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Ashlyn Dowling
Ashlyn Dowling’s weight problem isn’t easily noticeable on the outside. It’s more in her mind. She’s terrified of developing a weight-related disease, as family members have. And her idea of health is to be stick thin.
| Wednesday, Jan 9 2008 2:36 PM
Last Updated: Friday, Jan 25 2008 5:42 PM
Ashlyn Dowling is not obese.
ASHLYN DOWLING
Age: 14
Grade: freshman at Frontier High School
Height: 5 feet 5 inches
Weight: 162 pounds
Healthy weight for her height and age: 98-143 pounds
Body mass index: 27
Healthy body mass index for her height and age: 16.5-24
Percentile based on body mass index: 93rd (at risk of becoming overweight)
You wouldn’t even call her fat or noticeably overweight.
But at 5-feet-5-inches tall and 162 pounds, the 14-year-old could slim down a bit, according to national body mass index standards.
She’s 19 pounds above ideal, which puts her in the “at risk of being overweight” category.
In Ashlyn’s mind, though, she might as well be 250 pounds overweight.
“If I can’t pose on the Abercrombie and Fitch bag, I’m not fit,” she says.
Such body angst from teens is not uncommon but Ashlyn has a less vanity-oriented reason for concern.
Her family has a history of serious illness connected to weight — Mom, diabetes and high blood pressure; Dad, congestive heart failure, renal failure and diabetes; grandparents, high blood pressure, congestive heart failure and diabetes.
Ashlyn is right to be concerned.
And while her parents say they’re concerned as well, they also don’t want to harp on her weight and push her into an eating disorder. But neither parent has any real idea what their daughter is eating, or not eating, to try and achieve her unrealistic goals.
“She’s such a nice size child,” says Ashlyn’s mom, Kay Bert, 40. “I guess if I felt it was a serious problem and that she was seriously hurting herself, I would do something.”
That hands-off approach has left Ashlyn to the mercies of her own ill-informed ideas about diet and exercise.
While she was still at Freedom Middle School late last year, she and three friends shared a can of Sierra Mist in the shade for lunch.
“It has 140 calories,” wisp-thin Missi Zinn warns her friends.
“Is that bad?” asks one girl.
“It’s not good,” Ashlyn answers.
In her zeal for instant results, Ashlyn has tried and abandoned numerous fad diets.
She tried one diet that recommended several small, healthy meals a day but didn’t want others seeing her eat all the time.
“I tried to live on rice cakes and popcorn for a little bit,” she says.
She’s proud to go all day on only a few crackers and some water. Guilt over too many cookies one day results in punishment of only water the next day and a half. Her energy skyrockets from food and then plummets when she fasts.
“I don’t think I’ve had lunch at school for the past two weeks,” she says. “Now it’s a habit. I know it’s really bad for you, but it works.”
High school girls, in particular, often feel like they don’t have much control over their lives, says J.J. Conley, a counselor at Frontier High School. So they seek control over what and how much they eat.
Also, if the child is overweight the parents are likely overweight too, Conley says.
“I don’t know if the parents are too busy to notice or if they’re doing it too,” Conley says. “And if the parent doesn’t know how to manage their lifestyle, exercise or diet, then I’m sure they can’t expect their student to either.”
Though Ashlyn’s mom occasionally tries to monitor her daughter’s eating, her parents don’t know the extent of her crash dieting.
“I don’t think they notice,” Ashlyn says. “It’s really weird.”
Doctors, trainers and nutritionists have already warned her of the dangers such unhealthy eating poses. Her parents brought her to see some experts once they noticed the bad habits. But Ashlyn is convinced it’s OK even though she recently got a cold that wouldn’t go away for weeks.
“Would I want my 8-year-old cousin doing it?” she said. “I’d say no, but do I think it’s a bad thing for myself? I don’t know.
“I’m hoping I’ll be happy with how I look and stop before that happens.”
Now a freshman at Frontier High School, Ashlyn has continued her poor eating habits, losing about 10 pounds in the last few months.
On her first day, breakfast was a glass of water followed by a mad rush to classes, her brown and blond braids drawn up on top of her head.
“I officially know no one in my first class,” Ashlyn says as she and her friends make their way across campus. She wears size 13 jeans and a blue sleeveless shirt over a black tank top — trendy without looking it.
Lunchtime brings choices: deli subs, pizza or “special of the day.”
Friend Connie Conklin takes a cheeseburger and chocolate milk. Ashlyn: a chef salad and Naturally Fresh Fat-Free Italian dressing.
“I don’t even know what that means ... fat-free,” Ashlyn says, as she pokes the half frozen salad with a spork. “They have for nutrition information call a special number. Yeah, I’m going to do that. I’m going to pull out my cell phone and do that right now.”
How many calories are in the packet?
“I’m hoping not a lot,” she says.
A few “undesirable” boys sit near them, so the girls get up.
“We need to find our peeps,” she says.
After eating only about a fourth of her salad, Ashlyn throws it out. They find pals Jasmine Rocha and Paige West at the Snack Shack in front of the gym. Ashlyn passes on the pretzels, granola bars and beef jerky for an Arctic Fusion. “All Juice,” the poster says. “No Sugar Added.” And it’s only $1.
The bell rings.
“You’re kidding me,” Ashlyn says. “I just bought this!”
She hurriedly slurps it down.
Ashlyn doesn’t just want to be skinny — “But, I mean, who doesn’t want that?”
She saw her father recuperate from a heart attack in 2004. A year later, she had to call an ambulance when he vomited blood. That’s how the family learned he had renal failure.
“I think about it all the time. Like a lot, a lot,” she says. “I’m like, ‘I got to do one more rep. I’m going to lift five more pounds.'”
Both Kay and Ashlyn’s father, Keith Moon, show no signs of suffering from health conditions. Kay works as a claims adjuster, and Keith, 44, is a computer programmer analyst.
The whole family is active at Greater Harvest Christian Center on Oak Street, with Kay volunteering in the children’s ministry and Keith working as a staff minister. (Despite the different last names, Ashlyn is their biological daughter. Kay kept her maiden name. Keith has his mother’s maiden name. And Ashlyn was given her paternal grandfather’s last name.) Kay, especially, is larger than life, laughing with her whole body, pulling you into frequent hugs, telling animated stories.
But their lackadaisical attitude toward their health frustrates Ashlyn.
“I think they’re all just big lumps on a log,” she says. “It makes me mad.”
The family occasionally goes to 24 Hour Fitness but not enough, she says.
“They’re like, ‘I’m too tired. I don’t want to go.’ It’s like they don’t even care.”
Keith says they get busy.
“Or I may be wiped out,” he says. “I could improve in that area.”
Early in the school year, Ashlyn goes out for basketball.
Bert peers through a rectangular window into the gym at Frontier, watching Ashlyn at tryouts.
“She tries hard,” Kay says. “I have to give it to her.”
Keith stands just inside, with the Nikes Ashlyn forgot at home.
From a young age, they knew Ashlyn would be a handful.
“I would say, ‘Ashlyn, you’re going to get in trouble.’ And she would say, ‘How many licks am I going to get?’” Kay says. “That’s when I knew I had a special one.”
Ashlyn and four other girls run drills up and down the court. A girl in a black bandanna elbows Ashlyn in the eye.
“That poor little Ash,” Kay says. “She’s trying to stay out of the way.”
Between Ashlyn’s school activities (basketball and mock trial) and church, the family hardly ever eats together.
“I don’t know what she eats half the time,” Keith says. “What did she eat last night?”
“Shrimp, I think?” Kay responds.
Ashlyn hasn’t “fasted” in a while, Kay says, but if Ashlyn’s not sleeping, she’s complaining she’s tired.
“That worries me,” she says.
Inside the gym, basketball tryouts continue.
Ashlyn gets the ball and shoots — a miss. She sneaks another try. The ball goes in.
She makes the frosh/soph team.
Staff writer Lisa Schencker contributed to this report.
