In the News - Trying to get rid of chubby cells? Fat chance

I was reading on MSNBC (again, I know) and came upon the article Trying to get rid of chubby cells? Fat chance

As a mother, I worry about my daughter and her health and I want to make sure that she does not grow up as an overweight child. This is like the #1 priority in my life as a mother because I know what it's like to be overweight and the burden it has on a child.

Anyway, according to the article I mentioned above, the number of fat cells you have is determined when you are an adolescent. So, if you are healthy into your teen years you will have less fat cells as an adult then you would if you were overweight or obese as a child. "You're stuck with the number of fat cells you have acquired by about age 20, a new study finds."

Everyone knows that fat cells NEVER go away. If you didn't know that, now you do. They merely shrink in your body to a smaller size. "The finding also suggests that obesity in adulthood is at least partly determined by diet and exercise in childhood."

This is like a light bulb to me because I can do something to help my daughter to not have to suffer from low self esteem and self-worth like I have throughout life.

According to the article: "The tightly regulated number of fat cells in adulthood may explain why it seems easy to gain back lost weight, Buchholz said.

If you already have more fat cells from adolescence than other people, "it's harder to become thin," Buchholz told LiveScience.

The study raises a new mystery: Something tells the body to make a new fat cell when another dies, Buchholz said. In the future, if scientists could interfere with this turnover, they might actually reduce fat-cell number in adults, he said.

The findings, detailed in the May 4 online issue of the journal Nature, suggest that the focus for controlling obesity should be on children, said Dr. Jeffrey Gimble, who studies fat stem cells at the Pennington Biomedical Research Center in Baton Rouge and was not involved in the research. The idea is that if the number of fat cells is capped by age 20, then the smart approach is to prevent their formation in children.

Obesity prevention in the early years could have "a lifetime impact," Gimble said."

Since the things I do NOW with my daughter will help determine her overall health for life I am going to make sure she knows how to eat healthy and exercise. I'm not vying for the "Super Mom" award or anything, I just want to do what's right.