Emotional Triggers For Overweight Teens

Fitness camp weight loss for teens is challenging as counselors must deal not only with eating issues but also with the rolling emotional highs and lows common to the teenage years.

For obese teens, additional counseling is often recommended by doctors who are trying to establish the reason for a teen's weight problem. Clearly, overeating is the core problem but for teens the reason for weight gain may be more complex.

Obesity can have many causes:

* family problems
* peer problems
* low self esteem
* depression
* lack of exercise
* poor food choices
* overeating due to emotional problems
* family history (genetic link)
* steroids and some medications used to treat emotional problems
* medical problems such as thyroid disease

Some teens are just lazy and eat what they like when they want. Truly obese teens usually have contributing factors but whether these cause the obesity or are cause by the obese lifestyle is not clearly established.

Overweight teens are often motivated to lose weight but the desire for instant results and quick weight loss can be self defeating. Teen weight loss camps are effective in helping teens set realistic goals and develop a nutritional and exercise plan that will fit into their lifestyle. These camps also address the emotional aspects of teen weight loss.

With counseling, teens can identify their eating triggers and learn to avoid them. A teen who binges when his parents are fighting with each other can learn an alternative behavior that will release the emotions he feels without resorting to food.

Lack of exercise and poor food choices are problems that can be corrected to provide weight loss for teens. Parents play a huge role by providing healthy eating choices in the home and by demonstrating healthy nutrition with their own eating choices. There are families where teen weight loss plans are sabotaged by a well meaning parent afraid their teen will not eat enough. Dieting is not easy at any time but especially difficult for an obese teen with a parent urging him to eat more or providing favorite high calorie foods. Is this parent truly worried about starvation of their child? Of course not. They have emotional or control issues of their own or an obese parent may feel threatened their teen is doing something they have not been able to do themselves.

Teens who learn to identify the emotional triggers that cause them to overeat are more likely to succeed in their weight loss effort. Using the substitution method, a teen who is anxious or nervous may go for a run or do 20 sit-ups instead of reaching for the donuts when he becomes anxious.

Boredom is one of the common reasons for overeating according to teens. Boredom isn't an emotion - it's a lack of enthusiasm often expressed by teens accustomed to others providing entertainment for them. Obese teens use emotional terms to explain overeating. They will say they eat because they are mad, sad, depressed, bored, lonely, etc. Substituting other behaviors for eating when those triggers occur may help teens conquer their weight problems.

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