5ft1in...Do I need to lose weight?
=> i am a 14 year old girl i am 5ft 5 and i am around 150 pounds i know i am overweight but how much weight do i need to lose to be a healthy weight
=> i am 12 and weigh 140 5ft. and i am muscular do you think it is a healthy weight or about how much should i loose
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 The above questions are answered in order:
1) You are probably overweight. To see by how much you are overweight, you need to consider your age.
2) No, do not lose weight unless your doctor recommends it.
3) See the weight calculator to determine how much you should lose to reach your healthy weight range.
4) 112-115 pounds is the upper limit of your healthy weight range. Although losing 25 pounds to reach this upper limit may be ideal based on your current age and height, you may grow a few inches while losing weight. Re-assess your goals periodically by using our weight calculator.
We hope you all will use our Weight Calculator, which is also posted on the homepage. You will notice that the weight calculator gives you a number called BMI. BMI stands for Body Mass Index. BMI basically compares your weight to your height to determine whether you fall into the healthy, overweight, or obese weight range for your height.
Kids often hear on many websites that a BMI of 25 and below is healthy and mistakenly assume this applies to everyone. However, this only applies to adults (age 20 and above). Since kids are growing, BMI is more tricky. While adults can focus on BMI numbers, kids should pay attention to BMI PERCENTILES. For example, the child below has a BMI of 25.5 but correctly notes that she is not just a little overweight but obese, since her BMI is in the 97th percentile!
From Angela, Age 11 - 02/07/10 Ht. 5'1", Start: 135.5 lb, Today: 135 lb, Goal: 105 lb
Hi, My name is Angela. And I'm "obese" on their scale.
Reply from Taylor, Age 16 - 02/11/10 - INCORRECT INFORMATION:
Well, a BMI of 25.5 isn't anywhere near obese. Look the information up... obese is a BMI of 30 or greater, so it's giving conflicting information.
The reply above mistakenly focuses on BMI numbers (which would be okay if this website were for adults) whereas BMI PERCENTILES is what matters for kids.
Here are the BMI percentiles you will want to pay attention to:
BMI 1st to 4th percentile: Underweight*
BMI 5th to 84th percentile: Healthy Weight*
BMI 85th to 94th percentile: Overweight*
BMI 95th to 100th percentile: Obese*
See below for visual charts of how BMI works in children vs. adults (over 20 years old). You’ll notice the kid’s charts are complex and wavy while the chart for adults contain flat lines. Thus, BMI is interpreted differently between kids and adults! BMI numbers are important to adults, while BMI percentiles are important to kids.
Girls Under 20 Years of Age
Boys Under 20 Years of Age
Anyone 20 Years of Age or Older
This teen understands that there is a difference between kids and adults when using BMI calculators.
From Cathy, Age 18 - 02/22/04 - CORRECT INFORMATION:
Hey guys, I am around 5'5 and 148 pounds. I want to be down to 130 pounds by July. I want to go slow, since I am not looking for a miracle. I found a great website at http://www.blubberbuster.com/height_weight.html - it's a BMI calculator specifically targeted at people between 2 and 20. I find it better than a lot of the calculators out there. (BMI calculator for adults are not the same for teens)
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| Supporting Friends and Family Members with their Weight Loss |
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=> lucy my cuzin anna is overwight people in school keep on makeing fun of her what can she do
=> My sister is overweight and i do not know how to help her!!!
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It must be hard to see others you care about (friends, brothers, sisters, or other family members) struggle with being overweight. Although there is no single answer on how to support others in weight loss since everyone is different, here are a few basic ideas that should help most people.
1) Be a good role model. Avoid eating junks food. Try to eat healthier and share snack ideas with your friend or family member. Healthy eating ideas
2) Exercise together. Kids are more likely to move around when a friend or family member is inspired to be active too. Go to the park and try out the swings together. Activity ideas
3) Be available for emotional support during tough times. This means spending time with your friend or family member. Try to listen more than you talk. Overweight kids may suffer from a low self esteem, but having a buddy around can really help. Overweight kids can get especially depressed when teased by others about their weight. Share these tips on how to deal with bullies including "Greta Garbo's technique". |
| Doctor says I need to drink more water and eat less salt. |
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=> So, I got this new medicine that stablizes my moods, but my doctor said I needed to drink a LOT of water when I take it. Along with drinking a lot of water, I need to watch how much sodium I consume. Any advice, Wiz?
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While we can not give medical advice, if your doctor advised that you need to increase your water consumption while reducing your sodium (another word for salt) intake for your new medication, then these measures may help you lose weight too!
Lots of kids claim that drinking water helps them lose weight. This makes sense because it helps fill up the stomach so that you tend to eat less. To monitor how much water you are drinking, you can fill up a large pitcher of a known amount, and see how much you empty it each day. Another method posted by one teen uses 8 rubber-bands placed around a water glass. The teen then removed one band for each glass she drank through out the day. If you get tired of water, try different flavors of tea. Tea without any added sugar or honey is essentially water with some vitamins, minerals, and other healthy compounds. Unsweetened juice can have more calories than water but can still be a occasional choice for keeping hydrated when you are trying to lose weight. See what Lucy has to say about Watching What You Drink.
Reducing how much sodium we consume, would benefit many people. Water retention and the development of high blood pressure are consequences of eating a diet high in sodium. Chronic high blood pressure in turn may damage the kidneys and cardiovascular (heart and blood vessels) system.
Over 3/4 of sodium in the average U.S. diet comes from processed or prepared foods. That means food in boxes or packages from the store are the main culprits of sodium in our diets. Food companies add salt to help preserve and improve the taste of foods. Some of the foods that consistently have high sodium are canned vegetables, soups, luncheon meats, and frozen foods. Look for labels that say “low sodium” or “reduced sodium”. Try reading food nutrition labels from boxes in your kitchen cabinets to find which are the worst offenders in your household. Foods with 140 mg sodium or less per serving can be considered low sodium foods.
 For home cooking, try cutting in half or more the amount of salt in recipes. After a few weeks, your taste-buds should adjust and you should not miss it anymore. Eating more fresh fruits and vegetables will also help because these foods are naturally low in sodium.
Below are links to more tips for reducing your sodium intake:
MyPyramid.com Salt and Sodium: 10 tips to cut back
Mayo Clinic Sodium: Are you getting too much? |
| Wedding in one month! What can I do? |
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=> i am 11 years old and i am really fat please help i also got a realatives wedding coming up in a month please could you give me tips im desprate
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Losing 4-8 pounds in about a month (1-2 pounds or 1/2-1 kilogram per week), would be a reasonable and safe goal. If you need to lose more weight to reach a healthy range, then perhaps the wedding event will be a great reason to motivate you to get started in making changes necessary to lose weight. You can find numerous tips on healthy eating, physical activity, relating to food, self esteem, motivation and making progress on Lucy's Weight Loss Tips page.
While we don’t claim to be fashion experts, please look at this Clothing Tip for pointers in choosing a dress and accessories for the wedding event that will best flatter a heavy body. Choosing clothing that best compliments your figure can go a long way in giving your self esteem a boost. We hope you have fun at the wedding! |
| How Do I Lose Weight? It's so hard! |
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=> how to loss weight
=> how to control my body weight?
=> I try and try but I just can't lose weight What should I do?
=> hi my weight is 185 and i want to lose 60 or 70bl. how can i do this
=> Hi! I'm 12 1/2 years old.I'm 5'5 and 137lbs.I eat healthy and exercise.I don't know what to do.I want to lose at least 10lbs for now.My best friend stuffs her face all the time and never exercises.Ever!She just sits in from of her PC and she looks fantastic.Help!
=> i am 11 years old and weigh 150 lbs. and i mean i live in GA so everyone here has great tans and are a skinny has a tooth pick i have tried to go on diets but i always cheat PLEASE HELP ME!!!!
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“How do I lose weight?” is one of the most common types of questions submitted to us. If it were easy to follow the advice of eat less and exercise more, then you probably would have already done it. Since so many kids (and adults) have trouble losing weight, we think there is more going on.
You may not be consciously aware of it, but you may be emotionally dependent (hooked) on certain foods. For example, if you always drink a soda pop when you get home from school, would it cause you distress (for a few weeks anyway) if you completely cut this drink out of your diet and instead drank water or ice tea? Soda pop or chips may or may not be your favorite snack food, but there is probably SOMETHING that is either fattening, salty, or sweet, that often draws you to the kitchen. If so, you actually may be partially, or fully, addicted to that food. We suggest reading through our Healthy School “How Do I Lose Weight?” page to learn how to break the overeating habit of these addictive foods. |
| Saggy, excess, or extra skin after loosing lots of weight |
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=> I weigh 325 pounds, 5' 5", and I am 14. My doctor and school nurse says I am pretty much done growing (height-wise anyway) for my age. I was wondering, if I actually do end up losing weight, will I have a bunch of extra skin left over? (I have seen shows on TV where people have lost a lot of weight, and their skin is pretty loose.) If so, is their a way to get rid of it, without surgery?
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It is hard to give a yes or no answer as to whether you will develop saggy skin after weight loss. However, certain factors seem influence the likelihood (or not) of developing saggy skin. Fortunately, as a teenager, several of these are working in your favor.
People in the reality TV shows usually lose a lot of weight very quickly, much quicker than 1-2 pounds per week. Skin takes time to resume its former level of tautness. This is one reason why losing weight at a healthier rate can avoid the formation of saggy skin. Even if excess skin forms, people should be patient. Some recommend waiting 1-2 years after reaching their healthy weight to see if the skin will assume a more normal appearance before considering drastic measures such as surgery.
Younger people (including you!) have the advantage of more elastic skin, which has an easier time of "springing" back to the contours of a body at a healthy weight. The amount of time skin has been “stretched” out may also influence it’s ability to retract after weight loss. Nutrition can play a role in how your skin responds as well. Some people report that changing to a more healthy diet with plenty of fluids can reduce the amount of excess skin.
There are not many scientific studies done on treatment options (except surgery) for excess skin after major weight loss. However, some believe that even if one reaches a “healthy weight” but still has excess skin, the problem may be too much body fat and not enough lean body tissue (muscle). This means including or increasing the amount of exercise to obtain a healthier looking body.
Here are two experiences about saggy skin from kids who have posted on the bulletin boards. More posts on saggy skin can be found in the “Kids Helping Kids” page on this website as well as searches through the pre-teen, teen, and 18+ bulletin boards.
Reply From Michelle, Age 11 - 07/02/03
You can also walk 1hour and eat more healthy food but no junk food. Im telling you it works. But I will just tell you one thing don't loose weight fast cause you might have extra skin, and stretch marks. Cause my friend she weighed 270 pounds and she lost weight soo fast that she has whole bunch of stretch marks and extra skin. Good luck!!!
From Trip, Age 16 - 02/19/05
Once i realized i wanted to lose the weight for myself.......not because of being teased, or society has portrayed thin as glamorous.....all it took was researching healthy eating on the net.My highest weight......14 and 325...and now im 16 and 135.Of course you have to also exercise, like cardiovascular, so as your body begins to shrink from the lost weight the skin remains tight and healthy.Simple cardiovascular activities helped me to avoid the 'loose skin' situation.
 
In these photos, Georgia Davis, dubbed UK's former heaviest teen, lost over 200 pounds through the assistance of a weight loss camp and while not at her goal yet, she looks healthier with no noticeable saggy skin. What an improvement! |
| Tempting, addictive food. How can I resist? |
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=> dear lucy i just wanted to talk to you about me being obese i weigh alot and i need tips on how to be around food an not be tempted to eat it when i dont need it please right back i girl that dearly need help
=> I am addicted to chips and pop, i can't stop eating them
=> I was wondering is there any tricks to help people not eat so much food like, me.
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Some foods can be so tempting, even addictive! Chips, pop, chocolate, cookies and many other sweet, salty, and fattening foods can be irresistible to some people. There are several ways to stop yourself from over-indulging in these foods.
1. Remove tempting food from the house. This isn’t always possible, but it’s worth a try to talk to your parents about not buying some of the foods that you can’t resist when it’s in the house. If you are the one buying them, then stop. This rule can also be applied to fast food. If you have a weakness for McDonald’s Big Macs, then try not to even go to any McDonald's restaurants.
2. Place tempting food out of sight. There is some truth to the saying “out of sight, out of mind”. If tempting food is in the house, it might help to place it in cabinets or areas that you usually don’t visit. Top shelves can be good places to store these foods because you aren't as likely to see them and it requires extra effort to get them out (unless you are really tall). If this method doesn’t work for you because the food is always on your mind, you remember where these odd places are, and you get the food anyway, then ask your parents or siblings for help. Ask them to move the food somewhere else where you won’t find it. If you can handle it, set a small portion of the food aside in baggies for you to eat each week. But if it prompts you to look for the rest of the food that is stashed, then you may need to deal with a food addiction. See #3.
3. Identify food addictions and remove them from your diet. Just like smoking or alcohol, some foods can be quite addictive for certain people. Kids (and adults) can get hooked on the pleasure of junk food. Unfortunately the good feeling is short lived and the side effect is excess weight gain. If it seems like you can never say “no” to certain foods, then consider “de-toxing” from it. For example, one of you said that you are addicted to chips and pop. Start picking at your weaknesses one at a time. Choose either pop or chips and cut it out of your diet completely. You may have intense cravings for it for several weeks, just as a smoker would crave a cigarette, but this should go away through time. Once you’ve successfully cut one of these foods out of your diet, try another that is giving you trouble. Just make sure to substitute your cravings for junk food with something more healthy or distracting activities. See these links for food ideas to get you through cravings and activities.
Visit “How Do I Lose Weight?” within the Healthy Weight School on our website to learn more about these strategies. |
| Help! I’ve lost some weight but now my scale is stuck and I haven’t reached my goal! (Weight Plateau) |
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=> hi Lucy I'm only 12 I'm very overweight I lost 31 pounds
but i want 25 lost 100 pounds help (by the way i weight 257 lb.)
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Great job on losing 31 pounds already! Each pound is 3,500 calories so you’ve had a net loss of 108,500 calories! I understand you are still overweight but give yourself credit for what you’ve accomplished so far. Sometimes kids will start to lose weight, but then get hung up at a certain number before reaching their goal. This is also called a plateau. In fact, “weight plateaus” are one of the categories within the Kids Helping Kids area. One can browse through the pre-teen, teen, and 18+ areas on that page to see how other kids have successfully tackled weight plateaus.
Weight plateaus can be frustrating. But one can break through them with persistence. A plateau occurs when your metabolism (the rate at which your body burns calories) slows as you lose weight. It simply takes less energy, and thus fewer calories, to move around a smaller body. At some point you will reach equilibrium where the calories consumed equals the calories burned. This may happen before you reach your weight loss goal. This means you’ll need to either increase your activity, decrease the calories you eat, or do both if you want to continue losing weight.
Most people tend to underestimate their calorie intake by 20 percent, and overestimate how much they exercise. Can you add another exercise session, exercise longer, or find other ways to increase your physical activity through daily tasks such as cleaning your room and walking to the store? Reassess your eating habits by writing down everything you eat for a day or two. You may be surprised by how much you eat throughout the whole day. Snacks can sometimes really add up!
Again, give yourself credit for the weight loss you’ve accomplished so far. Even if you haven’t reached your goal yet, you’ve already improved your health and reduced your risk for chronic health conditions related to being overweight. Focus on the positive and don’t give up. Don't reach for extra cookies just because you're frustrated about hitting a stubborn weight plateau. Lucy thinks you can reach your goal! |
| Lucy comments about "starving" and skipping meals. |
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=> my friends keep saying im going to end up straving myself to lose weight because i'll never get skinny. Whatshould i do?
=> I feel like the world is closing in around me. All I want to do is hide. I thought I was starting to lose weight, but then some boy made a nasty comment about it. I'm depressed about my weight - I have skipped meals in the past to become slimmer. How can I lose weigh easily without ending up on a dangerous diet?
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Skipping meals and “starving” oneself hardly ever produces long term weight loss. One may lose some weight temporarily, but usually people resume their old eating habits when they reach their goal weight. Then they regain what they’ve lost (and sometimes more) because they didn’t learn to make any lasting lifestyle changes.
Instead of skipping meals altogether, try eating less than what you might consider a full meal at these times. This is also called portion control. Even if one doesn’t normally eat breakfast, including this meal can help you avoid binging later in the day. At the minimum, grab a piece of fruit and drink some milk in the morning (which takes almost no time for those with tight schedules).  Eating breakfast also helps your body to use stored fat for energy. Click here for more breakfast ideas from Lucy.
It also helps to eat only at scheduled meal times and not in between meals, although if you get really hungry for a snack, try a piece of fruit. Many times, we just want a pleasurable distraction from stress of the day, so maybe try calling a friend or take a walk while you eat an apple, which is good for releasing nervous energy.
Both of you sound like you are under some peer pressure. If you are not eating AT ALL around your friends, then they may have reason to be concerned. Your friends may not feel comfortable if they know their presence means that you will not eat. Again, try eating at least a little something at meal times. Kids (and even adults) will sometimes make nasty comments about others when really they don’t feel too good about themselves. You are likely not the only person that this bully tries to belittle. If bullying continues to be a problem, consider these tips when dealing with mean kids so that you can keep your spirits up.
Teasing at School...ouch!
Dealing with Bullies
Just remember, losing weight and keeping it off has the best chance for success if you do it the healthy way. Visit "How do I lose weight?" to get started. |
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Ask your parents to meet with her if you’d like them to be involved in your weight loss quest. Pictured at left are Ashlie and Lawrence when they first met.