Should Morbidly Obese Children Be Removed From Their Parents?

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Clarissa

November 30, 2011

Whenever the impotent social services wake up in this country and do something to save children who are getting abused by their horrible parents, there is always a bunch of idiots who start screeching that the parents’ rights to abuse their kids should be protected at all costs. Here is a recent case in point:

An 8-year-old Cleveland Heights boy was taken from his family and placed in foster care last month after county case workers said his mother wasn’t doing enough to control his weight.

At more than 200 pounds, the third-grader is considered severely obese and at risk for developing such diseases as diabetes and hypertension.

What I find mind-boggling is that this case immediately provoked a very weird discussion whether this child was in imminent danger. The main argument for leaving him with his parents was that he hasn’t developed hypertension and diabetes yet. As if these were the worst things this poor kid could suffer from. We are not talking about an extra few pounds. The weight of 200+ on an 8-year-old doesn’t just happen because of a few pizza slices here and there. There must be some severe psychological trauma going on for the kid to get to this point. And that needs to be investigated and stopped.

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27 responses to “Should Morbidly Obese Children Be Removed From Their Parents?”

Jennifer Frances Armstrong

November 30, 2011

The thing about “imminent danger” is that it is a retrospective category.

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David Bellamy

November 30, 2011

It might not be a psychological trauma. It could just as easily be a malfunctioning endocrine system, probably thyroid or adrenal.

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Josh Sietsema (@jsietsema)

November 30, 2011

You’ll love this then: http://www.ParentalRights.org

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1. Z
  
  December 1, 2011
  
  Arguably the scariest thing I’ve seen yet. In life. Ever. I do mean it.
  
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Darque

November 30, 2011

Yeah, ditto on the malfunctioning endocrine system. Sometimes weight gain isn’t just a reflection of a depressive state of mind.

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1. Clarissa
  
  December 1, 2011
  
  As I already explained, I believe that every disease is psychosomatic.
  
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  1. Jodi
    
    December 1, 2011
    
    Have to disagree with you on that one. Sometimes bodies just don’t work right or as well as they should, sometimes they are invaded by a stronger antigen.
    
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    1. bloggerclarissa
      
      December 1, 2011
      
      It’s OK to disagree. 🙂 But this is my worldview and I’m sticking to it. 🙂
      
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  2. Anonymous
    
    December 1, 2011
    
    When you say “psychosomatic,” do you mean the term in the sense that people are “thinking” their way into feeling bad and getting sick, or in the sense that environment and behavior play significant roles in physical as well as mental health? Because if I drink water polluted by septic runoff, whether because I was stupid or desperate, and contract dysentery, that is certainly a result of environment and behavior but I still have bacteria gooping up my insides. My mind isn’t tricking my body into getting the deadly shits. Or cancer. Going from my family history I’m genetically predisposed to cancer. This doesn’t mean I’ll get it necessarily, as long as I don’t worsen the odds through unhealthful behavior like smoking or swimming in nuclear waste, but it could also happen as a natural function of old age in which the telemerase in my DNA decays and cell growth becomes uncontrollable.
    
    None of which is to say I disagree with you that this kid’s obesity suggests something seriously fucked up in his home life.
    
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    1. bloggerclarissa
      
      December 1, 2011
      
      Of course, some people are predisposed to certain conditions by genetics. But whether they develop those conditions (or other conditions) depends on how they are doing psychologically.
      
      Example: I’m predisposed to high blood pressure by a long family history. Both my grandparents on my mother’s side died young of strokes. Both of my parents have high BP. However, I know that high BP is evidence of high levels of repressed aggression. So I engage in activities that allow me to release pent-up aggression productively and lower my BP. And it works, too. After I started working on this seriously, I haven’t had a single hypertensive episode in 11 months. For me, that’s huge.
      
      Blogging was recommended to me by a doctor as one of such ways to lower BP.
      
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      1. bloggerclarissa
        
        December 1, 2011
        
        I also wanted to add that I had my first hypertensive episode when I was only 24. Since then, I’ve been handling the issue without any medication at all.
        
        I have also restored my failing eye-sight and got rid of eye-glasses by using psychological hygiene methods. My ophthalmologist was absolutely stunned by the entire thing.
        
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  3. Anonymous
    
    December 2, 2011
    
    Just because you believe it doesn’t make it true. . .
    
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    1. bloggerclarissa
      
      December 2, 2011
      
      “Just because you believe it doesn’t make it true. . .”
      
      -You want to prevent me from sharing my worldview on my own blog? Otherwise, what is the point of this comment?
      
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Vicky Hyde

November 30, 2011

But what happens when the child is removed??? Is the USA really so full of dedicated caring intelligent foster families that there would be no problem placing that child??? And is there lots of funding for programs to help the family change what they’re doing???

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Titfortat

November 30, 2011

I guess if youre going to ask that question then what about single mothers and fathers who constantly pick abusers as partners and expose their children to them?

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1. bloggerclarissa
  
  November 30, 2011
  
  Vile jerks, what else can I say about them?
  
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Tim

December 1, 2011

I just browsed that parental rights website posted a few comments earlier and I am almost speechless. There really are parents who think they have or deserve the right to be in their childs life?

That is complete bullshit. Every human has the right to cut loose all relationships to people who are abusive/hurtful/whatever, no matter if or whose child they are. Children are just too dependant and helpless to recognize when this is necessary so someone from the outside has to step in.

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Clarissa

December 1, 2011

Tim :
Every human has the right to cut loose all relationships to people who are abusive/hurtful/whatever, no matter if or whose child they are. Children are just too dependant and helpless to recognize when this is necessary so someone from the outside has to step in.

Exactly.

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FD

December 1, 2011

As Khalil Gibran so succinctly said, ‘Your children are not your children’. That parental rights site is distressing.

I’m not sure that I’d go so far as to say always remove the kid stat, because separating kids from parents, even bad parents, can cause almost as much trauma as it prevents. But certainly there is a case there for intervention, or supervision, even if it is only of mandated medical investigation and therapy for the child. That said, food issues tend to be very intractable without the full co-operation of the patient – it’s such a basal drive. I can understand why they removed the child – we had a very sad case here recently where the mother, a nurse, killed her toddler by force-feeding her.

Where the abusive/harmful behaviour is not irredeemable I tend to think it’s better to work down the road of therapy etc, because we can remove this kid, but it doesn’t fix the problem. All too often as we have seen in the court system here, the parent, screwed up and hurt and perhaps grieving, as they are, just goes and has another, which then gets removed in turn, and so on, which causes great stress on the children, the parent and the system. Better to fix it at cause where possible.

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1. bloggerclarissa
  
  December 1, 2011
  
  I agree completely with what you say, FD. In the article about this specific case, I think it’s made clear that the parents were told to do something about this issue but nothing changed. Besides, they are looking at a small kid who weighs 200+ lbs and they don’t see an issue themselves? If I had a kid and s/he got that way, I’d be the first to ask the kid to be removed from me until I learn what I’ve been doing so horribly wrong.
  
  And don’t even start me on force-feeding! It might not be a frequent occurrence in English-speaking countries, but in my country, with a fairly recent memory of famine, it is a huge problem. Maybe I’ll blog about it one day.
  
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Miriam

December 1, 2011

I don’t understand why some commenters above think it’s relevant that the obesity may be the result of endocrine problems rather than overeating. Regardless of what caused the problem, the parents should’ve sought medical help LONG before it got to this point. I think it’s pretty self-evident from this situation that they are incapable of providing adequate care for their child. End of story.

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1. bloggerclarissa
  
  December 2, 2011
  
  Exactly.
  
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jodi

December 2, 2011

bloggerclarissa :
Of course, some people are predisposed to certain conditions by genetics. But whether they develop those conditions (or other conditions) depends on how they are doing psychologically.

And here’s an example in the other direction: A kid born with two copies of the deltaF508 mutation will develop cystic fibrosis because the body does not have a gene which tells it otherwise. This is not a predisposition; it is a fact of that person’s life. It cannot be fixed unless it can be fixed at the genetic level, which at this time is not possible.

CF results in a salt transport problem at the cellular level which (among other things) results in thick, sticky mucous instead of the thinner, slick mucous people produce when they don’t have it. This thick mucous causes systemic problems, but the worst for most people with this disorder is what it does to the surface of the lungs. Eventually, despite adherence to time-consuming treatments, medication, exercise, a great family life, whatever…a pathogen of some sort is going to become trapped in this thick sticky stuff on the surface of the lungs, and it’s going to grow and result in an illness.

It’s not a question as to whether the person is stressed or not stressed, it’s a question of exposure. Antibodies to fight this off really can’t get to the pathogen, so it doesn’t matter how strong the kid’s immune system is. If one’s own immune system can’t get to the pathogen, then it can’t possibly be a psychosomatic illness.

You are very lucky that your genetics allowed for lifestyle modifications which fixed the problem. Some people are not so lucky.

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1. bloggerclarissa
  
  December 2, 2011
  
  “A kid born with two copies of the deltaF508 mutation will develop cystic fibrosis because the body does not have a gene which tells it otherwise.”
  
  -I’d rather not discuss people who are born with diseases that are incompatible with life in this thread. This is a completely separate issue. Especially since there is no evidence that the child in question has any such condition.
  
  “It’s not a question as to whether the person is stressed or not stressed, it’s a question of exposure. ”
  
  -Nobody has been discussing stress in this thread.
  
  “You are very lucky that your genetics allowed for lifestyle modifications which fixed the problem. Some people are not so lucky.”
  
  -I know you don’t mean to condescend but this is very condescending. I never spoke about any “lifestyle modifications.” What am I, Dr. Phil? I am talking about addressing profound psychological issues. The concept of luck is absolutely alien to my worldview, so I’d rather not discuss it here either.
  
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Stringer Bell

December 2, 2011

“I also wanted to add that I had my first hypertensive episode when I was only 24. Since then, I’ve been handling the issue without any medication at all. I have also restored my failing eye-sight and got rid of eye-glasses by using psychological hygiene methods. My ophthalmologist was absolutely stunned by the entire thing.”

I would LOVE if you shared the details of your BP management and eyesight improvement. It’d help me a lot. I’ve been recently diagnosed with hypertension and though it has gotten better with medication, I really don’t want to rely on medication for this sort of thing.

Also, here’s an episode of Radiolab, which is one of my favorite radio shows/podcasts.The topic of this episode is placebos and it really blew my mind. I’m sure you’d love it. You can download it here: http://feeds.wnyc.org/~r/radiolab/~5/QYtXNxCXf4U/radiolab051807pod.mp3

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1. bloggerclarissa
  
  December 2, 2011
  
  “I would LOVE if you shared the details of your BP management and eyesight improvement. It’d help me a lot. ”
  
  -Gladly.
  
  “I’ve been recently diagnosed with hypertension”
  
  -Sorry to hear that!
  
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David Gendron

December 2, 2011

http://childfreedom.blogspot.com/2011/12/happy-meals-just-say-no.html

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