CHILDHOOD OBESITY PREVENTION STRATEGY.mexxez

Imagine that you are a parent faced with the following dilemma"How can I allow my kids to play some of their video games, watch some of their TV shows, and have some of those sugary, fat laden foods yet prevent them blowing up like a balloon?"

If that's your situation then I recommend this: Purchase a height adjustable pull up bar (HAPUB) that raises and lowers in one inch increments and install it in a place where your kids have easy access. Show your kids how to incorporate leg assisted pull ups (jumping and pulling at the same time) so they can succeed immediately on their new pull up bar. Immediate success is critical. If they can't perform at least 8 uninterrupted leg assisted pull ups, lower the bar until they can. Then designate that level as their starting point.
Opportunity Instead of Obligation
Now allow your kids to do as many leg assisted pull ups as they want for a period of five minutes or 100 cycles. Do this three days a week (say Monday, Wednesday, and Friday) ONLY! When their five minutes/100 cycles is up put the bar away and don't take it out again until their next scheduled workout day rolls around. Stick to your guns on this because this take away strategy makes doing pull ups a valued opportunity to get strong instead of a despised obligation to embarrass themselves in front of their friends. Your kids should feel as if they get to do pull ups instead of feeling as if they have to do them. Having to do pull ups is a deal breaker, so avoid it.
Strong VS Weak
Also, make the terms strong or stronger to be household names.do this regularly when talking about pull ups because all kids naturally want to be strong at everything and weak at nothing. Obviously, there are lots of kids who will tell you they want to be "bad" but there's not one kid on planet earth who wants to be weak at anything. Both of these two concepts are extremely important to OPYOW's long term motivation strategy.
They Deserve a Break Today
Once they kep to the regimen an incentive like a visit to the cinema or McDonald's is a sure incentive that would reinforce their commitment and make the whole exercise fun. Also take them to the grocery store and buy them some Captain Crunch or Frosted Flakes, a Snicker bar, and perhaps a six or twelve pack of Pepsi or Coke...just as long as they had three good OPYOW sessions this week.
The First Month
Now for the first month I want you to raise the bar ONE INCH (increase the difficulty) at the beginning of each week, and continue the pattern of related rewards on the weekend. At the end of the first month you will have raised the bar a total of 4 inches, your kids will have had the experience of working out, having fun, and getting stronger three times each week. Remember, this is a privilege not a right or an obligation.
The Second Month
In month two I want you to reduce the bar raising ceremony to once every other week while you continue the weekend reward system as long as the kids are participating, having fun on the bar, and getting stronger. So, at the end of two months your kids will have experienced the opportunity to do pull ups three times per week, the bar will have been raised a total of six inches, and they will have learned to expect to succeed on the pull up bar even as the task becomes more and more challenging. They will also be six inches closer to their end goal of being able to do conventional pull ups at which point they'll be naturally immunized against obesity as long as they maintain their ability to do pull ups.
The End Zone and Relentless Persistence
At the end of two months a significant percentage of kids will have actually reached the end zone, mastered the ability to do conventional pull ups, and you can allow them to do conventional in place of leg assisted pull ups. But that doesn't make one kid any better than the others. It's just a new and final level of performance that the other kids are going to reach in another few weeks or months through relentless persistence.
For those who have not reached the end zone at the end of the first two months you can continue raising the bar every other week as long as the level of difficulty is not infringing on the kids' successful experience. If it gets to be too much of a struggle then go to a once a month bar raising pattern instead of every other week.
The worst case scenario is, at the end of one year's time the bar will have been raised 16 inches and 95% of your participants will have reached the goal by that time. For the remaining 5% it's a matter of monitoring eating habits so that they reduce their body weight workload and they will eventually ring the bell, if they persist, persist, persist!
A Side Bene...
As a side benefit, your kids will have also had a hands on experience with setting a concrete goal, wrestling with a challenging task (like pull ups) and meeting that challenge with relentless persistence, fueled by small but regular increments of progress, and reaching that hard to achieve goal sooner or later. And by the way, just because everybody doesn't arrive at the party same time doesn't mean they won't arrive. It just takes some a little longer than others. But that's true of everything in life and experiencing it in this hands-on, highly practical context can help to bring that important lesson to life early on.
A Big Mac A Day...
One way or the other, I want to make the following observation. You can eat a Big Mac and Fries every day, all year long, play video games, and watch a ton of TV, but as long as you can still do pull ups, YOU CAN'T BE OBESE!. Furthermore, the more pull ups you can do, the TRIMMER YOU'LL BE, GUARANTEED! Therefore the McStrategy for the 21st Century Mcparents is to teach your McKids to Pull Their Own Weight, and tell 'em to maintain it for life. If they do they'll be naturally immunized against obesity forever. It's about that simple.