Four years ago, Jennifer was on the verge of accepting that she would be overweight forever.
 
 Then, the Houston teen developed a serious health problem that turned out to be a blessing in disguise. She was diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes and sent to Texas Children’s Hospital for treatment.
 
 “I just thought I was tired because I was heavy,” said Jennifer, who recently graduated from high school and looks forward to a bright future. “I thought maybe I would always be heavy because people in my family are heavy.”
 
 “When Jennifer first came to us, she was about 50 pounds heavier than she is now,” said Dr. Siripoom McKay, a Texas Children’s endocrinologist and assistant professor of pediatrics at Baylor College of Medicine. “She also had diabetes. Her glucose, or blood sugar, was very high — high enough that we put her on medicine to control her blood sugar and get it in the normal range.”
 
 Until recently, Type 2 diabetes rarely was seen in children and usually affected only adults who had become overweight over several decades. Today, more children are being diagnosed with the disease at a much earlier age. In fact, so many children have Type 2 diabetes that medical experts and government officials are calling obesity an epidemic.
 
 “Epidemic doesn’t even characterize it enough,” said Susan Combs, Texas Commissioner of Agriculture, who is speaking out about the problem of children being overweight. “The Centers for Disease Control two years ago said that, of all children born in the United States, one third would get Type 2 diabetes and one half of Hispanics would if we didn’t change what we were doing. In Houston, we’re looking at nearly 55,000 children getting Type 2 diabetes.”
 
 Dr. William Klish, a Texas Children’s gastroenterologist and professor of pediatric gastroenterology at Baylor College of Medicine, believes that childhood obesity is the most important public health dilemma facing America today.
 
 “Data shows that a child under age 14 who develops Type 2 diabetes loses as much as 27 years from his or her life span,” said Klish, who is helping to develop the Center of Excellence for Childhood Obesity.
 
 "The good news is that, healthy eating and exercise habits can help control Type 2 diabetes,” Dr. McKay said. “In Jennifer’s case, the team at Texas Children’s put her on a healthy diet plan and helped her find fun ways to exercise.”
 
 Jennifer’s lifestyle changes were part of a research program called the TODAY study or Treatment Options for Type 2 Diabetes in Adolescents and Children.
 
 “When I started losing weight, I felt better and that made me want to keep on doing it,” Jennifer said. “I learned that I don’t have to just run or walk. I can dance, swim or do whatever exercise I like — as long as I do it for a long enough period of time.”
 
 “We can’t treat this problem with just the doctor seeing the patient every three months or so,” Dr. McKay said. “The treatment is a daily treatment and not just with medicine.”
 
 Making positive lifestyle changes is important and involves help from the family as well as the patient and doctor.
 
 Parents must look at changes they can make in their lifestyle that can improve their child’s health, such as eating more fresh fruit and vegetables, cutting back on sugar and fat, and enjoying daily walks or other types of exercise. Doing this together as a family can make all the difference, McKay said.