14 yr. old needs motivation - HELP

jjblogs

Hi,

I have a nephew who is 11, and in quite overweight for his height/weight. My sister and I are trying to find ways to motivate this child to exercise. Eating properly is an issue too due to the fact that he refuses to eat a lot of healthy foods. Yes, he has some fairly severe behavioral issues that makes getting him to do things next to impossible. They've spoken to doctors about his behavior and are trying to work on that issue. As far as food goes, his Mother is going to have to keep the bad stuff out of the house and let him starve rather than substitute junk for nutritional food.

But, on my end, I thought I might take him out a couple days a week to "exercise". Just to get him started. Meaning I'd have to come up with a lot of fun ways to do it. I have many ideas there. My question is what to do for motivation to even get him to leave the house? It can't be to bribe with food or electronics. He's been exposed to enough of those "motivators". Any ideas? And, I thought about giving him a list of exercises to do each day...some sort of check list ...some fun way to do it. Help??

ps: He refuses organized sports, so that's not an option,

JoRocka

parkour?

rock climbing?

fencing?

swimming?

whitney_simpson

try things like the park, short nature walks, family bike rides, or public pools.

or maybe have him invite his friends along for a day outside

JenMc14

I'd invite him for a fun activity a few times a week. Perhaps laser tag or a hike or ones of those rock climbing places, etc. perhaps a local gymnastics gym has open gym time and you could do trampolines. I would not couch it as exercise. I would not give him lists. The more you push and nag, the more he'll resist.

lavaughan69

Is he 11 or is he 14? I'm confused. Your title said 14 but the body of your message said 11.

I would concentrate on keeping healthy food in the house and lower calorie snacks. What about family bike rides or walks? You're going to need to do it as a family, but if he's 14 years old I wish you luck. Motivating teenagers is a challenge at any given time, but if he's got behavior issues then that will make it even harder.

You need to find out what he likes to do. If not organized sports then how about karate? Or boxing, something more one on one. Do you have a rock wall center? What about a trampoline place? Plan fun things for him and his friends. Are you near water? a lake? can you go canoeing or kayaking?

That's it...I'm out of suggestions :-)

Fabfitgirl5

Swimming is excelent for kids, if he doesn't know how to swim put him in lessons, that way he will want to go to learn and you won't have to try to bribe him. If he is too self conscious to swim, you can always do laser tag, which requires a lot of running -do that for 45 minutes and you will be spent.

Also, like the other post said, fencing is also very good.

There is also tennis, which is awesome, the calorie burn when playing tennis is awesome or racquetball, since that will also help him release agression if he has certain issues.

Find a kid friendly obstacle course with like balance beams, or craw through tunnels, etc. things that aren't going to be too hard for him and let him do that. of find a tree house area where kids can climb up ladders and go through the different tree houses or play areas up off the ground, that way he will be working out wihtout realizing it.

If you live in a place with indoor or outdoor labrynths (mazes) or if you can find one near your area, take him to that and
tell him its a competition to see who can exit the fastest, but it has to be a pretty big maze so he runs around for at least 30 minutes.

There are also apple orchards open this time of year, you can take him to an orchard and walk from one end to the other. They tend to be pretty darn large.

Good luck!

WeepingAngel81

I know there isn't a whole lot of movement involved but a good start may be batting cages, bowling, mini golf. Then maybe work up to the more physical activites as he gets used to getting out and doing things. Good luck!

scunningham2012

One motivation we've found for my husband's younger brother is a game from the late 90's early 2000's called DDR (Dance Dance Revolution). He loves playing the game and that may be something to look into. Play Station 2 is the game system and any DDR games for it will work. Since it's an older Play Station it's very affordable now. :-)

Just a suggestion.

lilRicki

I have this problem. My child is 11, overweight and has Oppositional Defiant Disorder (paired with high anxiety) that causes extensive behavior issues. The one thing i did find was football. You might not like the contact sport, but it's bigger kids, running around and exercising. Plus he has social issues and being a part of a team is helping. It's tough to get him to go to practice 3 days a week, but it happens. I also take him grocery shopping with me, and he's generally in the kitchen when I'm cooking so he has examples of healthy food. He eats what ever I put in front of him, but if he could eat 2 big macs he would. You're going to struggle, the child is stubborn. We have spent so much money on things to get him active, that he doesn't use. We have 2 different types of bikes, a punching bag, every type of ball, I've even taken him to lift weights with me at the gym and he refused to go after day 2. He does love swimming, doesn't have to be lane swimming, just fun swim. Good Luck, it's a daily battle.

Ed98043

Anything that kids do for fun that just happens to be exercise. When I was a kid it was bike riding, skating, swimming, trampoline, climbing things...in the winter there was sledding and snowball fights and fort-building. Anything outdoors, I guess.

sheclimbsrocks

parkour?

rock climbing?

fencing?

swimming?

I second all of these. I always hated organized exercise and skipped gym as much as I could. Now I am married to a gym teacher. Go figure. If it's fun, it's not exercise. It's just fun!

jjblogs

crap....he's 11....i have no idea why i put 14 in the subject line...O.o

Patzycakes

Do you have any disc golf courses in your area? It's a really fun sport that involves a lot of walking and you really only need a few disc golf frisbees (I'm in Illinois and we have them everywhere).

All movement is excercise, so no need to run drills or make lists. It's suppose to be fun. If the kid in question has fun, he'll want to continue to have fun on his/her own.

So. Just going to the park is great, swings, slides, climbing walls. He's 11, you don't need motivation. Just say "get you stuff we're going out". He'll grumble until he starts having fun. You also don't want to break the bank doing this. Zoos, walks to the library, swimming (wrong season i know). Pay him a few dollars to rake the leaves here in a few weeks, or to mow the grass, weed the garden ect ect.

Lots of ways to get a kid moving. Does he have a bike? If not, I'm sure you can find a deal on a good used one at a garage sale or craigslist. Same thing with skateboards, skates, soccer balls, tennis rackets.

If he has a smart phone or ipod, there is an app called "epic win" that allows you add activies that are like "quests" in the video games, you get pts based on completing the quest objectives. It's free and if he's a video gamer, might lend a new perspective on activities.