Healthy habits, healthier kids

Published 8:00 am Wednesday, September 27, 2006

When I was a young kid, my brothers and sisters nicknamed me “Grimace.” Not because I was constantly scowling — I was, and still am, fairly happy-go-lucky — but because I could’ve (by their estimation) stood to lose a few pounds. Folks not of my generation should note that Grimace © is the fat, purple blob (of grease? Who knows?) who used to hang out with Ronald McDonald ©, the Fry Guys ©, Hamburglar © and Mayor McCheese © back in the ‘70s. Not sure what he’s up to now (270? Maybe 290?).

Anyway, most anyone who knows me now, and who hears the tale of my formidable years as a pudgy youngster usually gets a pretty good laugh out of it. I haven’t gained a whole lot of weight since I graduated from O’Dea High School in 1990 and am — according to some — “thin as a rail.”

This has been blamed on everything from my oddly low cholesterol count to my high metabolism and just about everything in between. Truth be told, I don’t know what it is, but since my days as “Grimace,” I have liked to stay on the fit side as opposed to the fat (that is to say obese) side. It’s easier, I maintain, to stay in shape than it is to get back into shape — not that I’m in the greatest one way or the other.

So when our school’s reporter recently dropped a brief in the Herald “Raw” copy folder about how the North Kitsap School District and others were following state mandates to curb childhood obesity by cutting out food of minimal nutritional value, I read it and hesitated. I assumed that “food of minimal nutritional value” was the new PC term for junk food? Much like obese is a PC term for fat, I suppose. Why food needs to be PC though, is interesting. You can call Kentucky Fried Chicken ® KFC ®, but it’s still a deep fried heart attack in a bucket. Junk food is what it is, and so are obese folks. The difference is that latter can, and often do ,change.

Hence my hesitation with the brief.

“This is either a story or it’s nothing to our readers,” I told the reporter, and we decided it was indeed a story. But nutrition — or lack thereof — was just part of it, I assured him.

“Have you ever seen a really fat soccer player?” I asked, knowing that while they do have greater numbers in Poulsbo Parks and Recreation’s co-rec league, they are few and far between on the high school pitch, which he also covers.

The problem isn’t just food. It’s also lifestyle. It has to be.

Why? Because obesity (basically being 30 pounds overweight) is increasing in America’s youth by leaps and bounds. Junk food, on the other hand, has been around long before Mr. McCheese realized his lifelong aspirations of leading McDonaldland ©.

That’s where the elastic meets the waist.

And while schools can dictate — to some degree — what kids eat on campus, lifestyle is a choice. One that should be positively reinforced at home. In millions of homes, this isn’t happening.

If the morbidly obese Ma and Pa Kettle sit around the TV, chowing down on high fat, high sodium, artery clogging meals all the time, chances are Jr. Kettle will follow suit.

I’m not trying to cast stones here but active kids, kids who eat good foods, are less likely to become obese. Does that make them “better” kids? Not at all. Does that make them healthier? Yes. Should everyone drop and give me 20 in an effort to one-up Nicole Richie? Of course not. Skinny isn’t necessarily healthy, either.

While the new mandate from the state takes aim at unhealthy eating habits and better physical education, it is by no means a silver bullet. Nor is it meant to be. Some will argue that schools have no place saying one way or the other what’s healthy for their children, others will point out that students will still have easy access to junk food via every grocery store and quickie mart in the area.

Either way, I think its definitely a step in the right direction.

Typically, healthy kids will become healthy adults. And by and large (no pun intended), obese children will become obese adults.

The ramifications of which go well beyond the individual and effect everything from health care costs to where our taxes go to some degree. I’d like to think the state is being proactive in this case, looking ahead and doing what it can to promote not only healthy kids but a healthy economy that is not wholly reliant on huge corporations mopping up vast profits at the expense of our children’s health and future.

JOE “Grimace” IRWIN

Editor