Weight Watchers Family Power: 5 Simple Rules for a Healthy-Weight Home

With refreshing practicality and easy-to-follow instructions, Weight Watchers' chief scientific officer Miller-Kovach shows how a family can take small steps to eliminate childhood weight problems and establish a "healthy-weight home... in which everyone who lives there has a lifestyle that encourages them to be at a weight that is right and healthy for them." The steps in this process are unthreatening lifestyle changes, such as focusing on nutritious foods, including treats; rationing nonhomework TV time; being active one hour or more every day; and having these changes apply to the whole family. Miller-Kovach outlines parents' responsibilities for ensuring a healthful diet for their kids: they must be food role models, food enforcers, activity providers and activity enforcers. Chapters such as "Setting Food Policy" and sections on adult versus child weight loss detail how to take these roles; sidebars called "Coach's Corner" pinpoint problems like "The Reluctant Teen." Portraits show how families made changes like taking walks or drinking nonfat milk to lose weight. In all, the book plainly offers ways to incorporate dietary common sense into a family's routine. Notes on special needs and additional sources complete the book. (Jan.)