Helping my son with healthy eating

mreichard

My son is 14 and still growing pretty fast (1/2" last month). He's about 6' and around 135 lbs. He is extremely active --- he has at least 2 basketball practices a week that run 2 hours, lifts weights 2-3 times a week and trains on his own or plays ball with friends for at least 30 minutes every day, often more like 2 hours. His doctor has expressed some slight concern about his weight (he's right at the edge of underweight) and his coaches have expressed not exactly concern but at least a wish that he were heavier (he plays with kids who almost all outweigh him by about 40 pounds).

He lifts weights and would like to bulk, but I think he's a bit young (still growing, not yet adding muscle) and he doesn't eat enough to add weight. He also doesn't love to eat, and has some ADD, so he often just forgets to eat unless he's really hungry. If I make him food, he'll eat but if he has to do it himself, he'd as soon skip it.

I want to raise a healthy, responsible kid with healthy eating habits. I don't want to pressure him to eat because I worry that could set up an unhealthy dynamic. I also want him to take responsibility for his own eating. But... when I try that, he tends to not eat. He will skip breakfast, not eat his school lunch, eat a small dinner and realize when he's laying in bed at night that he's really hungry.

So my question for people with experience with this kind of thing is this: do I just keep reminding him to eat and making him food? Do I let him figure it out on his own (at least until he gets underweight)? How do I teach him to take responsibility for this himself?

alphastarz

My ASD/ADHD 11yo son is underweight. He has difficulty regulating and identifying full vs hungry and lots of sensory issues and other health issues (lactose intolerance, soy allergy) that complicate what he can eat, and what he will try to eat even when prompted. We've been slightly successfully however with white grape juice and Powerade as a partial replacement for water. He does not like change so I believe it will be relatively easy to scale to light sports drinks and more watered down juices, or how often he drinks water vs caloric beverages, if it comes to that in the future, but meanwhile we don't have to fight or continually prompt our resistant kid about it. At 180 calories per cup for some of the 100% juices, I'm able to really pack calories in throughout the day without otherwise complicating meal times where we are working on other priorities and behaviors concurrently.

RoxieDawn

OP he is 14 years old and 135 at 6'. I really do not see anything wrong and he's not underweight yet. He is still growing and if he was malnourished he would not be growing at all and he def would not be able to play all the sports he does and workout like he does.

Personally at his age and height, you want him to grow to be 6'8" and play basketball and become rich and famous.

As far as leaving it all to him for total responsibility, not time to to let him be responsible for anything right now. As my husband just pointed out there is nothing wrong with what he sees in your OP. Has he been diagnosed with full ADD and on medication?

Here what you should do in my honest opinion, let him be a kid, let him be the energizer bunny, and when comes times for eating, you make him his food, you call him to down to eat dinner, lunch or breakfast, he will eat what and when he wants to.

My husband weighted 85 pounds when he was 18 (graduated high school) at 5'11" and played sports out the ya zoo. He weighed 89 when he went to college. He was a pipe cleaner per se, but being skinny is not unhealthy.

I think perhaps you are worring too much, you should watch and observe, and def intervene if you see something he is doing completely unhealthy, but he is just a growing boy with energy, love for sports and just being a kid!

ForecasterJason

Keep in mind that it's not particularly uncommon for some teenage boys to be very skinny while growing rapidly, then put on more weight as growth slows down.
Like RoxieDawn pointed out, it definitely seems as though he is eating enough to grow height-wise.

richln

Is he on medication for his ADD? Most of the medications are stimulants, and loss of appetite is a common side effect. We had to switch meds for my son who has ADHD because one of the drugs he was on caused him to lose a lot of weight.

mreichard

richln wrote: »

Is he on medication for his ADD? Most of the medications are stimulants, and loss of appetite is a common side effect. We had to switch meds for my son who has ADHD because one of the drugs he was on caused him to lose a lot of weight.

Richln - Yes, meds are part of the reason that we worry about this. He went through a period where he was growing slowly and losing weight. When we started making an effort to get him to eat more, the weight loss was reversed and his growth got back on track.

richln

mreichard wrote: »

richln wrote: »

Is he on medication for his ADD? Most of the medications are stimulants, and loss of appetite is a common side effect. We had to switch meds for my son who has ADHD because one of the drugs he was on caused him to lose a lot of weight.

Richln - Yes, meds are part of the reason that we worry about this. He went through a period where he was growing slowly and losing weight. When we started making an effort to get him to eat more, the weight loss was reversed and his growth got back on track.

Let his doctor know. My son's pediatrician stressed that it was very important to monitor his weight and eating habits. As soon as my son started dropping weight, his doctor switched him to a different prescription and he went back to a normal weight right away without any intervention from us trying to get him to eat more.