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Being a teenager can be a stressful time for some. Being an overweight teenager  would no doubt be stressful for many.

As with anything else that presents challenges, it is good to identify the cause if we can. First, rule out or dealt with any significant physical/medical reason. Then, it is likely due to past and/or existing eating habits, perhaps along with lack of exercise.

Dealing with exercise or lack of exercise can be an issue on its own and may well be related to physical limitations. I am not able to address these concerns but there is no shortage of professionals who can!

Choices to Be Made

With dietary concerns there are basically 2 issues to be addressed: 1) what foods are being eaten and 2) what quantities of foods are being eaten. So the questions are ” Are we eating healthy foods and what are they?”, “What are our typical serving sizes and what should they be?”.  A very good resource to use as a starting point to plan a healthier diet would be Canada’s Food Guide (or the USDA Food Guide Pyramid). Canada’s Food Guide recommends the number of servings of the four food groups for different age groups and discusses what a serving size is. Of course eating too much healthy food is going to mean consuming too many calories and they do count!

A Sensible Solution

The Eater’s Choice Daily Meal Planner for 9 to 13 year olds or females 14 to 18 years and males 14 to 18 years will help teach how many servings of each food group should be eaten. Canada’s Food Guide will help with understanding what a good serving size would be. The hope was that at least initially the planner would choose foods they like and later add a variety of new foods. If you purchase the Eater’s Choice Download PDF File we will include the list, with photos, of the 250+ foods in The Eating Game. This Food Booklet may help in the choice of new foods to eat.

The meal planner is a dry erasable format for reuse every day. The user records food choices for the day on the colored spaces. The colors correspond to the four food groups: fruit & vegetables, milk & alternatives, grains and meat & alternatives.

The Eater’s Choice Daily Meal Planner supports the user and puts them in control of the food choices. Furthermore, it is a plan for healthy weight management. In the long term it will help establish good eating habits, hopefully for a lifetime! For those who are overweight it will surely lead to a healthy a healthy weight loss too!

This would be a great tool to use with a group of teens, giving them some peer support. Are working with a group of teens and wish to purchase at least 6 Eater’s Choice Daily Meal Planners? Send me an email at jean@theeatinggame.ca and I will consider an arrangement for a discounted price.