Who knew such an innocent topic could make experts go bat house crazy?

If you want to see experts’ heads explode, all you have to do, apparently, is suggest that obese kids should lose weight by making healthy dietary choices.

Kablooie!

That’s what happened recently with a new children’s book titled “Maggie Goes on a Diet.”

In this story, intended for 4-to-8-year-olds, Maggie is an overweight 14-year-old girl who goes on a weight-loss diet combined with exercise. She succeeds in losing weight and becomes more confident with an improved self-image.

That’s all it took to set off “expert” fireworks.

In a Time magazine online blog, an eating disorder expert can’t even get past the title, saying it sends the wrong message by emphasizing dieting instead of healthy eating.

She says, “We don’t want kids to ‘go on diets,’ we don’t want kids to use diet language.”

Some other psychologists and nutritionists take this reasoning even further, claiming the book will cause eating disorders.

Right — as if chronic overeating combined with poor food choices ISN’T an eating disorder!

It’s absurd to get hung up on the word “diet.” EVERYONE has a diet. The things you eat today — that’s your diet for today.

The only difference between “having” a diet and being “on” a diet is that with the latter you’re focused on the goal of dropping excess weight. And addressing it upfront and explaining the healthy way to approach it is MUCH safer for teenage girls than ignoring it and leaving them on their own to figure out the best way to slim down. So it’s absurd to tiptoe around the word “diet” as if just uttering it will set off dangerous problems.

Anyone — whether 4, 14 or 40 — has a much better shot a good health when they eat mindfully and moderately.

If that’s an eating disorder, I’ll take it.

Sources:
“‘Maggie Goes on a Diet’: A Kids’ Book About Dieting? Not Without Controversy” Bonnie Rochman, Time Magazine, 8/25/11, healthland.time.com