Underweight preteen

toastedbagel

Thu, Apr 20 2017, 12:04 pm

OP I could have written your post myself. DS12 is literally below the bottom of the charts. Although he does seem to eat fine at home, but he usually takes a small school lunch and brings home half uneaten. Even if he is fressing though, nothing sticks. All the weight goes to his twin who is 30+ pounds heavier, but still in healthy weight range (he's a drop taller, but not 30 pounds worth. Just shows you how skinny the skinny one is...)
I've started to remind him to eat
Would love any tips and ideas.

amother

Lemon

Thu, Apr 20 2017, 1:02 pm

I was underweight at that age (and before and after) due to a combination of ritalin and some other health problems. I also have an underweight daughter, but she is younger than this.

A few important things:
- Protein and fat are both needed to gain weight. So ice cream and high fat yogurt won't cut it. Increase the amount of chicken, eggs, fish, and meat your kid's diet. Include high fat cuts as well. Aside from regular chicken/meat/eggs/fish, many foods have high protein+fat together - think muffins (made with eggs), quiches (have eggs and cheese), kugels (made with eggs). Try increasing the number of protein rich vegetables vs other vegetables - give more green beans, peas, chickpeas, edamame instead of lots of raw vegetable salad or carrots or sweet potatoes or broccoli.
- Don't let your kids fill up on fruits and vegetables. If they want a snack or need a side dish, try something with protein as in the previous point, or something like a handful of nuts or peanut butter on rice cakes, etc. If they are snacking on raw veggies, tryto have a healthy protein rich dip such as techina (not the processed kind, buy the technia base and mix in some spices and lemon juice), chummus (not the store bought kind, it doesn't have much protein, but you can easily make your own), peanut butter or other nut butter, or even make a mayonnaise-based dip (mix mayo, ketchup, mustard, and garlic powder - the eggs in the mayo add calories ad protein).
- Try quinoa instead of rice or couscous. Quinoa has a lot of protein.
- Oats and oatmeal have higher protein than other grains. But don't overdo the oatmeal because that's not good for weight gain either. But oat-based muffins are good.
- Look at the protein content of breakfast cereals and buy the ones with higher content. Oat based cereals generally have the most, while corn-base cereals generally have the least.
- Don't just increase fat content or sugar content - this can lead to other health problems. It often doesn't increase weight gain, and can give high cholesterol (I had this as a teenager already due to a lifetime of a high fat diet), and a constant very high sugar intake can lead to a lifetime habit which can increase the chances of diabetes later in life.
- See a child nutritionist - they can help you figure out whether your child is getting enough calories overall, as well as whether they are getting the right proportions of fats vs protein vs carbs vs fruits and vegetables. Both overall calorie consumption and the food type breakdown play a role in weight gain.
- Lastly, as a last resort, talk your child's psychiatrist about this side effect and see if there might be a different medication to take instead.