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ADOLESCENTS:

These suggestions generally do not work for your adolescent, who may skip meals, eat in a hurry, or eat nothing but junk food. Remember, a milk shake, hamburger, and fries make a fairly adequate meal; a pizza and a salad come close to good nutrition. In any case, keep track of what your adolescent is eating. If she is not eating fairly well-balanced meals, then you must insist she eat better meals, including breakfast. The value of a reasonably good breakfast to your adolescent is worth a little pressure on your relationship. The same applies to dinner. Your adolescent may occasionally go on a crash diet; but if she is in good health, then two or three days of this every so often probably does no harm. Longer diets can be quite harmful and should be forbidden. At the same time, respect your adolescent’s right to avoid becoming too fat or her desire to lose excess weight. In such situations, consult your family doctor about the weight problem. From infants to adolescents, the importance of good eating habits cannot be overemphasized. They may have more to do with the physical, emotional, social, sexual, and intellectual development of children than most people suspect.

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