MomsTalk Q&A: Getting Exercised Over Inactivity

A couple of weeks ago I took a little bit of flack for a that some felt was a little over the top. I'm not so worried about offending people this time, because they're too fat and lazy to chase after me.

I'm looking at you, or at least most of you, because two-thirds of Americans are overweight.

The cause of this current episode of indignation: A recent report about a 13-year-old kid in Detroit who was hospitalized for a week because he was made to do push-ups in school. The push-ups were punishment for running in the hallways, and now the student's mother is considering hiring a lawyer.

So many things about this story leave me dumbstruck. First of all, people still live in Detroit? (Sorry, Detroit, I know that's a cheap shot.)

What does it say about this generation of youth when doing push-ups puts a kid in the hospital? For a week!

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, almost a third of children are overweight and about 17 percent are obese. The changes over the last generation are startling.

Comparing health data from 2007-08 to data collected from 1976-80 reveals that obesity increased from 5 to 10.4 percent among pre-schoolers, from 6.5 to 19.6 percent among 6-11 year olds, and from 5 to 18.1 percent among teens  12-19.

Children are beginning to suffer diseases typically linked to old age: type 2 diabetes (which used to be called adult-onset diabetes), high blood pressure, cardiovascular disease. Two decades ago, type 2 diabetes in a person younger than 20 was virtually unheard of. Today, diabetes is surging among the young, with thousands of new cases are diagnosed every year.

We're killing our kids, and typically don't even see it when it's close to home. Studies show that parents tend to under-estimate obesity in their own children but recognize it in others.

Listen, Mom and Dad: Your precious snowflake isn't big-boned, large-framed or "pleasantly plump." If you have to walk single-file to fit through the sliding doors at Wal-mart, your family is overweight.

It's easy to blame fast food, the extended use of computers and video games that contribute to a sedentary lifestyle, inadequate physical activity and play time in schools. The question is, what are we going to do about it?