Is it just me or is this heartbreaking to read?

[i-need-a-martini]

It is an excerpt from a book and it is too long to post so have only put the link in. It is a mothers book about the struggle to out her 7 year old daughter on a diet. Dotted throughout the article are comments from the mother about her own dieting and self esteem issues and she thinks that putting her daughter on a strict diet will ensure she doesn't have the same issues she does. What a wack-job!

I'll copy in some sections but it worth reading the whole lot:

(should point out that the daughter was never obese)

This is what happened when daughter complained about being hungry at a family function. She had just eaten a smaller (than the other kids) portion of pasta: 

"If she's hungry, she can have some salad," my friend offered again.

"Okay," said Bea.

I stared at the Niçoise salad, full of tuna, eggs, potatoes - and olive oil.

"I'm sorry. Bea," I interjected. "It's got a lot of dressing on it, and ..."

"Just olive oil!" my friend interrupted. "It's super healthy!"

I forced a grim smile. "I know, but ..."

"Just a little!" my friend insisted, and pushed the bowl into Bea's hands.

I didn't know what to do. My friend was being a hospitable dinner hostess, responding caringly to a child complaining of being hungry. I was trying to be a good mother, an advocate for my child's health. But I also wanted to be a polite dinner guest. Bea happily devoured the salad as I sat silently.

I was mad at myself for not being more protective. I felt bad that I'd let her eat food we hadn't planned on, just to avoid some social discomfort. It wasn't the one bowl of salad that worried me. It was the very real fear that not sticking to our strategy 100 per cent, all the time, left the door open for more such moments to creep in. I'd been on enough diets myself and had tried enough half-hearted measures with Bea to realise what was required.

And this is the transcript when she came out of the weigh-in with a doctor:

Bea stepped on the scale, and i had a moment of reflection. I recalled the previous year's weigh-in at 42 kilograms. I remembered the worry over whether I could help her, of my determination to help her, of the effort of helping her, of the frustrations and triumphs and surprises and disappointments. All, it seemed, leading up to this moment.   

The digital scale displayed her weight as ... 35 kilograms.

There it was. The magic number we'd been working towards, finally appearing on the scale.

When our appointment ended, Bea got dressed and we stepped outside of the office. I looked at her, beaming expectantly as we walked down the street. But she said nothing.

"How do you feel about all the weight you lost?" I asked her when we got home.

"Good," she said, blandly.

"Do you like the way you look now?" I asked.

"Yes," she said, definitively.

"Do you feel different?"

"No. That's still me," she said. "I'm not a different person just because I lost seven kilograms."

http://www.dailylife.com.au/lifestyle/if-shes-hungry-she-can-have-some-salad-20130126-2dd0b.html

[kilroy_is_here]

 i see no problem with teaching a child to eat healthy , the big problem arises when you focus entirly on food as the cuase of her low self esteme, the risk is that it can bring on anerexia , which on average kicks in in the arly teenage years.

having watched my niece starve her self at 15 down 32 kilo's to be within weeks of a total organ shut down to literal walk into icu & be placed on life support  to be force fed by a feeding tube , to see the battle she & her mum went through to save her life, to have to watch my sister struggle to pay back the 100k it cost to do so, is heart breaking.

to me i would take slightly over weight anyday, healthy eating yes, starvation and forced dieting in anybody is just a slippery slope to hell 

[lis351]

Kilroy, that is so sad, I'm sorry for what you're family has gone through. I hope your niece is better now.

Just to clarify, I wasn't saying the Mother shouldn't address her daughters weight and health issues, but that she is going about it entirely the wrong way.