Zone/Paleo and a young teen (13)

[Luke Sirakos]

I wish when I was 13 someone would have told me to stuff my face with as much food as possible and hit the weights hard. I was too worried about have a little bit of fat around my belly and so I kept my calories down when I could have been packing on the muscle. I would tell him if he wants to look better then you can use the paleo diet as a foundation but I would add plenty of whole milk and even some grains like oatmeal and rice and hit the weights.

[Blair Robert Lowe]

Eat less of junk, work out hard.

Yogurt is probably fine so long at it isn't sweetened. See about yogurt and adding fruit.

Milk to some degree. I don't think you need to worry about this so much unless he is drinking about half a gallon a day. Then again I coached a kid and his mom and I were ok with him drinking as much milk as he wanted because he didnt like water as much and was scrawny besides dealing with GERD. I'd love to see him become a great gymnast but I know his parents would like to see him hit 5'9 instead of 5'3.

Big feet and growing fast is tough. Best thing to fight it is to keep active and work out.

[Mike Gray]

Hi guys!

Well now - my son, having read the boards a bit, has a taken a shine to the caveman lifestyle and now adamantly wants to go paleo.

Which is cool, basically - I love it when my kids get fired up about stuff, and I wouldn't mind going that direction myself. However, we need to work out some kind of compromise, since Mom (who - let's be honest - does most of the work) has drawn a bit of a line: there's no way she's going to extremes on this. We can go *reduce* dependence on stuff like bread and pasta and potatoes (though, she points out, we don't eat THAT much of those things anyway, thanks to me being in the Crossfit scene for a few years now), but there's no way she's eliminating it entirely.

Fair enough. One step at a time.

So ... we're working on hammering out a sort of "paleo lite" solution. I've ordered Robb Wolf's book and the Paleo Cookbook, and we'll work on it from there ...

Mike

[Tricia Magrini]

Originally Posted by Mike Gray

Hi guys!

Well now - my son, having read the boards a bit, has a taken a shine to the caveman lifestyle and now adamantly wants to go paleo.

Which is cool, basically - I love it when my kids get fired up about stuff, and I wouldn't mind going that direction myself. However, we need to work out some kind of compromise, since Mom (who - let's be honest - does most of the work) has drawn a bit of a line: there's no way she's going to extremes on this. We can go *reduce* dependence on stuff like bread and pasta and potatoes (though, she points out, we don't eat THAT much of those things anyway, thanks to me being in the Crossfit scene for a few years now), but there's no way she's eliminating it entirely.

Fair enough. One step at a time.

So ... we're working on hammering out a sort of "paleo lite" solution. I've ordered Robb Wolf's book and the Paleo Cookbook, and we'll work on it from there ...

Mike

Good stuff! Can't recommend the Paleo Comfort Foods book enough. I have 4 or 5 Paleo cookbooks and bookmark every stinkin blog under the sun and to me this is by far the best! Think mom can get on board to dump the gluten? I'd rather see you eating rice and perhaps oats than bread/pasta. Unfortunately most GF breads and pastas are fullk of other crap, but may be worth looking into.

[Nick Karrasch]

Originally Posted by Mike Gray

So ... we're working on hammering out a sort of "paleo lite" solution. I've ordered Robb Wolf's book and the Paleo Cookbook, and we'll work on it from there ...

Breakfast is a fantastic, easy and delicious place to start. Here's my paleo breakfast (WFS)

[Heath Shumate]

My son, on the other hand is lean. Hes 13, 5' 11" and weighs 145lbs with size 12 feet. Here the kids can either play youth football or school football in the 7th grade. He chose to forgo youth and move right on into school ball. Hes had 2 summers and 2 full seasons under his belt. Although very lean in the bf dept. His strength to bw ratio is very high. The problem is he will not eat. He does love milk so I let him drink as much as he wants. Bad idea?? Imnot sure. Would a supplemental protein powder mixed in small amounts into his milk be a bad idea? Any thoughts??

[Luke Sirakos]

Originally Posted by Heath Shumate

My son, on the other hand is lean. Hes 13, 5' 11" and weighs 145lbs with size 12 feet. Here the kids can either play youth football or school football in the 7th grade. He chose to forgo youth and move right on into school ball. Hes had 2 summers and 2 full seasons under his belt. Although very lean in the bf dept. His strength to bw ratio is very high. The problem is he will not eat. He does love milk so I let him drink as much as he wants. Bad idea?? Imnot sure. Would a supplemental protein powder mixed in small amounts into his milk be a bad idea? Any thoughts??

I don't see how it is a bad idea, it is just protein powder. Is eating more chicken a bad idea?

[Veronica Carpenter]

Originally Posted by Heath Shumate

My son, on the other hand is lean. Hes 13, 5' 11" and weighs 145lbs with size 12 feet. Here the kids can either play youth football or school football in the 7th grade. He chose to forgo youth and move right on into school ball. Hes had 2 summers and 2 full seasons under his belt. Although very lean in the bf dept. His strength to bw ratio is very high. The problem is he will not eat. He does love milk so I let him drink as much as he wants. Bad idea?? Imnot sure. Would a supplemental protein powder mixed in small amounts into his milk be a bad idea? Any thoughts??

Just maybe his body is very "fuel efficient" and doesn't need much food to keep him fueled and performing at his best. If his performance/strength and weight are dropping with continued training, then I'd worry.

[Blair Robert Lowe]

Heath, some kids are like that. They're just not big eaters. I've had my share of these and so long as their performance isn't hampered, it's not a big deal.

Some parents have dealt with these kids by bargaining computer and video game time with mitigating success.

I dunno about the protein powder. A lot of don't seem to like the taste so if it tastes bad it's a hard sell.

Then again we had two young girls who we were training to be elites and they downed some of those gatorade milk like protein drinks and made the worst faces. However, they were totally gonna do it since we told them it would make them strong. After a few gulps, we told them they didn't have to really.