Addendum: Children and Food Labels

There is one more personal anecdote I would like to add to my last post.

I have a daughter who is thirteen. Last year, while she was still twelve, we went to the grocery store and were picking out a salad dressing. Now, dressing is not a particularly healthy thing to consume. Anyone who can read a label knows this, whether they acknowledge it or not. So, we were picking what kind of dressing we wanted and comparing nutrition labels. You know; calories per serving, grams of fat. My mom has had issues with high cholesterol and high blood pressure in the past. Nothing to write home about, but enough to where I feel like I can teach my daughter what those things are and what they mean nutritionally, so we were looking at cholesterol and sodium as well. I thought we were having an interesting conversation; organic vs synthetic, local vs big brand, less expensive vs more expensive. Then this woman slams down a bottle of dressing in her cart. I turn to look. She makes direct eye contact, cocks her head, scoffs and stomps off. I look at my daughter. Anyone who knows me knows she’s tiny, and anyone who knows her knows she’s athletic. I can no longer give my friends my daughter’s old clothes, even to the seven-year-olds, because my thirteen-year-old is smaller than they are. She is not now, nor has she ever been, failure to thrive. She just came from a family of really tiny people and, as such, is really tiny. Her mother, at a massive 5’5” and 115 is taller than her father, though not by much. So, the kid’s small. BFD. Her entire life I’ve had random strangers in stores tell me I’m mistreating my child because she’s always looked younger than she is. Here I am trying to teach her how to read food labels, a skill everyone should have and that a twelve-year-old is mature enough to begin learning about, and this bitch is passing judgment like I’m a pageant mom trying to make sure my eight-year-old doesn’t eat salad dressing that’s too high in fat content. So, you can’t win for losing, sometimes. At least someone out there gave a shit whether she knew what she was thinking or not.

I, personally, believe that more parents should be teaching their children how to read nutrition labels and to make smart food choices, but what the hell do I know?? To some, I’m a skinny liberal bitch teaching her eight-year-old to shun calories.