Parents Must Be Role Models

Author: Jessica Vachal

The push to eat and live healthfully is a strong one for many Americans – despite the rising rates of obesity in their country. Unfortunately, the same needs to be just as true for parents - as childhood obesity is becoming an epidemic within this country as well. It cannot be denied that there is nothing sadder than the thought of your child being teased by mean classmates or standard bullies. However, overweight children are very often the brunt of such cruel childhood pranks, and as parents we should want to do everything possible to keep that from happening with our own children. However, in order to do this, parents generally need to make the first stand in setting an example for their children and in doing so, they need to start eating and living healthfully on a day-to-day basis.

After all, many adults will eat or live healthfully as a particular date draws near that they want to look their best for – a reunion, a vacation, and so forth. When a child is looking up to you for guidance, however, you need to ensure that you are being healthy day in and day out or else your offspring will not learn that this is the way life should be lived every single day. Eating fruits and vegetables is one easy way to make living healthfully a part of your day-to-day life, and at the same time this will allow you to teach your children that the best way to stay healthy and, let’s face it, trim, is to eat a diet rich in both fruits and vegetables. High in fiber and relatively low in calories, fresh fruits and vegetables are a great way to teach your children – and to teach yourself – how to feel fuller, longer with great nutritional benefits to boot.

Learning that fruits and vegetables should be the largest component of your daily intake of food can help a child to make smart choices when they are left to their own devices as well. At school, a well-taught child may choose to get a fast lunch from the YoNaturals vending machine on campus and will choose from its selection of organic fruit juices and organic snacks rather than the potato chips and soda from a neighboring vending machine. A well-taught child will go to a friend’s house and have an extra serving of salad with their pizza rather than two extra slices. The point is that parents must be involved, however, so go to it moms and dads, and buy some bananas and carrots for the fridge.