Dr. Elisa Song, M.D.: Healthy Kids, Happy Kids | WAM227

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Welcome to another episode of well Adjusted Mama. This is a podcast dedicated to educating and empowering women from preconception, pregnancy, birth and through early motherhood on wellness lifestyle. I'm your host, Dr. Laura Brayton. I'm a maternity pediatric, chiropractor, functional medicine practitioner and mother who has hand selected experts in natural holistic healthcare specialties to shine light on options and choices during this exciting phase of a woman's life. Today I had such an honor and Privilege to interview Dr. Elisa Song, M.D. on Healthy Kids Happy Kids. Dr. Elisa Song, MD. Is a Stanford NYU UCSF trained integrative pediatrician, pediatric functional medicine expert and a mom to two thriving children. And she's on a mission to revolutionize the future of Children's Health. Dr. Song is the author of the national bestseller Healthy Kids Happy Kids An Integrative Pediatrician's Guide to whole child resilience. Dr. Song created Healthy Kids happy kids.com as an online holistic pediatric resource to help practitioners and parents bridge the gap between conventional and integrated pediatrics with an evidence based pediatrician backed mom approved approach. In her integrative pediatric practice, she's helped thousands of kids get to the root cause of their health concern and empowered parents to help their children thrive by integrating conventional pediatrics with functional medicine, homeopathy, acupuncture, herbal medicine and essential oils. Dr. Song is chair of A4M's pediatric education and has lectured around the world at leading integrative and functional medicine conferences and premier parenting events. She's also been featured in hundreds of top podcast, print and online media outlets. Hi Dr. Song, welcome to the show. I'm very excited to have you on today.

Oh yeah, I'm really excited to be here with you and all of the listeners.

Thank you. So you wrote this amazing book which I have a copy of called Healthy Kids Happy An Integrative Pediatrician's Guide to Whole Child Resilience. And I would love for us to just kind of step back a little bit and talk about like your story of how you became a integrated pediatrician and chose to write a book that is so valuable for parents out there who are looking for some guidance and support.

Yeah, well, you know, I, I think that the, the right path comes to you if you're, if you're open to it. Right. And so I always knew I want to work with children. I just wasn't sure in what capacity because my mom was an OB gyn, you know, solo private practice in the, you know, she started in the early 70s. I mean, she was busy and we don't have a lot of, you know, private practice, solo OB GYNs anymore because it's tough. It's a tough life. And so, you know, she. Especially as a mom, especially as a mom. And, you know, she was a single mom, too. I mean, thankfully my grandmother was in the household with us, and so we grew up household of women. But we were lucky. Her office was literally attached. It was like the in law unit that she converted for in our house. So she always made it a point to carve out time and kind out and have dinner with us and then continue to see patients. So. But, you know, I. I toyed with the idea of being a pediatrician. I mean, I babysat all of my young life, but I just. I didn't see anything in the clinical world that I thought, oh, I want to do that. So I was going the route of children's advocacy. I was going to be a civil rights lawyer and, you know, do a lot of good on Capitol Hill and I mean, really kind of dive into the political scene. So. And, you know, when I was an undergrad at Stanford, I. I stumbled upon this flyer for what was then called in the late 80s, the American Holistic Medical Association. It no longer exists, but I drove myself down to the convention center, and that was the start. I mean, my mind was blown. I heard from people who were just starting to get known, like Andrew Weil and Deepak Chopra and Joan Borisenko and. And I learned about this term called holistic medicine and natural medicine. And so from then, I remember calling my mom and saying, you know what? I think want to become a naturopathic doctor. And. And I actually even called. At that time, I only knew a best year. I called best, got an application. But, you know, back. Back in those times, none of my circle really knew what naturopathic medicine was. And nobody discouraged me. I mean, my mom would have supported whatever I want to do, but. But it also wasn't the kind of the. The path that people were familiar with. So. So that's how ultimately I decided to go to medical school towards how do we weave in more, you know, natural approaches, more root cause approaches, more integrative approaches, even in residency. And when I discovered functional medicine, it was like all the pieces fell into place. And then, you know, from there, it's. It's not just that you have to really integrate, you know, not just the nutrition and the functional medicine, but, you know, I. I do acupuncture. I learned about essential oils and kids and homeopathy and herbal medicine and just Created the practice that serves my patients the best that I can.

So that's an interesting story because I find that a lot of MDs that go into functional medicine don't necessarily know that before they start medical school. Like they kind of figure it out. Their end practice, practicing the way they were traditionally taught with allopathic medicine and not getting the results that they want to see. And they're open minded and they learn and they discover and then they're like, oh, there's another way to do this that is potentially better, especially from like a primary care, you know, wellness perspective. Right. But you knew before going to medical school that you wanted to bring that in. So when you were in medical school, were you kind of finding mentors along the way that were maybe more functional or integrative minded to teach you?

Not really. Not really. I mean, you know, I went in medical school, you know, I went to nyu and this again, this was a long time ago. This was, I mean, not that long ago, but kind of long ago. It was in the, you know, early 90s where it was still a very conventional, and I'm guessing NYU is still fairly, fairly conventional. But even from a, you know, a dean standpoint, there was only one female dean. And you know, it was very, very male dominated. And you know, when I actually approached my, my dean to say, look, I, you know, I've found this rotation and back then it was called alternative medicine. It wasn't called integrative. Right. It was, you know, even the, the NIH had an office of, you know, a National center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine. And you know, which, which it shouldn't be alternative. It's really where integrative is, is I think the best term to use. But sure, but back then there was a doctor at, I believe she was at the University of Virginia. Her name was Dr. Pally Delavitt. And she had an alternative medicine for medical students that I, I just kind of stumbled upon and, and I really wanted to go, but I was declined. I mean, I, you know, I was told, hey, look, you know, that's, that's interesting. But you know, wait till you're a real doctor. I mean, I have all these like, wait till you're a real doctor to do that. And so, so, but I did, you know, even in medical school, it was something that I explored. You know, advocacy and, and more natural therapies have always been intertwined. I mean, I was, you know, American Medical Student association advocacy group in my medical school and we went lobbying, you know, wrote letters and, and also the, quote, alternative medicine group. And I introduced, you know, the students to. And me to different, quote, alternative practitioners and same thing in residency at ucsf, you know, I was the, the resident to my colleagues, my, my fellow residents and attendings. They knew, oh, Elise is the one. If you have a family who needs a PR pediatrician who, you know, wants to have an, you know, open discussion around whether vaccines or alternatives to antibiotics or whatever it was. Oh, they should see elisa. So I mean it. And, you know, I was really fortunate that I was never. What's the right word? I was never ostracized in residency. I mean, I, you know, it was, it was more like, oh, that's an ELISA thing. So I think it was tolerated, but nobody ever fully supported me. I mean, as a third year resident, I remember I was able to create an elective in my rheumatology immunology rotation and I requested to do an elective on complementary and alternative therapies for juvenile arthritis. And so I went around the city and I interviewed chiropractors and acupuncturists and osteopathic doctors and really combed the research, which there's so much more, but created a presentation and a primer on alternative therapies for juvenile arthritis. And it was really. Well, I mean, it was taken well, and I presented in front of the residents and the attendings. But really, once after residency, I discovered. Found out what functional medicine was, because even then, I mean, this was 2000 that I finished, functional medicine was just really kind of taking hold. And I thought, wow, this is what I've been looking for, this root cause, this structure to thinking about kids with chronic illnesses and how we can either truly prevent or once they're diagnosed with a chronic illness, really repair and heal from the inside out.

Totally. And it really matches the chiropractic philosophy that's been around since 1895, where chiropractors always knew the body heals from inside out. And there's this innate intelligence. And that applies to infants, children, it doesn't matter. You don't have to be an adult. Right. To benefit from chiropractic care. So, you know, I've been under chiropractic care my entire life and was raised with that philosophy. So it just always, you know, just was so logical to me. Right. And I always knew, even growing up, if I got sick like a cold, my mom would bring me the chiropractor and I would get adjusted and I immediately feel better, get fat, you know, recover quicker.

Yeah.

And get sick less often in General. So, you know, that.

And, and the thing with kids, too, I mean, I'm sure you see it in your practice. I mean, kids just respond so much better to whatever treatments that we recommend for them. I think they're just their bodies and their immune systems, their nervous systems are just easier to get back into balance, which is the beauty, I think, of working with kids. And some kids have really more severe, chronic illnesses that take work, but adults just have layers and layers and layers of, you know, medication use, past trauma, you know, inflammatory, you know, inflammation that's built up over, you know, decades instead of a matter of years. And so I do feel like, you know, there's so much more hope in working with kids. And it really. Yeah, it. I mean, it keeps me going because kids are just so amazing. And that's where we really are going to help impact future generations. And, you know, I think about my, you know, not just my kids, but my grandkids and my great grandkids. I mean, how do we create family, you know, a future where all of our next generations are going to really thrive?

Yes. And it's. For me, it really comes from this functional medicine approach, because what we're really even speaking about is the epigenetic factors of. On our children which will impact the future generations. Right. We know that, you know, a grandmother impacts her granddaughter's fertility, right, from exposure she has, just because of our eggs, how we reproduce. So this lifestyle, which impacts every exposure, everything that touches us and in us, will impact the quality of health that we're passing on for these future generations. And then if they do need support, right, if they are having symptoms and having dis. Ease in their body, what can we do that's going to encourage the healing process?

Yeah, well, and that's where I love that you. You do that. Your work is centered around the preconception and conception phase, because from an epigenetic standpoint, I mean, we can't go back and change what our. What our moms and dads did, you know, like grandparents, grandmothers. And, you know, but the research is fascinating how, you know, even. Even grandfather's microbiome impacts baby's epigenetics. I mean, there's a role. It's not just, it's not just the woman guys, but, but, you know, we know more about the impact of the maternal lineage, know, being able to really have that impact. I mean, I would love for every, every family who's thinking about conceiving or trying to conceive to pause and, you know, take that six months at least to, you know, really reset, reboot, optimize your microbiome, egg and sperm quality, your baby's epigenetic potential, so that you have, you know, first of all, the, the easiest time getting pregnant, which is such a struggle for many families, and then also have the healthiest b. I mean, that's, that's where we can practice true prevention is, you know, even before your baby has been conceived. And so, you know, I just, I wish that that message would really get out, you know, far and wide. And, you know, the reason I wrote the book was just to have parents be aware no matter where they're starting from. I mean, for some families, you know, as they think about wanting to become pregnant, they're already down this path. And, you know, the elements in my book can just help to fine tune and give really practical tips for things maybe they are aware of, but want to know, how do I do this in real life? But so many parents don't know yet the power of the microbiome of your baby and child and teenager to influence their current and future health and that it can be such a simple tweak in how we're eating and living to really optimize your microbiome before we go down, you know, the testing and the supplements and all of that, there's so many foundations that we can set for, for optimal life.

Yeah. The lifestyle is so huge. And you speak a lot about this in your book, which I appreciate as American families, especially if there's two working parents, it can be really hard in our current culture to have a healthy lifestyle. Like unfortunately, our culture is anti health in a lot of ways. We have to be so conscious and deliberate about how we move, what we think, what we put in our bodies regarding food, water, nourishment. And it takes planning. Right. And it takes preparation. So I love that you speak about that in your book and you make it, you know, you give tips to make it, you know, as, as easeful as possible for busy families to have this microbiome, healthy foods. Can you talk a little bit about the microbiome? Because I know it's a big part of your book. Like if somebody's listening has never heard of the microbiome, let's talk about that and why it's so important and what we can do to support it.

Yeah, so I mean, the whole, it is one of the main core principles of the book. And in fact, on the, on the COVID you'll see a blue burst that says why your child's microbiome holds the key to lifelong wellness. And so, you know, there's, there's. Every day it seems like the microbiome science is exploding even from, you know, the time, even from five years ago. We know so much more and, and especially the impact of a baby's microbiome from birth and how that sets the stage for the developing gut brain connection. They're developing gut immune system connection and their future epigenetic potential even as we look forward to, you know, teenage girls and teenage boys and the gut hormone connection and gut metabolic health connection. So the foundations really are set in the microbiome. And we know that babies microbiomes take shape and rapidly shift in the first two and a half to maybe three years of life before they take a more adult like pattern. And in those early stages, it is so important that infants microbiomes develop in a way that the microbiome can talk with their immune system and reduce or increase the risks of allergic diseases. For instance, we know more data from what occurs with disruption of the gut microbiome in early stages. So there's one really large study that looked at infants who received antibiotics or antacid medications in the first six months of life, which is very common. Right, right. And why these medications? Well, these medications have a direct impact on, disrupt the balance of beneficial flora, your bacteria in your gut and the disruptive microbes in your gut. And so, and they can directly trigger something called gut dysbiosis. And so when infants are given antibiotics or antacid medications in the first six months of life, this study found that by the time they were four years of age, they had a significantly increased risk of pretty much every single allergic disease, sometimes double the risk, including things like eczema, asthma, hives, hay fever, anaphylactic food allergies, which are all on the rise. We know one in five kids at least has eczema. And the eczema kids are getting is more and more severe. It's not just a little, a little dry, itchy patch here and there and anaphylactic, life threatening food allergies. Well, when I was a resident finishing up in 2000, I mean, I really never wrote EpiPen prescriptions. It was so unusual. Right. And then, I mean, Fast forward now, 1 in 12 kids has a life threatening anaphylactic food allergies or multiple food allergies.

That just gives me chills. Right.

And we can actually trace that back. A lot of it is this early microbiome not developing in a way that is, that is primed for immune system development. So babies need almost 100% bifidobacteria species in their gut microbiome. We often think of adults as, oh, we want a lot of variety, we want a lot of different kinds of probiotics. For infants, it's the exact opposite. We do not want a lot of diversity. And, you know, we know that babies and adults for that matter, are really losing a lot of our bifidobacteria strains in our modern world. And so really supporting that is very important even before birth, making sure mamas have healthy levels of bifidobacteria in their gut. And then the gut brain connection also, again from more disruptive studies. This study was a study in Denmark just looking at mother infant pairs and infants who were exposed to antibiotics, whether it was in uteros. So that even included moms who might have received antibiotics while they were pregnant for a sinus infection or UTI or antibiotics for group B strep around the time of delivery. But they found that any antibiotic exposure significantly increased the risk by up to 50% of mental health disorders by the time babies were either older kids or teenagers. Wow. And that risk was highest when those antibiotics were given before six months of age. Now, we know this from adult studies and we should be, you know, why this isn't more well known? I don't know, because we have an epidemic of mental health crisis in not just, you know, kids and teens, but adults. And we know from adult studies that after even just one round of antibiotics, there is a, subsequently a significantly increased risk of anxiety or depression developing. And the more rounds of antibiotics, the higher the risk. So instead, you know, when a patient shows up with a newer, maybe they had a tendency to be anxious or, you know, to feeling blue, but now they're having really significant, you know, clinically significant anxiety or depression. Go back in time and ask about medication use. And were there, were there factors that, that could have disrupted the microbiome? And instead of just thinking about, you know, a psychiatric medication, we have to dig under the surface and look at the gut brain connection and what the microbiome is doing. So it's way of looking at things. And it's another way for parents and for children to have their eyes open to, oh, we need to look at the gut. Even if there's no, quote, gut symptoms, you know, no tummy, no reflux, no constipation, no whatever it is, no diarrhea, even if poops are perfect, we still look at the gut microbiome. And so I want that aha moment to really, really sink in. So that, you know, kids, kids, teens, parents know that, you know, when they're going to a functional medicine doc or they come to see me. That is why we always start with a look, closer look at the microbiome. How do we restore that? And, you know, the whole second part of the book is how do we optimize our microbiomes from a diet and lifestyle perspective in a really easy, practical, and fun way so that we can reverse a lot of the damage or, you know, prevent damage from happening. Right? Yeah.

I mean, all of it is so fascinating. So if, you know people, I think a lot of people understand, they take an antibiotic, it's going to kill the good and bad bacteria in their body and specifically their gut as well. So what about, like, can we talk a little bit about other lifestyle influences that will disrupt a healthy microbiome besides medication?

Yes. And, you know, when we think about the list of microbiome disruptors, this is where we have to really kind of stop and think, okay, what do I have in my power? And a lot of these things we do have in our power to reduce. Right. These factors that disrupt the microbiome. Because, to be honest, in our modern world, it's almost everything, you know, that we're encountering on a daily basis. But we can't let that paralyze us in fear or want us or make us live in a very sanitary, isolated, lonely bubble, because that actually is disruptive, too. Right. And so we just really, I mean. I mean, you and I are all about empowering moms and families. And that's really the message is there are some things, like forever chemicals that honestly, there's no way we can completely eliminate our exposure. And, you know, for when we live in a modern world with a lot of modern conveniences, we enjoy a lot of those conveniences. Right. I mean, nobody wants to go back to a time where there's no electricity and, you know, we cooked by campfire every single night. That might be fun for, you know, a weekend. Right. But not forever and ever. Now, there are some families I know who can, you know, who can really live more of a homesteading life, but that's not the majority of my families. Right? So. So we have to think, okay, how do we help our families thrive in our modern world and also teach our kids how to do that as they, you know, are more and more independent in our homes and once they leave the homes. So medications are one. And of course, a lot of people think, oh, antibiotics. But what we don't Recognize are there so many other medications that also disrupt the gut microbiome. And in the literature, some of them disrupt as much as antibiotics do. So we already mentioned antacid medication. So that is also can be fairly obvious because that's a direct gut medicine, right? You're influencing the PH of your stomach, which then influences, you know, the PH of your, your small and large intestines and what bugs actually want to grow. Because, you know, just like we have a certain, you know, know, temperature that we thrive at certain environment, we thrive at same thing with, with our gut bugs, there's a certain PH that they like to live in and pathogenic bacteria like to live at different phs. Now, there are also antihistamines, right? Your Zyrtec, your Allegra, your Benadryl. I mean those can disrupt your SSRI antidepressant medications. So Prozac, Lexapro, steroids. And how many kids and adults are on, you know, and I'm not just even talking about oral steroids, but also nasal steroids for sinus problem or inhaled steroids, topical steroids, everything gets absorbed through our skin. We also have birth control pills, right? And how many of our girls with significant depression, you know, and they have PCOS and horrible cramps and acne and they're on antibiotics for their ACNE, they're on SSRIs for their anxiety, and they're on the birth control pills to manage their horrible period cramps. And we wonder why they feel terrible. Yeah, right. And so, you know, all of these things. And then of course we have our environmental factors. So, you know, all of these endocrine disrupting chemicals like parabens, phthalates, the forever, the PFAS is forever chemicals, Bisphenol A, they, they've all been known to disrupt the microbiome and you know, heavy metals like lead and arsenic and cadmium and mercury in our environment. And so there's one really interesting article where the researchers really, you know, recomm calling these not just hormone disrupting or endocrine disrupting chemicals because that, that puts a narrow focus on just the impact on our hormones. We know these chemicals also impact our children's and our and our adults cognitive functioning, immune functioning, you know, so many other, you know, gut functioning. And so really, you know, made a call to call them microbiome disrupting chemicals because that's how we can see why these hormone disruptors don't just impact the hormone, they have a ripple effect on virtually every single organ system via microbiome disruption. And then in Terms of lifestyle, of stressors, not getting enough exercise, not getting enough sleep. You know, being sleep deprived for just 48 hours can disrupt your gut microbiome. So think about how many kids, you know, during finals week, you know, they're up all night or adults too, you who are like, I mean, I'm telling you, mamas are, you know, we're some of the worst culprits, right? Because our kids go to bed at whatever, seven, eight o' clock and we're like, oh, I have these couple hours just to myself. So you know, we, we, you know, stay up late, whatever we're doing, reading, watching a show, you know, doom scrolling on Instagram, whatever it is, right? But we feel like, oh, that's me time, right? So you have your me time. But we don't factor factor in that. Okay? Our babies are still going to wake up at 4 or 5 in the morning, right. So you know, we have to prioritize me time. Sleep is me time. It is. And another factor, I think one of the biggest factors, I mean antibiotics I think are the number one acute immediate disruptor of our microbiome. But psychological stress, chronic psychological stress is our most significant kind of insidious, this chronic microbiome disruptor and psychological stress can trigger leaky gut, can cause gut dysbiosis within an hour. Within an hour. Right. And so it causes just as much inflammation as any of these other things that we can think of. And you know, then we think about our foods and you know, the glyphosate or the pesticides that are used in foods that were initially patented as antibiotics, you know, glyphosate and you know, all of those ultra processed food additives, food dyes, they wreak havoc on our microbiomes and for our kids especially, they can wreak havoc on their gut immune system connection and their gut brain connection. I mean, some studies have found that kids who eat ultra processed food have, you know, two to seven times the increased risk of developing adhd. And if a parent knew that, if we really knew that, and if practitioners really, you know, believe that and told parents, look, you're coming to me because your kid has behaviors that are impacting their friendships and their school and their focus and they're not happy and comfortable in their bodies or their brains and if they knew that one tweak would be to get back to whole real unprocessed and minimally processed foods, I think that most parents would say, yeah, I'm going to try that. But first, first we have to educate them as Practitioners and have that belief. Right. And I'm not saying, you know, I mean natural practitioners and integrative practitioners. I mean, this is. We believe this, right? But we have to really make this movement, you know, in the conventional world, and parents have to believe it. Because, I mean, these changes aren't necessarily easy if your kids are used to eating, you know, having, you know, a package of Takis in their lunchbox every single day or snackables, and they're not, you know, know, and their taste buds and their brains have really become now entrenched and addicted to these addicted foods. Right. It's a process, but it's. It's a. It's an important process.

Right. And I think you really hit it on the head, too, about the addiction to these ultra processed foods. So for a lot of the women listening, they are pregnant or new moms, and perhaps even their baby hasn't started solid foods yet. So can you speak a little bit about maybe that first year of life with breast milk and how to introduce solid foods that are gonna be microbiome friendly and supportive and also help with cultivating taste buds to eating whole foods versus chemicals?

Yeah. Yeah. Now, I would say that one of the most important things is to make sure that while you are pregnant and nursing that you are eating the foods that you want your baby and children and teenagers to eat.

Because.

Because it's fascinating, you know, when your baby's inside you. There are studies looking at, you know, babies having, you know, different swallowing movements. I mean, think about it. Amniotic fluid is one of their first quote foods, right? It's not really a food, but it passes through their digestive tract and they're tasting that. And so depending on what moms have eaten, we can see different swallowing movements. And there was one study, you know, and a lot of moms have this experience where they say, gosh, I was craving this when I was pregnant, and now my kid. That's the kid who wants X, Y or Z, right? And I see this with my own kids. I mean, my. My. During. When I was pregnant with my daughter, I just. I'm not. I'm a vegetable person more than a fruit person. But for whatever reason, when I was pregnant with her, I was craving fruits and fruit smoothies, right? And so as she's my fruit girl, she loves fruit as opposed to bode. When I was pregnant with him, I just. I was craving red meat. Like, I couldn't get enough hamburgers or steaks or ribs or whatever it was. And he's a meat, a Sore. We're trying to like ratchet it back. Okay. We can't have, you know, hamburgers every night of the week. Right. But, but you know, there was another say that, that told that split up pregnant and breastfeeding moms and had one group eat a lot of carrots. Right. Carrots are great for you. Right. Have carrot juice, eat carrots. And those babies were much more likely to want and accept carrots in different forms when they were introduced foods and also later on in their childhood. So it's fascinating. I mean, these tastes really do get transferred through our breast milk. Now when we're thinking about starting off, I mean, for babies, I feel like you have this golden window when your kids are maybe 0 to 2 years of age until they start preschool. If they're going to be in preschool. Right. Where you have 100% control over anything that goes in their mouth. Once preschool starts and certainly once they're in elementary school, I mean, they're just all. Yeah. I mean, they see what other kids are eating and there's needs to be a lot more empowerment and education so that kids can own that these are the foods that they want to eat and that make them feel good and make them feel strong. But when they're younger, you know, really one of the things that again, I mentioned the anaphylactic food allergies. So as a pediatrician, I grapple with that because I don't want kids to develop anaphylactic food allergies. And so. So the key in that first year of life is as much variety as possible. Now, when I was starting off in medical school, there was a whole laundry list of foods that we were supposed to help mothers to avoid in the first year of life. And even if there are allergies in the family, to avoid eating even peanuts while they were nursing or even while they were pregnant, we don't do that anymore. We wanna build immune tolerance. Immune mem. So one of the most important factors in really reducing the risk of developing food allergies is to start, you know, when they're ready. So ideally around six months of age, some babies are ready a little bit before then. I wouldn't wait too long though, and, and introducing a variety. And nowadays we are recommending that first foods be. Be animal proteins or protein rich foods because we're recognizing how many babies not just have iron deficiency, but zinc deficiency.

I was going to say iron rich foods. Yep.

So liver, I mean, you can make pate and have your baby eat some pureed liver. You can, you know, if you cook liver? You can actually this. One of my moms taught me this even for her older kids, she just makes liver and puts it in the freezer. And then you know when it's when she makes soup or makes salad or you know, whatever food she's making, you know, a lasagna, she just takes that frozen pizza and just shreds it, you know, with a grater, a zester into fine pieces and just puts it into the food and she even puts them into her kids smoothies. So liver is a great, one of a great first food.

That was my son's first food.

Yeah.

And then we also pureed it with bone broth.

Oh yeah, bone broth is amazing. You can get your kids sipping bone broth, you know, right away. Fermented food, they can do a little bit of sauerkraut juice. You know, even from the beginning incorporating these, all the different flavors, not just the sweet. I mean because we have the most, most sweet taste buds and they're right in the tip of our tongue. And so that's of course, I mean almost everyone really has a preference for sweets. So we don't want tons of sweets and fruits are sweet, a lot of vegetables are sweet. So we want to introduce a savory, sour, bitter flavors, you know, your beet greens and your arugula and all of these. And the more variety we have with our kids, it does a couple of things. So in the book I talk about the whole gut rainbow and it's not just fruits and vegetables we're really thinking about. Gut nourishing foods are going to be plant based foods that help to feed your microbiome. So I call them microbiome champions. And we think about our three Fs. So fiber, okay, so fiber is going to be fruits and vegetables but also legumes and nuts and seeds. So little tahini mixed with your beans with, with some of your foods you can do of course nuts and seeds, they are choking hazards. So in the beginning we're going to be doing purees, you know, nut butters and seed butters until they're able to manage the harder, harder foods and chew and, and beans of all sorts. I mean I love adding beans to kids diets early on and then sprouting them. Sprouting them? Yeah, soaking them and sprouting them, making them more digestible and then fermented food foods just you know, getting in your variety of fermented foods. Think beyond yogurt, you know, because dairy is, can be really inflammatory for a lot of kids and so you know, doing, you can do sauerkraut, you can do, I mean in my culture, you know, Korean culture, there's kimchi, kids don't eat the spicy, but you can, you know, water it down right. And have a little bit, you know, we, we, we have not in a while, but we used to brew kombucha at home and that's such a fun way to get kids involved in making fermented foods. And you know, my book I recipe for fermented fruit and fermented BlackBerry lemonade with that fruit. But you can ferment fruit. You can ferment any vegetable and fruit for that matter. But when you ferment fruit, you can make into like a compote, a sauce for Sunday waffles you can put into your smoothies, you can make into lemonade or popsicles. So really thinking how can we get more of these fermented foods and for not just their probiotic benefit, but there's all these byproducts called postbiotic. I mean they really are so amazing for your gut and your brain and your immune system and also to help with detoxification. So you know this, it's not a specific list necessarily in the first year of life, but just to say get as much variety in, you know. And there's not no food that's off the table now except for the choking hazards. And we've, the studies have really pointed to the more foods that can be introduced in that first 12 to 24 months of life, the lower the risk of development. Developing anaphylactic food allergies after that first year.

Yeah, that makes sense. I mean what about things like even like gluten free grains?

Yeah, you know, I think that grains can, I mean, because grains can wait on those, right? Really? I mean I wait a little bit on those. I think, you know, our, our culture is so heavy in you know, grains anyway in the diet and they can be a little bit harder to digest. I, I'm definitely not a fan of, of rice cereal. The commercial rice or rice. Yeah, yeah.

Rice crackers.

Yeah, there's, I mean a lot of rice around and so, so really, you know, first foods should be real foods. I mean whole foods that you know there and there are. If you can make a batch make them. I used to batch make, you know, with my, what is it called? Baby.

Baby blender or whatever.

Whatever.

Yeah, Baby bullet.

It just made it so easy. Yeah, baby. I don't remember. I'm sure they have so many different ones now. My kids are teenagers now. But I just would batch make, let me take a Sunday and get some butternut squash and some ground turkey and then just blend it together and I would make like turkey meatballs loaded with different vegetables and, and think about also seasonings and spices and herbs. Not, not spicy necessarily. But you know, most families, as, you know, adults in the household don't eat plain food without any seasoning. So we want to get our kids used to the flavors that they're going to eat as part of being in your household. And so, and also, so many spices and herbs have such benefits for our gut microbiome and really act as EPI nutrients. So nutrients that support epigenetics from a gut gene perspective. A lot of these, what are called phytonutrients, you know, the colors and foods, we don't really absorb a lot of them. You know, we, we, we as human cells and in our human body don't use them, but our microbiome does. Our microbiota use uses, you know, curcumin and resveratrol from grapes and you know, EGCG from green tea. I mean that, that is actual like fodder for our microb, help us kind of switch on and off the genes that really support us.

I did not realize that our human cells didn't use those.

No. That's why it's interesting. I've been hearing more discussion on why, you know, for instance, you know, with curcumin having a bioavailable curcumin, it may not be as that important because it's really our microbes that are using those phytonutrients for our benefit.

Maybe bioavailable for the them.

Yes. Yeah. Buy available for, for our, our little, our tiny friends in our.

Which are like 10 times the amount of ourselves.

Y. Right.

So that's definitely the larger population.

Yes. Yeah. I mean, and you know, really talking to our kids about, you know, our kids from very early ages and I feel like it was even in preschool on Earth Day, you know, they're learning about taking care of the world and our ecosystem and you know, we reuse, reduce, recycle all the things and you know, so when talk to them and teach them about this microscopic ecosystem inside our gut that's called our gut microbiome. And you know, if we take care of our gut microbiome, our gut microbiome can take care of us in the same way if we take care of the world, our Earth can continue to sustain us. It's, it's a very similar phenomenon. We're so intertwined. And so kids, so many kids love that analogy because now it's not just. Just, oh, I'm. I'm eating for myself. I'm eating for this ecosystem inside me. Right. Just like, you know, when we're using plastics, it's not just, you know, for my benefit that we're reducing it. We're. We're really helping to sustain our ecosystem around us and outside of us. So I just, I think the more that we can educate kids and teenagers and empower them, the more they will carry these principles with them when they're out of the house, which is a little closer for me. I mean, I. I was in denial for very long time that my kids would ever leave the house. Right. But, you know, now, you know, they're. They're just turned 15 and one is 13, and they do go out with their friends. I mean, they go downtown on their minimum days and, you know, they'll have lunch with their friends. I mean, eating is such a social.

Yeah.

Phenomena. Right. And so. And pretty soon, you know, they're going to be, you know, off out of high school, you know, off to college or work or whatever it is and doing their own grocery shopping. And so, you know, really, you know, teaching them and empowering them. And of course, they may not necessarily make all the decisions that we would want them to make, but. But it's a learning process, and at least they know the foundations and they'll come back to it for sure.

And I think, you know, even as we're talking about this, learning about how to cook, you can teach our kids how to cook healthy meals. So when they do have their own place, you know, they're not dependent on always ordering takeout and fast food because they have no idea how to prepare a meal for themselves.

Yeah, that is one of the best ways. Even from the time that your kids are little. I mean, kids can help in the kitchen in so many different ways. It's just understanding developmentally what stage they're at. And of course, you're not going to, you know, give your toddler the butcher knife, you know, to kind of cut the chicken. But. But little kids, I mean, you can give them. You can, you know, boil soft boil carrots and then, you know, cut them in half so they have a flat surface, and then they have one of those, like, little plastic knives that they can start to help cook, or kids can, you know, shred the kale leaves and they can help massage the kale to get it soft. I mean, there's so many Things they can do. And especially for kids who maybe are a little hesitant to try new things or really are, you know, more selective, you know, pickier eaters, getting them in the kitchen makes them so much more likely to at least smell it, put a little taste on their tongue, even if they spit it out, right? And eventually try it, as opposed to putting a whole plate of something brand new in front of them that they had no say in helping to choose or helping to make. So at any age or stage. And I do feel like one of the most important life skills we can teach our kids as we get ready to send them off into adulthood is learning how to. Learning how to cook, as you said. I mean, my kids who are juniors, I actually started talking to them about this when they're freshmen and sophomores in high school. And I say, look, you have this golden opportunity while you're at home still for mom and dad to help support you in learning these skills, because freshman year you're probably gonna be in a dorm, but you may be in an apartment sophomore year, and you are gonna be responsible for the state of your apartment and the food that you're eating. And so learning how to, to make a breakfast, lunch, and dinner so, you know, three meals that's not out of a microwave, right? Like learning how to cook, right. Learning how to clean the toilets and the showers, right. Doing laundry from start to finish, meaning from, you know, taking it off your dirty clothes to the hand camper dryer, I mean, laundry dryer back in your drawer, right? The whole cycle. So, so, you know, if, and you know, of course, if they have any plants, they have to know how to water the place. But, but those foundations, if they have those, I'm like, okay, then at least you have those foundations set. And, you know, your college life, whatever, you know, new experiences you're going to have, you will have those foundations so that, so that, you know, we can feel confident that, that you can make.

It, you know, how to manage money. I mean, these are all things to teach kids before they leave the nest.

And you start young. I mean, the conversation around, you know, cooking or, you know, even like cleaning the bathrooms and, you know, really, I mean, it starts by you modeling it, showing them, right? Even when they're little. And same thing with reading food labels. That's, I think, you know, I always talk to kids, you know, when, when people ask me, what, what are the most important things for kids to learn? I'll say, look, the two most important skills really to have as, as you as your kids. Leave the house are learning how to read food labels like a gut hero. Right. And learning how to regulate their nervous systems. Oh yeah. I mean the other things can, you know, like you can teach kids how to cook in a short matter of time and you know, they can learn how to vacuum and do the laundry, but really learning how to be savvy about the packaged foods that they're buying is so key. That's going to set, set them up, you know, for, for healthy, healthy and healthier eating for the rest of their lives. Even for their, their own kids. In fact, you know, one study found that, that teenagers who knew how to cook actually gave more fruits and vegetables to their own children when they had kids. Right. And, and regulating your nervous system, I mean that's just something that we all need to learn how to do.

Oh, that is, is, that's a big one. Do you have any tips that you want to end this episode with about that?

Yeah, you know, all of these things when I, when I talk about, you know, how do we create microbiome magic every day, they're really, you know, framed in the five things that we are already doing every day. We just have to learn how to make small shifts so that we can really create microbiome magic every day. So we spoke about, you know, eating that's nourishing our microbiome, sleep, sleep, movement, hydration, all the foundations. But if we learn how to do those really, you know, in a way. And I talk to kids about being gut heroes, you know, we want to be heroes for our gut, but one another factor is breathe. And it's about really engaging your vagus nerve. And it's so important that it's actually its own chapter. Because I really wanted to impress upon kids, teens and parents that this is not just kind of woo mind body medicine. I'm going to get to it when I lifetime, you know that because a lot of, a lot of people will and kids, they might have a yoga class, you know, or a meditation class in there. Even in elementary school they're starting to incorporate that. But you know, I get a lot of kind of silent kind of eye rolls, you know, from kids. Oh, that's, that's. I get to fall asleep in that class. Right. So what is, you know, what's one of the most important ways that we can learn how to regulate our nervous systems? It's something we have to do, we should do every single day. And that's learning how to breathe with our belly, you know, diaphragmatic breathing. We have our vagus nerve is, you know, the part of our parasympathetic nervous system for the listeners that is involved in rest, digest and healing and recovering. It is very important to help us stay healthy and also to recover from any acute or chronic illness. There's a counterbalance called the sympathetic nervous system, which is our fight or flight response. Right. Our fight, flight or freeze response. Now the fight or flight, it's not, you know, it's actually an evolutionary response to something that's going to happen. And you know, back in, back in the caveman days, right. Everyone's heard of the saber toothed tiger. You bet we wanted our fight or flight to kick in. You know, when a saber toothed tiger is there, it's important. We need that amount of stress to get us going and figuring out what to do. So it's not that it's a bad thing, it's just that nowadays kids and adults are kind of in perpetual fight or flight. You know, you're late to school or your friend texted you something mean or you have a deadline and you know, it's all of these things that pile up. And so we are used to being in the sympathetic state. What we're not doing enough on a daily basis is engaging our parasympathetic nervous system. System, our vagus nerves, so that, you know, if we're stressed about being late to school, like mom stressed, kids stressed, everyone's yelling, trying to get out the door. Right. I've had those moments. Right. And, and, and then you make it to school, right? Right. And you're driving away and you're still stressed. Right? Right. And we should, our, our vagus nerves should then kick in at that point to say, look, there's no more saber tooth tiger. You made it. Let's shh. Right. But we, but nowadays we have to do this purposefully and so learning how to, then, then. And you know, this part of our nervous system, it's called the autonomic nervous system. And some people will say you can also call it the automatic. Because we, we can't control it. Really. We can't control, we can't tell our heartbeat slow down. Right. We can't tell our pupils stop dilating. You know, you're not in, you're not at war anymore. Well, the one thing that we can control, which is a direct line to our vagus nerve is our breath. It's the one thing where if we can fully engage our diaphragm when we're breathing in, you know, inhaling, we keep our shoulders and we inhale the balloon in our belly slowly. And then we exhale, really deflate the balloon in our belly, keeping our shoulders down. You do that three times, your vagus nerve kicks in and your heart rate slows down. Your pupils stop dilating, your ears become less attuned to high pitched sounds. I mean, literally everything just kind of, you start being able to digest better. And so, you know, we really, in those moments, and I would love for kids and adults to really, throughout the day, just stop when they have a moment to just engage their vagus nerve, breathe so that they know how to do it. And when they get that surge of adrenaline before a soccer tournament or before a test, they can start to breathe. They have that vagus nerve quote muscle memory. And they can engage their parasympathetic. And it's something that's free, that we can do anytime, that we can. I mean, there are other tools that I love like eft, you know, tapping, you know, heart math. There's certain vagus nerve devices that I, you know, love to use. There's, you know, you can meditate, you can walk in nature, you can do laughter yoga. But breathing is something that kids can do without anybody knowing what they, they're doing. Right? Because a lot of kids, they don't want to look different. They don't want to, you know, have to do something that's, you know, I mean, tapping is going to be, if they're sitting in the classroom, kids might be like, what are you doing there? You know, tapping, tapping your voice. Right. I mean, you can certainly go to the bathroom for a little bit and start tapping and say, even though I'm stressed, I know I love and appreciate myself. Right. But, but really, you know, breathing, you get that down and you have this instant line to regulating your nervous system. And so many adults, like I will have, have kids and parents sit there and demonstrate diaphragmatic breathing. And so many adults are concentrating. How do I do that? Because they're so used to breathing with their shoulders. So we all have to practice and it can be something that we all practice. You know, before dinner, let's just slow down, breathe. Because now we can really digest and enjoy our dinner. Right.

I mean, I find that people, including adults especially, are so used to that stress breathing using their shoulders that they've actually created a hiatal hernia pushing, you know, the diaphragms push their stomach up. I have to manually pull it down and remind them. Breathe with your belly.

Yeah, yeah. And you know, a lot in this day and age where people are looking for, you know, this, the next biohacking tool, and this, this or that. It's like, you know, you get to the back to the foundations and we don't need to do all of that biohacking. Right. That's just kind of an added thing. But we don't want to rely on biohacking to manage in lieu of the lifestyle.

Right. Like you said, those foundations all deserve, you know, their time and respect and attention.

Well, absolutely. So important.

So we're going to wrap up this episode. This was such a pleasure speaking with you. If parents are listening, want to learn more about you, where can they find you?

The best place to find me is on my website. That's healthykidshappykids.com and also my Instagram. It's healthykidshappykids. Awesome.

Dr. Song, thank you so much for coming on the show today.

Thanks for having me.

Well, I hope you enjoyed Today's episode interviewing Dr. Song. I mean, she is such a wealth of information in all things around integrative pediatrics. And I really enjoyed our conversation. There was so much great content there. And if it felt like a lot for you to absorb, all you have to do is pick up her book, Healthy Kids, Happy Kids, and you can get all of that great juicy content in your fingertips to use as a resource so that if you're looking as your child is growing and developing to support specific symptoms or issues that your child might be having, you can use that book as a reference guide to really feel empowered as the mom and parent in how you can get your child back to thriving. And then she's also, of course, available for consults as well if you live in the California area. Area HealthyKids Happy Kids dot com.