“We’re Seeing an Explosion of Chronic Disease in Children” — Why Healing Modern Kids Means Stepping Outside the System | Dr. Elisa Song

Have you ever heard of microbiome magic? Or how gut and immune resistance can support our health? Or have you heard the term canaries in a coal mine? Well, you're about to. Welcome to the Everyday Ancestral Podcast. I'm your host, James Barry. My next guest is Dr. Elissa Song. She is a Stanford NYU and UCSF trained integrative pediatrician, a pediatric functional medicine expert, and a mom of 2 thriving kids. She's on a mission to revolutionize children's health. In this episode, she shares how science, holistic wisdom, and real-life parenting can transform the future for our kids. I learned so much, and I can't wait to hear from you what you get out of this episode. Please enjoy. Dr. Elise Song, what got you into medicine? Was this something you wanted to be when you were a little girl, or was there some health episode that happened that kind of propelled you into it?

Yeah, I mean, I knock on wood, never had any health episode for me or my family that propelled me into medicine. I mean, that I think especially that propelled me into integrative medicine and functional medicine, because I think that's a story for a lot of practitioners who've done the conventional route. And then all of a sudden they can't find answers for either themselves, their kids, their parents, or whomever. That wasn't my story, which was, which I'm so grateful for. I think as a kid, I just loved taking care of things and, and people. I mean, I loved babysitting and I actually had this vision that I was gonna be a veterinarian. And, and I had this vision of living in this ginormous barn and having one of every single animal in the world. And taking care of them. And, and when I realized that that probably wasn't going to happen, I thought, well, what else could I do that would be similar where I would feel like I'm, I'm really taking care of and nurturing these, these little creatures? And so here I am, I ended up as a pediatrician.

Well, what's so incredible though about how you are a pediatrician is that it seems like you're really finding the balance between Western medicine and functional or integrative medicine, more holistic medicine. What got you on that path? 'Cause I imagine you went down the normal trajectory, right? Initially.

When I was, I was at Stanford as an undergrad, and at that point was not gonna go into medicine 'cause my mom was an OB-GYN, and I just saw how hard she worked. I mean, she delivered all of her own babies. Her office was attached to our house, and, you know, she made time every night to stop her office hours and have family dinners with us, which, In retrospect, I'm like, wow, that was amazing that she did that. But that wasn't the lifestyle that I really wanted. So I kind of discounted medicine and, and I still wanted to work with kids and I was gonna be a children's public advocate and go to law school and fight for children's civil rights. And I had this big vision of, you know, being in DC and making a huge difference for kids in that way. But then I actually, my junior year, After I'd taken the LSATs, I came across this flyer that was just in one of those telephone poles, and, and I looked at it and it said, Annual Conference of the American Holistic Medical Association. And this was back in the late '80s. And I thought, what is holistic medicine? Like, I'd never heard that phrase before. And back then it was also called alternative medicine. So whatever got me as a junior to drive down to the Santa Clara Convention Center and attend this conference, I think it was just the path I was meant to take because my mind was totally blown. I was, I heard from folks who were just starting to get known, like Andrew Weil, Deepak Chopra, Joan Borisenko. And I remember I came home and I called my mom and I said, you know what? I think I wanna become a naturopathic doctor. And she was kind of quiet for a little bit. And, and she said, what is that? And that was kind of the response I got from, I mean, again, late '80s. I mean, I, I actually called Bastyr and got an application, but None of my friends or family had heard of naturopathy. They never discouraged me, but they also never really were kind of fully like, yeah, that's the right way to go. And the refrain I got was, maybe go to medical school first and then you can kind of sort it out. And so that's what I did. And all through medical school though, I kind of paved little ways to get a little integrative holistic medicine in my path. And as a medical student, I, you know, actually at NYU started the holistic medical student chapter in our medical school. And in residency, I created a little elective for myself in rheumatology immunology on integrative pediatrics and was able to shadow a whole bunch of practitioners in San Francisco, like chiropractors and osteopaths and acupuncturists, and, and see that there was a different way that we could really do things, not an alternative way, not a, you know, completely separate way, but really, you know, try to marry the best of all worlds, knowing that each modality has its benefits, but also its limitations. And now we're kind of up against really seeing all of the limitations in conventional pediatrics, which can be life-saving for acute conditions, but for the chronic conditions that are really taking over our children's physical, immune, and mental health, Conventional pediatrics doesn't have the answers, and we need to look at root cause, functional medicine, and integrative approaches.

I want to go into what chronic illnesses we're seeing in kids these days, but before we do, I just want to touch base on something you brought up, which is that a lot of your colleagues or a lot of the people you were in medical school didn't really understand or kind of didn't view medicine in the way you were. Why do you think There's such, maybe resistance is the wrong word because that's a judgment, but there is kind of a resistance to looking at medicine in a different way. As you, as you said, it doesn't have to be exclusively different, but just including these other modalities. Why do you think that is in the medical world? Is it just simply that they don't have the awareness because it's not in the programs? Or do you think it's a literal resistance of like, no, you, this is wrong and we're right?

I think it's, it's a little bit of both and depending on the person. One of the things is, as I was starting out, and I started my practice in 2004 as an integrative pediatric practice, and I certainly got a lot of pushback, negative comments, you know, definitely was not supported by the larger pediatric population as a whole. And yet there were people who, you know, pediatric colleagues who came to me saying, wow, I really admire what you're doing and, you know, thinking outside of the box and, and, and Interestingly, it was a lot of the much older pediatricians, you know, who'd kind of seen the evolution of pediatrics and seeing humbleness that comes with experience, that we don't have all the answers. And it was really a lot of times the younger, maybe fresh out of residency, or even the medical students and residents who, you know, were not so much opposed, but not as open-minded to the fact that there could be another way and to accept that we don't know everything yet and we never will. And we always need to maintain that open mind of scientific inquiry and questioning, are we still doing the right thing? I'm really just so, I think, honored and blessed to know a growing number of pediatric practitioners, nurse practitioners, physician assistants, pediatricians, MDs, DOs, who are starting to think outside the box and have the courage to say, I'm really grateful for my conventional training. It has served me well, and it continues to serve my patients well. at a certain level, and now we need to dive deeper. And so it's growing. It's going to take some time, and we're not quite there yet. But I've had, you know, with my book that came out last year, Healthy Kids, Happy Kids, I never ever dreamed that this would be possible. But I've had universities like UCLA and UC San Diego and, you know, a nursing— a nurse practitioner school in Minnesota reach out and say that they're having their pediatric trainees read my book because it is grounded in science, yet very, very practical and meant for initially for parents, but really for practitioners to open their eyes and see that there is another way that we can address, you know, as we mentioned, this, this, you know, rising crisis of chronic childhood disease that our kids are facing.

Absolutely. And one last question before we go there, which is, If you could change the medical system where, you know, the education piece of it, where people are learning at that learning stage and ideally at that curiosity stage that you mentioned, what are 3 holistic practices that you would want immediately incorporated into those programs that you have found to be just hands down, like the most effective in your practice?

I don't know that I would call this even holistic, but nutrition, right?

Right.

I mean, just understanding the foundations of, you know, food as medicine and food as information. This shouldn't be, you know, holistic or alternative. In the conventional world, there is lip service paid to diet and lifestyle. And yet, when we don't understand as physicians, the underlying science and the biochemistry and the why of why this is probably the most important prescription that you could write, we don't necessarily have that conviction and that belief in the power of food to then impart that to our patients. Because changing diet, let's face it, it's one of the hardest things in the world to do. It's so much easier to pop a pill for many kids and adults, right? But when we're asking for a paradigm shift in how we're eating and how we're thinking about food and how we're thinking about what we put into our bodies, We, as practitioners, have to 100% believe and live that. Otherwise, we're just kind of saying, don't smoke, while we're taking a smoking break, you know, at lunchtime, right? I would say, you know, not just nutrition surface level, but understanding the biochemistry, understanding, you know, the biochemical reasons why food is such powerful information for your genes and your microbiome and your immune system and your brain.

And right now in medical school, it's true that that's really not covered at all. Or if it is, it's very surface level, like maybe 2 weeks or something.

Very surface level. And then, you know, when you, when you look at some of the studies looking at, gosh, there was this one study that, that just came out, you know, showing there was a, I can't remember, it was a probiotic supplement, I think that was used and there were better outcomes. And this was for adults. But what they also found was that adults who took the probiotic supplement were also much more likely to have a healthier diet and lifestyle. And so, you know, could that— could we attribute those outcomes just to the probiotic? Now, okay, yes, I get that. And the outcomes were really remarkable that, you know, health patterns were much better in those adults who had healthier diet and lifestyle. So why not tease that out? I mean, time and again, we're seeing the power of the Mediterranean diet or You know, adding more fiber to your diet, getting healthy lean proteins, healthy fats in your diet. And so, if we don't, as practitioners, impart that to parents and to children, we're just going to be on this continued trajectory of, you know, nobody's getting well, and we're going to be scrambling as adults to, once our health has fallen apart, trying to biohack our way back to however we felt in our 20s, right? And so, I don't want that to be the future for our children.

Absolutely. I mean, in, in many ways, our kids are the canaries in the coal mine. Would you agree with that?

Yes, absolutely. You know, as I was doing research for my book and really trying to get down what is the state of kids' health today, one of the studies I found was looking at autoimmune levels in different age groups. And there's a very nonspecific blood marker called an ANA or antinuclear antibody. It doesn't mean that you have an autoimmune disease, but it means that your immune system Is shifting into autoimmunity. And it, that is absolutely the canary in the coal mine. And what they found was every single age group since the '80s, when they started looking at this, has had a, a rapidly increased rate of positive ANA levels. Now, what they found was that the age group that had the quickest rise from the '80s to the '90s, there was double the rate. And then from the '80s, from the '90s to, you know, the early 2000s, triple the rate from baseline of positive ANAs were our teenagers, 12 to 18 years of age.

Oh, wow.

Right? These are adolescents, and nobody is really checking ANA levels. Now, I started checking ANA levels because I want to know, and it can be frightening to see on your 13-year-old that they have this positive ANA, but, but I want to reframe that and really have parents and kids think about the fact that And positive ANA is something we can absolutely reverse with diet and lifestyle and supplements and all the things. And so, we can actually prevent your child from tipping over into an autoimmune disease. That is why I check the labs now, because I want to see which teenagers have this simmering autoimmunity that may not present until they're in their 20s or 30s, but why wait until that point?

Why do you think we're seeing that rise? Is it just from increased testing, or is— do you think it's environmental toxins and processed foods? Like, what is your thought on that?

Yeah, well, I think it's really bottom line that our kids and us as adults, our gut microbiomes have changed, and our gut microbiome is really the heart of, you know, 70 to 80% of our immune system, which lies in our gut, and the crosstalk between our gut microbiome And the immune system in our gut is essential for maintaining what's called immune tolerance, that we can tolerate living in this world that's foreign, right, without attacking it, and also in tolerating ourselves. And with autoimmune conditions, our immune system starts to not tolerate ourselves and literally starts attacking different parts of our bodies, whether it's our thyroid in Hashimoto's, or whether it's our joints in rheumatoid arthritis. We know that there's a particular category of beneficial bacteria in our gut called Bifidobacteria that has been gradually declining over the decades in the last century. And in fact, babies, when they're born, should have almost 80 to 100% of their gut microbiota composed of Bifidobacteria. There is a really what I would consider a landmark study that was published earlier this year that found— they tested newborns, their gut microbiome, And found that almost all of them had no bifidobacteria levels.

None?

None, or like very low. And again, it should be 80 to 100%. And when we look back, you know, there was a Scottish pathologist 100 years ago that looked at baby poops, you know, and there was actually even formula back then, and compared baby poops of breastfed babies and formula-fed babies. The breastfed babies of 100 years ago had 100% bifidobacteria. Fast forward now, the breastfed babies of today, their gut microbiomes look much more like the gut microbiomes of the formula-fed babies 100 years ago.

Oh my goodness. Right?

So even nursing doesn't guarantee that your baby's gonna have the right microbiome to inform and educate their immune system from the start. And that has to do with environmental toxins, ultra-processed foods, psychological stress, which can harm our microbiome as much as any toxin that we're put in, the overuse and inappropriate use of antibiotics, whether in our food supply or actual antibiotics that are prescribed. You know, for children, in some studies, up to 70% of antibiotics were inappropriately prescribed because Most kids, when they get sick, they have viruses and antibiotics don't do anything. And so we're at this time now where this is what, you know, we in our modern world have done to our microbiomes. And it's time to then now wake up and recognize that and figure out how to optimize our microbiomes so that we as kids and adults can have the healthiest gut immune system connections and gut-brain connections.

When you talk about resilience, is that what you're ultimately talking about is like resilience comes from that, you know, that strong and resilient immune system? Is that the equation for you?

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, resilience, you know, many parents, when, when, you know, we talk about resilience, we're thinking more about mental health resilience, that, that grit, the blessing of a skinned knee, you know, how do you kind of get back up? But that trickles to every cell in our body and affects our immune system, affects our gut microbiome. In fact, we can now see measures of gut microbiome resilience. You know, how resilient is your gut microbiome to bouncing back after a round of antibiotics, or after, you know, a vacation where you just ate, you know, tons of junk all week long, or travel time zones? I mean, all of those can affect our microbiome. And so, it's not that we want to live in a bubble, We want to reduce the factors that disrupt our gut microbiome, but we also want to build that resilience so that when the inevitable, you know, birthday party with, you know, neon blue frosted cupcakes, like, make it into your kid's diet, you're not freaking out and you can trust, okay, their microbiome took a little hit just now, going to bounce back. And I have the tools to do that.

So before I go to the tools question, which is inevitably coming, Do you think we're stressing out too much about some of these things? Like, because as you mentioned earlier, stress is a huge contributor to that lower microbiome, and we are getting inundated with information around food that we historically never had.

Yeah.

And so do you think we're getting too granular about it?

I think exactly the word that is appropriate, too granular. I think that we're at the point now, it's just information overload, and It's better than no information, and we understand so much more about the impact of what we put in and on our bodies, and how that affects our immune system, and our brains, and our microbiomes. And yet, what we're not stepping back enough and doing is realizing that way of thinking granularly about how this vitamin affects this cell, and, oh, I'm— oh, I have these labs saying I need to take, you know, 50 different supplements. Well, our body is not isolated cells, isolated organ systems. When we step back and look at our bodies and our brains and our immune systems as an interconnected web, and we can move the dial on, you know, a couple of things, and we can really look more holistically at, well, how do we live on the whole? How do we help our brains as a whole? You know, really be safe and comfortable and empowered in this world, that's when we can move into real health. And what I worry about, and this is one of the things that's happened in the functional medicine space, I love functional medicine. It is one of the foundations of how I practice and how I teach. And yet, for many functional medicine practitioners, especially those who are starting, they haven't yet moved out of the conventional model. of looking at this test result and assigning this medicine for that. Now we've shifted to, let's look at this test result and assign a supplement to that. And that is where we come out, you know, with pages of supplement lists and families or children who believe that they can't be well without supplements.

Oh, God. This is such a good point.

Right? And then who look, you know, I've had kids who have had Autoimmune illnesses, you know, PANS/PANDAS, rheumatoid arthritis. These are not, you know, light health conditions. And I completely get that. And yet, when we're to a point where kids are in remission, doing great and thriving, and we have a lab result that shows maybe 1 or 2 lab values off, I have parents who, you know, really are then just focused on correcting that lab.

Right.

Instead of stepping back and, and looking at their child and seeing, you know, my child is doing great. Every single one of us, if we did lab work, we are going to find one or two or maybe more things that are off balance or not optimal. Do we wanna work to optimize those? Yes. But we don't define our health by our labs. That is a part of the picture. And I really think stepping back and taking a bigger picture is what's It's eventually going to shift the paradigm of medicine. We haven't been doing that well in functional medicine, really. And even in the biohacking world, right? You know, you see all of these gadgets and everything that we have to do, these supplement stacks and, you know, these, these devices from dawn until dusk that you are literally trying to biohack every moment of the day. That's not the way to health either, because now you're not trusting your body to do anything. You're saying, I need all of these external things to maintain and optimize my health. And so, I think it's shifting. I think we're going to get there. I think that we're now in this age where, yes, functional medicine devices, you know, biohacking, it's kind of had its huge heyday. And now there are people stepping back and saying, what about a simpler way? You know, what about, you know, trusting again our body?

And yet, I was just in Target recently because my daughter was influenced by, at her camp, some of these kids had these supplements and she was like, oh, I want to go get what they had. And they were all gummy supplements. And when I went into Target, because we were like, look, we'll, we'll let you try this once, but you realize everything we do at home is already supporting all these things because we're very functional, clearly, you know? Really thinking through these things and trying to create that lifestyle that that supports that resilience with nutrition and gut health, and I was shocked at how many gummies and how trending that is. And I was honestly very disgusted. I actually got angry because I was like, this is the candification of these supplements that you're talking, you know, of this functional medicines. It's literally making it like candy, which it's really not. And I think that's the wrong message. And it's the illusion of health. It's making it sound like this is enough.

Yeah. And that's with supplements in general. It started off with, you know, Flintstones when we were kids, right? And those were delicious from my memory, right? I remember my parents saying, oh, you can only have 2, or whatever it was, even though we wanted more and more. Yeah. You'd survive.

Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. And when you look at The gummies, you know, and I'll call out some names, right? There's Ollie, there's, um, there's, there's—

Golly.

Yeah. I mean, there, there are so many brands out there. And what is the other brand that is so— Smarty Pants, right? Smarty Pants are probably the 2 most popular. Smarty Pants and Ollie have the gummies. And when you look at the serving, because I'll have parents come in and I've recommended maybe vitamin D, you know, because they're, deficient or insufficient, and maybe some magnesium, 'cause they're constipated or having headaches or having trouble sleeping. So then, you know, they'll go out and buy the gummies. And when we line them up and look at the amount of added sugar in each serving, right? One serving of, you know, vitamin D gummies will have maybe a teaspoon, 5 grams of added sugar. Now they're having gummy omega fish, which are total junk because they don't have enough omega fatty acids in them. And they're having gummy vitamin C and gummy vitamin D, and they're having, you know, gummy, you know, magnesium, and then all— and a gummy multi. And then all of a sudden, that's 30 grams of added sugar right there.

They're not thinking about the cumulative effect. That's exactly what made me so angry. And I even said that to my daughter. I was like, ugh, no one's taking just one of these a day.

And then you have to watch out for the zero sugar ones because those Can have sucralose and acesulfame potassium, which are artificial sugar substitutes, which in my mind is even worse. Now, I don't want— kids should have no more than 25 grams of added sugar in a day. So already with their gummy sugar, they're, they're kind of upping that. But then when we look at the acesulfame potassium and the sucralose, which is found in lots of zero sugar sports hydration drinks and protein bars and whatever, you know, now my teenagers. are looking at. We look at the labels and they understand which ingredients, even if the front of the package says, you know, high protein, you know, good energy, whatever it is, right? Sports recovery. They know to look and put back if it has artificial colors, if it has sucralose, if it has acesulfame potassium. I mean, this is where our kids now, they're going to be inundated. The supplement industry is not going to go away. And, you know, I am committed to teaching kids how to really be savvy supplement consumers. Because at some point, and I do believe many kids will, at least at certain times, require supplements above and beyond food because our food has become so depleted and because our immune and brain needs have gone so high, you know, in our modern world. But they need to understand how to be savvy because, I mean, there's— you can see now I mean, the shelves and shelves and shelves at Whole Foods and Target and Walmart and whatever, of lots of supplements that are— some are good and some are total junk. So even when, just as we're being more savvy about reading food labels, we have to be very savvy about reading supplement labels too.

It's so true. And I think, though, then that goes to the question of like, well, how do we discern these things? Because, I mean, really, it's not just food labels, it's like, how do you discern what this influencer's saying versus that influencer? How do you discern this study versus that other study? Because as you know, I'm sure you know about this, is like those '80s studies that all came out saying, oh, you know, drinking soda pop a day is not bad for you, you just need to exercise more or whatever, that those were all debunked later, realizing that they were all paid for by Coca-Cola or one of those companies, right? So how do we know what to trust, and what are we looking for?

Really, the ultimate question, isn't it? How do we become savvy research readers, especially if we're not scientists or physicians? Kids are so savvy nowadays. And our kids, who are kind of bordering Gen Z and then Gen Alpha kids, our Gen Alpha kids are growing up in an AI world where they're going to be able to ChatGPT anything. And I have kids coming in with ideas for supplement stacks, you know, for, you know, optimizing their sports performance or, you know, helping them with, you know, lose weight or whatever it is. And they're researching and they want the right evidence, and yet they're, they don't understand how to look for the right evidence. And that comes with looking at the source. I mean, you have to try to figure out what the source of the funding for the research was. Mm-hmm. It doesn't mean that just because it was sponsored by a supplement company or a food company that it is automatically a bad study, but you need to have an even more critical lens when you read the results and you read the interpretation. And then also, you know, making sure that they're reading multiple papers, not just the ones that confirm what they want to hear. I had this one kiddo who came in with this list of research papers Trying to prove to me that MSG was totally safe and fine. And I said, well, let's take a look at your sources, and now let's try to find some other sources that might refute this, and then really try to, you know, compare those head to head. So it's, you know, we have to also meet kids where they're at too. And kids nowadays, it's not enough to say, oh, you know, because I told you it's healthy or not. Like, they want to know, but then we need to help them understand how to be savvy.

Yeah, absolutely. Well, let's equate symptom to how you would advise healing with some of these. Now, obviously you're giving just very surface advice because clearly if something serious is going on, they should really be testing and working with, you know, someone that like yourself, but what are kind of the top 3 symptoms you're seeing in kids these days and what are potential things that parents can immediately incorporate to support those symptoms from, with some healing?

I'd say the most common issues that I'm seeing in kids as young children, it's eczema. I mean, 1 in 3 kids to 1 in 5 kids nowadays has eczema. And the babies I'm seeing, most of them are not coming in with the buttery soft skin that we think of, you know, as, as smooth baby skin. And then of course, as kids get older, they have the bumps on their arms, the keratosis pilaris, and then the acne. I mean, those are all signs that there's something going on on the inside that's not balanced, that's coming out on the skin. And then we have the brain symptoms. Attention and focus and behavioral symptoms show up really early on, and anxiety. And anxiety is something that, you know, when your kids are little and they're in preschool and they're starting elementary school, For most parents, it's all about their immune health. So, that is part of it. You know, if your kids are getting sick all the time, getting ear infections all the time, that also is a sign, hey, let's look to see what's going on inside that we can balance. How do we, you know, optimize their immune health and their gut health? But then, you know, towards the end of elementary, middle school, and certainly by high school, the immune health takes a lower level of concern and it becomes a mental health and anxiety and, you know, this lack of stress resilience. And what we're seeing And what we're seeing in our teenagers is really, you know, this crisis of mental health that has existed for decades, but now is really coming to light. I think thankfully, you know, this new generation of kids, there's not as much of a mental health stigma. And so there's an openness about talking about, well, I have anxiety, I have ADHD, I'm neurodiverse. And yet, we're not meeting them with the tools that they need. to then manage their anxieties or their ADHD or, you know, whatever behavioral, you know, cognitive concerns that they have. And so I really wanna help kids reframe that. And I think about this 'cause my daughter right now, she's 15 and a half, and teenage girls since the pandemic, it's been noted that, you know, up to 1 in 3 teenage girls has seriously thought of suicide. Wow.

I hear cutting is increased as well, right?

Cutting is increasing. And I look for that in my kids. And when I see marks, I'll ask them, oh, why did, why did that happen? You know, why did you hurt yourself? What, you know, what's going on here with the parents not in the room? Well, I'll ask them what's going on. You know, what happened that you, you know, you really felt like you needed to do this because this is not okay. Your brain should not feel this way. When we think about the gut-brain connection, that's why I always talk to kids and teenagers about what their gut microbiome does for them. And really, from the mental health standpoint, I want them to understand that their gut microbiome produces up to 80 to 90% of their serotonin, which a lot of high schoolers have heard of serotonin. It's our, quote, brain chemical that helps us feel calm and relaxed. manage stress, helps us sleep, but we can only have the optimal amount of serotonin in our bodies if we have the right gut microbes to make the serotonin for us. And I've had remarkable stories of, in fact, I just spoke with this one kiddo yesterday and she came to me at 10 and she's almost 11 now. So at 10 years of age with ADHD, OCD, ODD. I mean, you name it. I mean, she had all of these initials, you know, diagnoses, and she had tried many different medications. All of them either caused worse behaviors or caused her to stop eating, losing weight. I mean, too many side effects. None of them really helped her behavioral and cognitive symptoms. And so when the parents came to me, she— they were desperate because she had stopped really eating. She had narrowed down to like 3 different foods. The whole family was walking on eggshells. The poor girl, I mean, she did not like how she was acting, but she couldn't control it. And the parents were almost afraid of, you know, interacting in the least bit because she would explode and become aggressive and throw things and become aggressive with her younger sister. The vibration of their stress was so palpable. And so the first thing I did was just say, look, I'm not gonna, you know, give you any supplements or make you change your diet if you don't want to, but I'm gonna educate you and tell you what, why I think that's important. And so we just laid that foundation and the mom called that night and said, you know, she actually, she heard you and she was willing to have a little floret of broccoli on her plate, right?

Mm-hmm.

Without pushing, just, you know, saying, look, you have the power here, right? And then I spoke with her about her microbiome and she agreed to do a stool test. And when we looked through her stool test, she had these abnormal bacteria that we know can cause a lot of inflammation. She had something called lipopolysaccharide that these abnormal bacteria make that can cause a lot of immune and brain symptoms. And we worked on that with some supplements. And within less than a month, her mom called back and said, I can't believe that my daughter is willing to take her supplements every single day. She must be feeling better. And this is the first time we've seen her actually relax and smile in like months or years. And she said, I thank you so much. We finally feel like we're getting our daughter back.

Oh.

And that was in less than 1 month. And now it's been, I think it's been about 9 months since we've been working together. She's starting middle school and things are just continuing to go up. And even yesterday she said, all the things that we're trying, they're helping. My daughter knows that they're helping. She was on the Zoom with me. And none of them has any side effects like the medications. And so they're just so hopeful that things can get even better and better. And I want parents and kids to understand that, that sometimes medications are necessary and I've prescribed medications for anxiety and for ADHD. But if we don't look back at the foundations of the gut microbiome, food, you know, how we're living, it's going to be an uphill battle. Getting those foundations is key. And then we layer in medications if needed.

Yeah. I love this. Are there specific practices that would support that step towards optimal health that families listening or watching this podcast could just start right now without going to a doctor, without even testing, but just, just because this is the smart thing to do? Are there a few that you might impart?

I mean, the first thing I would say is if you wanna dive in more, I would read my book, 'cause I put everything in there that we're talking about today in a really practical, doable way for every family. It has all the steps, and I call them the 5 Things for Microbiome Magic. They're the 5 things. They show you how to nourish your microbiome, what foods to really focus on, what foods to keep out, how we really breathe and engage our vagus nerve every day, how we move, hydrate, and sleep. All those things, it's the way I actually speak with the kids in my practice and the teens in my practice. And so, I've had teenagers read the book, you know, then want to implement some of the facets because they're reading it, right? And not because mom and dad are telling them. And in fact, what I'm loving is that a lot of my kids who have graduated off to college now, they're reading it and saying, oh, that's what you were talking about, Dr. Song. And now I really, I'm trying to do this in my dorm and, you know, trying to cook this way. So what are the things that we can focus on if we're thinking about what foods to try to get in? We really want to focus on, I mean, I call them the, the 3 microbiome champions are fiber, fermented foods, and phytonutrients. Our microbiome needs plants. I mean, they feed on the plants in our diet. And so fiber is what our microbiota eat and use to ferment and create all of these other compounds. for us, like the serotonin I just mentioned, or dopamine, which helps with attention and focus. Our microbiome, when they ferment these fibers, they actually make a lot of vitamins for us, like B vitamins and vitamin K. So these are all what we call postbiotics that are really rich in fermented foods. And that's, you know, another thing, that's another microbiome champion. Get your fermented foods in. There's lots of different creative ways to get fermented foods. We can move way beyond sauerkraut. I give an easy fermented blackberry lemonade recipe in the book that kids love, and we can ferment just about anything, right? You can ferment fruits and make popsicles and smoothies with them, or, you know, really nutritious gummies with grass-fed gelatin and really whole foods. And then phytonutrients, so the color. I mean, each color in a different fruit or vegetable or plant provides information for our microbiota to communicate and affect our epigenetics. So what does that mean? It means that even if anxiety or autoimmunity or heart disease runs in our family, or diabetes, like everyone on my, on my dad's side has diabetes, well, you can shape how your body will eventually interact, and your microbiome can shape how your genes— express themselves so that you don't have to be one of those, you know, everyone in my family conditions. That's one place to start. If your kids are super picky, one of the places I start with is just letting kids know and parents know that really picky eating, narrow palate, sensory, you know, not liking the different textures of the food often is related to not having enough zinc in your system. And zinc is highly correlated with animal protein intake. Now you can get zinc from, you know, pumpkin seeds, you know, nuts, seeds, and legumes, but it is highly correlated with animal protein intake. So making sure that you're getting high-quality proteins in your diet, sustainably caught, low-mercury seafood, really important because that also has the omega-3s, fatty acids for your immune system and your brain. And of course, you know, we want to use pluck, you know, organ meats, right? I mean, organ meats are so rich in iron and vitamin B12, which we need for methylation and vitamin A for immune support and, and has some zinc in it as well. And so there are ways that we can optimize the very, very common nutritional deficiencies that kids have with food. Now, there are also signs, like I mentioned, the picky eating that can be a sign of low zinc. I know if your kids are really sensory, loud sounds bother them, tags on their shirts Hmm, maybe I'm going to try adding more zinc in their diet or trying a little bit of a zinc supplement. Or magnesium, another really common nutrient deficiency in kids. If your kids have, are constipated, get headaches, have trouble sleeping, have, you know, a really hard time managing their stress, have really bad period cramps if they're teenagers, that to me says, ooh, your body is screaming for magnesium. So let's get in those magnesium-rich foods. And maybe we'll try, you know, a safe dose of magnesium if we can't check and test to see how much your body really needs. And I give those clues in my book on, on some clinical physical signs that your child might have these nutrient deficiencies, even if you don't have a doctor near you that can do the testing.

These are such great tips. How do you deal with diets? I mean, a lot of these kids, particularly Junior high to high school, they're probably coming in sometimes of like, well, this is how I'm going to eat. Or they're, they're kind of like already standing on that soapbox of like, this is the diet that I'm going to get. And it's possibly that diet that's causing that havoc. So how do you, or how do you even recommend parents navigate, you know, all these dietary influences that they might be getting from social media or their peers or whatnot? How do you recommend that parents navigate dietary preferences?

It starts with the education, right? I think that's really important. I mean, when kids come in, I mean, let's say, you know, with horrible acne, right? That is a, I mean, many kids and teenagers, if they have really bad acne, they're a little more motivated to try some things. And I just let them know, look, your skin is a mirror of what's going on on the inside. And if you have really bad acne, just now pay attention to when you have outbreaks, what could be some of the triggers. And I will list some of the common triggers. Of course, for girls, some of it can be their period hormonal, but for girls and boys, I talk to them about food triggers. It could be dairy is a very common culprit. And of course, sugar, right? And just notice. I mean, I have kids who come back from summer camps where they're eating, you know, tons and tons of Kool-Aid and, you know, desserts and whatever. I mean, ultra-processed, not such great food. And they come back and their skin is a mess. And I just plant the seed, do you think that could have been from the food you were eating? Plant those questions. And then, you know, I let them know, look, if this is something that you're really interested in working on, I would suggest a trial going off of dairy and mapping out. And here's how I might do it. Let's make it as easy as possible, you know, and plan it out. Let's look at what is in your diet that has dairy, first of all. And now let's think about what we can swap instead. What are some of the replacements so that you're not stuck at Chipotle with your friends thinking, oh my God, what am I gonna get? Right?

Right.

And so mapping all of, like, making it as easy as possible. I do the same thing with parents with younger kids. I map out exactly like, what does your week look like? Where do you, you know, eat out? Where do you shop? Let's think about, you know, what you're gonna swap at the grocery store, what you're gonna swap at restaurants to make it really easy. So, for kids who are pushing back, I don't say they have to change anything at the moment. I just say, look, this is something that could help your eczema that you don't, you know, you wear long sleeves so that nobody can see your elbows and you're scratching all the time. That could be gluten. And just kind of planting those seeds. And some kids will immediately after that kind of make note and go home and actually wanna start trying and making those changes. Other kids, it takes several visits, but that's okay. I mean, these conditions didn't happen overnight. And we really want these dietary changes and optimization to be for a lifestyle. So, I just let parents know if food is becoming a battle, just back off, right? Because you're not going to win that, especially when they're teenagers, right? And they're going off and buying their own food. You have things available. You have cut-up vegetables, chopped, you know, chopped fruit available as a snack when they come home on the table. So, they're not just reaching to the pantry and grabbing the bag of chips and the soda and the whatever. And you keep your pantry the way you would like it so that, you know, if you're buying potato chips, you're buying the, maybe the bolder ones with olive oil, you know, and the Siete Cassava tortilla chips so that that's what's in your pantry, not the fiery hot Cheetos or the Takis. So you are, as a parent, responsible for buying the groceries and choosing what's in your household and making it available to your kids. And then the kids are responsible for making the choices that they want to, but then you're educating them. So as their brain and their frontal cortex develops, they can start making those rational decisions for themselves.

If someone decides to try the elimination diet where they're pulling out either gluten or dairy or soy or something like that, one of, you know, just picking one, how long do you recommend they try that for? 2 weeks?

2 weeks at a minimum. 2 weeks, 2 to 3 weeks. I mean, I let, I let parents know and kids know that if we wanna do a really, really good experiment, It has to be minimum 2 weeks, sometimes 3 weeks, and it has to be 100%. So, I'll walk them through it. Now, before I have kids do an elimination diet, I have them replace that food in their diet already, so that when it's like, you know, D-Day on the calendar, this is when we're going to do the 100% elimination, they already have all the different pastas that they're going to eat, or, you know, the tortillas that are appropriate, or whatever they love, like croutons, or, you know, if, you know, that they have the replacements at home. And it's part of their diet. And then once we decide to do the elimination trial, we do 100% for minimum of 2 to 3 weeks. And then after that, take gluten for instance, we will then take one day where we reintroduce gluten full force, breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and then we stop. And then we wait and watch brain symptoms, skin symptoms, gut symptoms, immune symptoms, sleep, mood, whatever it is. for the next 4 or 5 days. And if there's no reaction, then we can say, oh, okay, gluten's probably not a huge factor. Maybe we'll try the next one. Now, what I prefer to do is actually eliminate, 'cause sometimes it's multiple foods, right? And so, I prefer with, with gluten, usually I'm doing gluten and dairy at the same time.

Uh-huh.

And then, depending on what my level of suspicion is, eczema, I often find citrus can be a big culprit. So, if they're eating a lot of citrus, I'll have them, you know, try eliminating that. And for some kids it might be eggs. So we just kind of go with what they're eating a lot of and what parents and kids suspect.

We only have a few more minutes, so I want to just give you some kind of like questions that are more quickfire. But what is one surprising daily habit that has had a profound modern health impact?

I would say the one simple thing that can profoundly change the trajectory of your health is learning how to engage your vagus nerve every day. And that it's simple. If we just teach kids and adults how to do belly breathing or diaphragmatic breathing, you know, when they're sitting on the way to school or sitting at their desk before a test or whenever it is, we want to get our body and our brains out of fight or flight. And just breathe with our belly, not with our shoulders, for maybe 10 slow, deep breaths, that slows your sympathetic nervous system down, engages your vagus nerve, and sets a whole chain reaction in motion that strengthens your immune system and your brain health and your gut microbiome. And so, with that one thing that we can do anywhere, anytime, without looking strange or different, you know, in the classroom or wherever, before a soccer game, if you're kind of— You know, amped up. Okay. Just slow down. Do 10 belly breaths. We're teaching our vagus nerve to kick in when it's supposed to. And we're teaching it to be able to kick in whenever we need it. Like when we're sick with a virus or when we're really stressed because of exams.

Yeah. So some deep breathing. Yeah. I find I have to support my older daughter with that a lot. Like just teaching her how to regu— you know, regulate her breath when she's up there, you know? And it works every time. But I have to really kind of come up to her physical touch and I have to breathe with, with her. But my hope is that by me doing this now for however the next 10 years or whatever I need to do, she'll eventually do it on her own. That's my hope.

She, she will. And, and I love what you're saying because as a parent, for any parents listening, This co-regulation piece is so important. And when we see our kids stressed or sick or anxious, or it's so easy for us to kind of escalate to, right?

Or to problem solve, like, oh, well, we gotta fix it, right?

That's right. But if all you did was what you do, what you're doing, slowing yourself down, using your touch so that your temperature and your heart rate start to co-regulate, That helps kids to understand what that regulated state is. And with that kind of body-brain memory, it's going to be so much easier for her to access that when she's older on her own. So, so absolutely. And it starts with just practicing because we have to know how to get into that state.

Yeah. Thank you. Yeah, that's so good. Screen time, social media, some of our, you know, parents, they're some of our top concerns.

Yeah.

And our top battles, right? And I know your kids are in high school, so maybe it's starting to change for you because it's, or maybe it's not, maybe it's increasing, but is there an ancestral rhythm or a physical resilience that can help restore, or I should say, is there an ancestral rhythm or ritual that can help restore the mental and physical resilience in today's kids?

Yes, absolutely. Because to be really just completely honest, there's not going to ever be a time where our kids don't have screens in their lives. I mean, these are the first generations where they are digital natives, where screens and AI are a part of their everyday life. Now, that doesn't mean they have to have a screen at every age. And my children, they're almost 14. And 15 and a half, and they do have smartphones. I would've gone back and not had their first phone be a smartphone, like if in retrospect, but it is what it is. They don't have social media yet. And I've told them honestly, I don't know when we will allow them to have social media on their phone. It has to be a reciprocal decision where they have to show that their brains are responsible enough.

Mm-hmm.

To be able to shut off when needed, to not get mesmerized and addicted to the doom scrolling, which honestly for adults is really hard, right? I mean, I find myself doom scrolling at night when I'm like, all of a sudden it's like, oh my God, it's 45 minutes. I should have been asleep, right? And so I just, I want their brains to be more in control of that. And I let them know, I mean, teenage years is all about building independence, self-advocacy, being in control of your life. And screens are designed to take over your minds, just like ultra-processed foods, right?

Mm-hmm.

Those food additives and those sugars. So by allowing the screen or this ultra-processed food to take over your brain and cause a craving and an addiction, you are then no longer in control. What's one thing that can counter that though? Because, you know, there's no going back from phones. I mean, teenagers are gonna have phones at some point. I mean, we want, we need their brains to learn how to use them. successfully. Again, this doesn't mean that they learn how to do that when they're 7 or 8, right? But having time every day where there's a screen-free zone, I am adamant that mealtimes need to be screen-free, whether that means you have a basket where everyone, including the parents, put the screens away. There's not even a temptation. If it's beeping, that can wait, right? There's never Rarely a time that there's such an urgency that you have to interrupt your meal, your family meal, to go answer the phone or reply to a text. Mealtimes screen-free. I, you know, really try to enforce, and this is something that this year as we start back at our new school year, a screen-free car zone, right? Where, because some of the best conversations you're ever going to have with your kids is going to be on the ride to school. Where you're not Kind of in their face, eye to eye. They're in the backseat. And I mean, conversations just happen if they're not buried in their phones, right? And I also think really implementing, if you can do this daily, great, but at least weekly, a walk in nature where no one has phones, you're together. Being in nature will engage your vagus nerve, and then having the opportunity to not have your brain constantly looking at something. will give your brain the opportunity to know what it looks like and feels like to be just free and calm.

This has been such a great conversation. I, I would love to just keep talking, but I, I wanna respect your time. And, um, I cannot emphasize enough how important it is that people check out your book. I think it's a phenomenal book. We, we passed it out to so many of our friends when it first came out. We bought a bunch of 'em and gave 'em as gifts.

Aw, thank you.

But you're also working on, a pre and probiotic, right? So you are trying to provide a solution for supporting the microbiome. When can we expect that? And when, what does that look like?

Yeah. So it's a microbiome supplement. So it is a complete daily all-in-one essentials for your kids and their microbiomes. And there are no probiotics in it. So it has all of the foundations to grow this ecosystem Inside your child that then houses the most favorable microbiome possible. And the reason there's no probiotics in it, because this is a huge educational lift for a lot of people, is that our microbiome is composed of hundreds of trillions of microorganisms, and just sprinkling a few strains of probiotics may not be the right ones. We have such a unique microbiome. And so probiotics are designed to be supplemented. At least my belief is probiotics are meant to be supplemented for specific needs. So if your child has eczema, we're going to look for one that supports, in the science, healthier skin. If your child has anxiety, we're going to look in the science for the specific strains that support a healthy stress response, not just a random smattering of different probiotic strains. It's called Hello Biome. It has 30 different plants. Remember, plants and phytonutrients are so important for your microbiome. It's got a blend of 10 fermented berries, It has prebiotic fibers that are evidence-based for pediatric populations and a complete multivitamin, multimineral mix. So, it's basically everything your kids and their microbiomes need to sustain daily a healthy, optimal life. And that is called HelloBiome and coming out in December.

Awesome.

If all goes well, December or January, it's coming right around the corner.

That's excellent. That's 2025, everyone, no matter when you listen to it. So, hopefully, it's either out already or it's coming. Well, thank you so much. And I love that you're, you're focusing on, hey, cuz, cuz that's true when you ferment, you know, dough. I mean, there's micro microbes in the air, right? So in a sense, you're, you're basically saying, look, we already have these things. We just have to nurture them really, right?

Absolutely. Absolutely.

Yeah.

And I love, I love that analogy.

I love your point as well early on where you were really talking about like not just focusing on the illness, but focusing on the capability of the body to heal. And to really focus on the child as a whole of what's possible in them, not what's wrong with them. And I think that if there's any message we can take from this, I really cannot stress that enough, because that came up for our own family this summer when my daughter went into the camp that she went to feeling like she had something going on and came out feeling empowered because the camp focused on Your, the body's ability to heal without anything else. And it focused on, there were no screens. It focused on like interaction, touch, like very ancestral human principles. And so she had literally an entire 3 weeks of just that. And she's camp— come out of that camp so much more regulated. So there, it really is a testimony of what you're saying, that it's not always just about—

Yeah.

you know, focusing on the illness or a certain supplement, that it's sometimes it's just about reminding the child that they have the capacity to heal and that they're designed to thrive.

Absolutely.

Well, thank you so much. How can people find you and how do you recommend if they wanna work with you, they reach out?

Best place to find me is on my website, healthykidshappykids.com, and also Instagram, which is healthykids_happykids. I unfortunately am no longer accepting new patients, which is why I'm training practitioners. to practice in the same way. So you can find practitioners. I have my practitioner membership site, and we hope to have a list soon of the practitioners there.

Oh, that's so good. Thank you again for your time today. Thank you for everything you do to support families and kids so that we can heal and kind of get out of this, this hole that we've been digging and hopefully have more optimal resilience and Everyone's life moving forward. So thank you for that.

Thanks for having me.

Thank you so much for joining me on Everyday Ancestral. If you enjoyed this episode, hit subscribe so you don't miss the next one. You can find the show notes, links, and resources mentioned at eatpluck.com. That's E-A-T-P-L-U-C-K dot com. And hey, if you know someone who'd get something out of this, share it with them too. Stay curious, live well, and keep it ancestral.