I wanted to start my own thread for my son Zack instead of posting on someone else's thread (don't want to detract from their experience ).

Zack is 13 and in 7th grade now. He had cardiac surgery in Oct. of 2002.

He is 5'5" and 185# currently and his cardiologist wants him to lose about 30#.

I have him reading Carbohydrate-Addicted Kids by the Hellers.

His dad and I are divorced and he has chosen to live with him so I can't help him as much as I would like but I am making small progresses. Example: When I take them out for breakfast I have him get an omlette instead of pancakes, ect.

My other son Josh, who just turned 11, also chose to live with his dad (same dad lol) but he's the exact opposite. He's actually a little small for his age (about 4'11" and 85#) and not an OUNCE of fat on him. OMG he has the 6-pack abs already as I read on someone else's thread lol. He is a natural born athlete and just never stops with the activities but he takes after his dad who never had a weight problem.

Poor Zack on the other hand takes after me. I was always the big girl in school and was always teased. To the point I actually graduated a year early since I couldn't take the thought of spending another year there.

Zack has always been a fairly inactive kid although we had him in T-ball from ages 5-8. He was always a little slower than the other kids and never could seem to run as fast or as far. He got tired out easily. Well now we know why. He was born with a heart defect called Coarctation of the Aorta. Basically his aorta had a section the never grew with the rest of him..it just kept getting more "pinched" as the rest expanded. So his poor lungs were never getting enough oxygenated blood.

How this was discovered is an amazing story in itself. He was 11 at the time and I was in the drugstore getting my RX filled. And like most drugstores now they have a blood pressure machine sitting there. And to this day I still don't know why I said this but i told him to sit down and stick his arm in it. Well he had a high reading. Not high enough to scare me but I had him do it again and it was still high.

So I thought hmm I go to the doctor in a couple days, I'll take him and have the nurse check it. So she did and she did it 3 times and it WAS high. So I made him an appointment for the next day. Took him in and his regular family doc did little office tests such as listening to the pulse in his ankles and took his blood pressure on his calf, things like that. Then the doc say ok this is what i think it is, COA, and next day we were at the cardiologist office at Rainbow Hospital in Cleveland (thank GOD we live near such fine health care facilities) and 2 days later he had surgery. They had to replace 6 inches of his aorta (he was 80% blocked) with artificial dacron. And there was a tiny spot they couldn't reach (they did his surgery from his side so his scar starts like under his left arm and arcs around to under his shoulder blade on his back) that is still a tad blocked (only 10%) and they don't think it will cause problems.

So now as a result he will always have to be careful of his weight and what he eats so as to prevent heart disease in the future. His cardiologist told him Ok now we didn't fix you all up just to have you get heart disease when you are 30.

So anyway after this rather long read (sorry) I encourage all parents of overweight or healthy kids for that matter to have their blood pressure checked regularly. It's not like when us adults go to the doctor. They check our BP if we go in for a broken nail lol.

His cardiac surgeon said this was one of the biggest repairs he had ever done and for a child to reach his age and for his degree of COA to go undetected for so long was truely unusual (and very LUCKY that nothing happened to him)

As for me being the one to find a problem, he said a Higher Power was definitely with you that day. Give Thanks..and I have... every single day [B]

Wow! I am so happy for your family that Zack's condition was diagnosed and treated in time.

Have you considered discussing Zack's weight issues with a trusted teacher at school? Perhaps, there is a coach at school who could encourage Zack to participate in heart safe activities...promoting weight loss. A mentor outside of the family may be just the ticket!

WOW! I am so happy you listened to good ole *mother's intituion!*

I have three kids, kailee who is 8, nick is 11 and Don who is 17. I just did a post about Don as he's 5'11 and 245lbs and I want to get him on the Atkins diet too!

But, after reading your post, I wanted to tell you a little bout my son Nick who just turned 11. When he was born and they were doing his routine apgar score, they discovered something wrong with his heart...mainly they couldn't find the heart beat, lol but he was screaming!

Fastforward to two weeks later ~ Children's Hospital in Vancouver BC. He's diagnosed with dextraversion and hysplasia of his right lung. In plain English it means his heart is on the right hand side of his chest and he only has one functioning lung (the other is a use nib)

I can only imagine the horror and disbleif you went thru when you discovered you son's condtion!! We were in shock ourselfs!

Also, in this case Nick is the opposite of his big brother. He's a small little thing at about 60 lbs, I'm not sure how tall he is though. But his sister who is three years younger then him has almost caught up to him and is within 5lbs of him.

I just wanted to let you know that as a mom I understand!!