Anne M. Fletcher: Weight Loss Confidential: How Teens Lose Weight and Keep It Off—and What They Wish Parents Knew

Excerpt

Obesity is a ubiquitous problem. It is one of the most serious health problems facing the youth of the United States (Troiano and Flegal 1998), and the problem is on a steep incline. In the recent years, nothing else has caught the imagination of people across the world from all walks of life to get a handle on “globesity”. Hundreds of research papers and books have been written on this topic, from theory to practice. Commercial and public programs have mushroomed in response to the crisis. Solutions offered range from DNA manipulation to regulating the types of foods served in schools, including healthy foods in school vending machines, increasing the cost of high calorie foods, and limiting the number of fast food restaurants. A common thread across these and other interventions is the use of a top down model with adults telling teens what is good for them and how they should go about it. This book distinguishes itself from the others by providing information from the lens of the teens themselves. The author, Anne Fletcher, shares with the readers the profiles of more than 104 youths from the Unites States and Canada who had to deal with their weight related issues and how they went about using various strategies and lost an average weight of 58 pounds (range is 50–100 pounds). …