Sticking To Your Parenting Choices On Nutrition With Confidence

Episode Transcript

Dr. Nicole Beurkens: 

Hi everyone, welcome to the show, I am Dr. Nicole, and on today’s episode, we’re going to talk about an issue that many of you have no doubt encountered if you’ve ever tried to make changes to the way you, your child or your family eats. I know that when my husband and I changed our family’s diet to eliminate foods that we were sensitive to, and really just to be healthier overall, it brought on many opinions from family members, friends, my kid’s teachers and other people, so it’s challenging enough to deal with managing food choices with our family without the judgement, questions, emotions of other people — but the reality is that our kids do spend time with people outside of our family where food is involved and this naturally raises questions and opinions from other people. So what’s the best way to handle this? How can we stick to our parenting choices with confidence and deal with challenging conversations with people who don’t get what we’re doing or think that we’re doing things wrong?

My guest today is family nutrition specialist Jess Sherman. She is going to give us some tips for navigating these uncomfortable situations. Let me tell you a bit about Jess. She is a former teacher turned registered holistic nutritionist and a family health expert. Specializing in nutrition for brain health and resilience for kids. Over 10 years, she has worked alongside naturopathic and medical doctors, family counselors and psychologists, occupational therapists, teachers and parents to bring an understanding of the power of good nutrition, simplicity and connection into mainstream conversation about children’s mental health, learning and resilience. Her book Raising Resilience and her online resources have helped families all over the world improve the lives of their children with learning differences, anxiety, ADHD, autism and mood disorders by helping them use food to help kids calm down, learn better, have better sleep, have better poops, enjoy more stable moods and get over their picky eating. As you can hear from Jess’s bio, she and I have many things in common, in terms of not only our background, but also how we approach things in kids and families, so Jess, it is a joy to have you on the show today!

Jess Sherman:

Thank you for having me! This is a great topic to tackle, one of my favorites!

Dr. Nicole Beurkens: 

It is a great topic, because as we were talking before the show started, I’ve been there, you’ve been there — this is sort of the inevitable thing that comes up when families start to think about shifting the way that they do anything related to their kids. Everybody’s got opinions, so I think this is a really great challenge to talk about and give people tips around. I want to back up a little bit though and start with you sharing just a bit about your story of how you came to be doing this work, because as I did, you started out as a teacher working with kids that way, and then really morphed into this role as a nutrition specialist. So tell us a little bit about that journey for you.

Jess Sherman: 

Yeah. I started as a teacher and I worked — I actually started in experiential education, which is kind of like a sub-category, I guess, you would call it. When I studied education, it was all about getting kids moving and getting them doing stuff and having experiences, immersing them in experiences. When I look back on it now, I think I was drawn to that type of education because I have always been drawn to understanding how people develop and how they become who they are and how they become their best selves, so it’s really been rooted in my whole education journey and now my nutrition journey, it’s really rooted in kind of self-development. So I was working in the classroom and I was working with experiential education in the classroom, and I actually wrote my master’s thesis on the contradictions between what we know about experience and development and what we expect of kids in the classroom and the tension between the two was really interesting to me. But what I was noticing is that more kids were struggling than weren’t struggling. 

And they were either struggling with something physical like allergies or asthma or acne or something like that, or they were struggling with something mood-related or anxiety or learning-related. And it was really to the point, like so many kids were on medications, there were so many IEPs, there were so many referrals out to doctors. And I thought, really, our only recourse as teachers when someone was struggling was to bring in the medical world, which is fine. And if it was a physical thing, it would be, you know, “You should see your doctor about this”, and if it was a mental/emotional/learning thing, it was “You should see the psychiatrist or psychologist about this.” Like head people. 

And I just felt like something was missing, you know? We were doing so many wonderful things education-wise, and then we would get all these diagnoses and so I took a sabbatical and started — It’s interesting to me now that when I took a sabbatical, I didn’t go into spec ed. I didn’t want more education tools. I wanted a holistic nutrition and health — because I felt like there was some key there missing. And that’s when I learned that yeah, you know what? This feeling with this paradigm, I guess that we’re in, where the body and the brain are not considered as co-workers was just doing our kids a disservice. So I started learning that the brain and the body actually work together and that it’s all part of the same ecosystem. And when you improve health in one, you improve health in the other. Bi-directionally. So that’s what I started teaching parents was how they can consider their whole child, whether it’s something physical or something neurological to improve their health. And the number one tool we have for that is food. So that’s what I do now, is I coach parents on how to make practical food changes to improve the health of the bodies so that the body and the brain both work better. 

Dr. Nicole Beurkens: 

It’s great, and I want to mention it too, just because I think this is important for our listeners to know, you also, along the way became a mom yourself, you have children. And the reason I think that’s really relevant is because there are certain experts on these things or people who talk about these things who don’t have children, who haven’t lived this on the personal side to know what it’s actually like to try to change the food planned for a family, or what we’re talking about today. What it’s like to deal with grandparents or teachers or whatever around some of these things. So I want our listeners to understand that not only are you experienced from the professional side of this, but also, there is a personal component to this as well. You have experienced this and had to navigate this yourself, right? 

Jess Sherman: 

Yeah. And one thing I learned early on — well not actually that early on, it actually came to me a little bit as I was deep into coaching around nutrition that changing your own health is one thing, and we all know how hard that is to start a new exercise routine or change your diet or whatever. But changing the health of another person is a completely different ballgame. Especially when that person is your child, for a couple of reasons: First, because we are so emotionally attached to the outcome, and second because they are a child and they are developing not only their bodies, but they are developing their relationship with the world, their relationship with themselves, their relationship with food, their relationship with you — and so we really need to tread carefully when we are talking about kids. So I root — and again, this is something you and I have in common, I root all my nutrition work in the attachment parenting model because that tells us the way our kids are developing their relationships is just as important as what they are eating, so we need to consider the two together. So that makes it very different from some nutrition.

Dr. Nicole Beurkens: 

Well, I’m glad that you raised that because you cannot, in my opinion and in yours as well, you can’t separate the two, especially when we’re talking about the parent-child dynamics of that. It is not just about being told “Here is what you and your child should be eating”, because most people know or have a sense or have learned a bit about that or been told some of that. The real issue is “How do I do that? How do I make that happen?”, and that’s the bigger piece of it. That’s the case for most of us, even as adults, right? There are very few adults walking around out there who have absolutely no idea what it would mean to eat healthier, right? The problem is not a lack of information or a lack of understanding about what we or our kids should be eating. It’s about “How do I do that?”, and the emotions involved in that, as we are going to get into today, the emotional dynamics involved with other people who actually aren’t in our family, but the fear of people’s judgements, their opinions, their reactions to it, can keep us from implementing things that we know would be valuable for our kids and our family. 

Jess Sherman: 

Yeah. And I would add to that and say I think you’re totally right, that it’s not a lack of information, and when it comes to parents, also, another specific thing to this group of people is that we usually have too much information. When you start looking, when you start looking down this rabbit hole, you get so much information and that paralyzes you. So I’ve spent a considerable amount of time translating information into practical application because we’re busy. We just want to know, “What do I do? What do I put on my table?” And the other really important thing is that we just talked about this — the importance of relationship and conversation about this stuff is that that is often a game-ender, like a dealbreaker, because parents will say, “Oh, it’s just too stressful. It’s causing stress between parents”, or “It’s causing stress between the kids.” And that’s an instinct, right? Because we know that those attachments are really, really important, and so I think it’s instinctual for us to say, “Oh, if it’s interfering with that, then I’m just not going to do it.” What I would love to see happen is to say, “Oh, okay, I see a problem here, I see a barrier”, which is what we’re going to get into. “We need to move through that because this is too important to turn our backs on.”

Dr. Nicole Beurkens: 

Yeah. Well, on that note, let’s dive into why it’s so important, and we don’t need to spend a ton of time here because the majority of our listeners have heard me talk ad nauseam, and we’ve had so many guests on the show talking about the connection between food and not only physical health and wellness but also mental health and wellness, how food impacts our kids’ mood, behavior and learning, but I always think it’s good for us to hear that again in a new way, from a new person. So to get to the way this is important in the first place, can you talk for a minute about that? Why should we be looking at the food that our kids are eating?

 

Jess Sherman: 

Well, I’ll be brief, because like I said, we have so many great resources on this. The crux of it is that our body works as an interconnected series of systems. They’re all connected and they run on nutrients. Nutrients are the building blocks. The way I break it down for parents, is to say if you want to take a whole-body approach to your child’s learning or behavior, when it comes to food, there are three areas to explore: Is enough food coming in? So are all the building blocks coming in or do you need some nutritional supplements, to unpack the nutrition piece, because everything runs — I’m sure you have lots of resources to link people to about our neurotransmitters, our hormones, everything runs on nutrients. Our detox systems, our digestive system. So that’s the first thing. The second thing is irritation. Is your child eating something, or exposed to something? So something in or around their bodies that is causing extra stress to an already stressed out kid, and how can we alleviate some of that? And the third is digestion, because we know now that the gut and the brain are constantly talking to each other and food affects what’s going in on the microbiome. A lot of things affect what is going on in the microbiome and food is one of them. So if we can get that conversation to be more health-promoting, less inflammatory and all of that, then the brain is going to work better. So I sort of break it down into those three chunks of information. We’ll explore those and we’re going to find all our answers in there, somewhere. 

Dr. Nicole Beurkens: 

It’s really a lovely way of breaking that down, it really simplifies it for people. Is there enough of the right things coming in? Does the child have enough of those nutrient building blocks for their brain and body to work with? Are there things that are coming in that are maybe causing problems or irritating or stressing out the brain and the body? And then, the digestion: How the gut is working, the balance of the microbiome. That’s a really nice sort of set of baskets to put that in and it simplifies it, to your point earlier about information overwhelm, so much of it just, ugh — and that gives people some nice boxes or containers to put that in, so I love that. So yes, we need to be looking at what our kids are eating. It’s indisputable that food impacts mood, learning, behavior — that’s just a fact. So when parents are saying, “Okay, I’m ready to do this. I want to think about this. I’m ready to make some changes, I think this is important for my child.” I’m curious: What’s the first thing that you really encourage parents to do or to focus on if they want to change their child’s behavior using food?

Jess Sherman: 

I’d say the first thing is to develop an unwavering confidence that this matters, in yourself.

Dr. Nicole Beurkens: 

Love that.

Jess Sherman:

Because it’s going to get hard. Any change is hard, right? Like you’ve been going one way, you’ve been experiencing one reality for a while and you’re looking at exploring a different option. So that’s a change. And anytime there’s a change, there’s going to be a moment of disruption, so you need to know why you’re doing this. So if that means that some people need more research, some people need to talk to other parents. Some people need a coach. Some people already know, right? So just develop — and the way I guide people, it’s the very first thing that I do with parents, usually even before they start working with me, but certainly, once they do start working with me, we hammer this for a little while: What does your vision of perfection look like? What do you want for your kids and for your family? What kind of dynamic do you want in the home? What kind of relationship do you want with them? What kind of success do you want them to experience? And it’s different for everybody. So I get people to write it out, and this is an exercise everyone can do. Write it out in first person as if it has already happened: What’s your vision for your family’s health? 

And this is something that gets lost, right? We never really talk about this, and once I started recognizing it, I was like, oh, my husband and I never really talked about the way we want to set up the culture in our family, and luckily we’re on the same page, but I know a lot of parents don’t talk about it, so when something happens, like you get a diagnosis where you have a troublesome kid or whatever, all of a sudden you’re like whoa, we actually don’t see this the same way. So that’s a challenging conversation you’re going to have to have as a team. 

Dr. Nicole Beurkens: 

Well, that idea of “If we don’t know where we’re going, how do we even know how to map a path to get there? How do we know when we’ve arrived? So, I like this idea of sort of articulating from the start what we want this to look like.

Jess Sherman: 

YEah. And when you’re doing this, just another little tip for people: When you’re creating your vision, don’t worry about the how just yet. This is one of the problems with these conversations, that you enter into a conversation with somebody and they throw all kinds of questions at you: “Well, I saw this research” or “I read this article” and all of a sudden you’re just like “Ugh, I don’t know”, right? There is this expectation that if you want to change something, you need to be an expert in it before you can change it. That’s not true. You don’t have to be an expert in parenting or an expert in nutrition or an expert in psychology or whatever to try something. So detach from the how. This is going to be an experiment. If you want to accelerate the process, then work with somebody who can help you with that, but it’s something you can do on your own, but you do need to know where you want to be. You don’t necessarily need to know how you are going to get there. Those pieces will fill in. 

Dr. Nicole Beurkens: 

I want to back up to what you said initially when I asked the question because that is a nice, quotable, take-home piece. I said “What’s the first thing you have people do?” And you didn’t revel off, “Well, start reducing sugar” and you know, all these things. You said, “Have an unwavering confidence that changing the way your kid eats matters. You started with this “Us” piece. This starts with us going, “This matters. This is important to me. I don’t necessarily know how exactly I’m going to do this, but this matters and I’m going to proceed from there.” I think that’s really a powerful, powerful thing for people to latch on to. 

Jess Sherman:

Yeah. And your kids will feel that. If you go into this kind of wishy-washy thing like, “Well, I heard that gluten is not a good thing. We’re going to try taking it out for a while and see what happens!” Your kids will be all over you, right? But if you go in and you’re like, “This is what we’re doing. I’m doing it, you’re doing it, dad’s doing it, brother’s doing it — we want to up level our health and we’re going to give this a go.” Give it a timeframe too, that really helps as well. “We’re going to do this for 4 weeks and see what happens. 

Dr. Nicole Beurkens: 

Well, in that piece too, I love what you said about, “You don’t have to be an expert” because I think what you said there just throws so many people — they feel like, “Okay, I’m going to do this.” And then the first time they share something with grandma or their sister or the kids’ teacher or whatever and somebody says, “Well, you know, I read that article in the paper several months ago about how that’s really not a good thing!”. They go, “Oh my gosh, I don’t know what I’m doing. I’m not an expert. What if I’m doing something bad?”, and they just kind of fold with it, and so I love that you just shined a spotlight right on that because we’ve all experienced that, and I’ll tell you I have, as a professional with advanced degrees in these things, with published research — I still had these moments where someone will come at me with something and I’m like, “Oh, is that really the right thing?” So I think just to say yes, this happens to all of us and we need to have some tools within ourselves to work through that. 

Jess Sherman: 

Yeah, and I think a good response, just to bring it to something real practical, a good response for that kind of challenge would be, “This is my decision, I’m doing it for four weeks, and this is what we’re doing.” You don’t have to get into, “Well, research shows that blah blah blah blah blah!” You don’t have to go there! You don’t need to pretend to be an expert. Unless you are! And if you’re comfortable going there, what I’d suggest is — let’s say it’s a teacher or, I don’t know, it could be anyone. First thing is “This is what I’m doing. I would appreciate your support.” And the second, if you feel comfortable, another level you could go is set a time to talk about it. Be like — “You know what? I actually do know quite a lot about this, and I know I have very good reasons for doing that. It’s not really the time to get into it right now, but can we make an appointment? Maybe next Wednesday after school. Let’s chat about it so you can really know what I’m doing.” If you’re comfortable. Don’t go there if you’re just experimenting because don’t put that pressure on yourself. But if you are well seeped into the research and you know why you’re doing what you’re doing, then by all means, bring them onboard.

Dr. Nicole Beurkens: 

So, the first tip for handling those kinds of challenges is to just be clear about: This is what we’re doing. And that kind of sets the tone for I’m not really interested in your opinion, I don’t really want to get into a debate or discussion, right? Because so often, that’s what we fear, that’s what makes us uncomfortable is we’re going to get dragged into this trauma around trying to defend our position or somebody telling us that we’re wrong — particularly someone that we maybe feel or look at as sort of an authority figure, maybe our own parent, you know, the child’s grandparent or the teacher or whatever. We can be concerned that we’re going to get dragged into arguments or contentions debates about it. And I love what you’re saying is: No, we don’t have to invite that. We can just be clear about “This is what we’re doing, and this is the amount of time we’re doing it for and I would appreciate your support”. That’s a really nice way of approaching that. 

Jess Sherman:

And it can be anything parenting too, let’s be honest too right? You want to try a different discipline style or you want to try a different homework agenda or something like that — You’re a parent and I think, yes you have a teen. You’ve got the teachers and the doctors and the therapists and the, whatever, other parents — you’ve got people on your parenting team, but I do feel like we compare. I really just want people to parent from a place of confidence. Find the people, put the people on your team that help you with your confidence and you could say no to the others. So yeah, you need to find that confidence. 

Dr. Nicole Beurkens:

So let’s get into some other tips around challenging conversations that come up. Maybe it’s as you mentioned earlier, a situation where partners or spouses are not on the same page, and there’s some concern there, or getting our kids, having challenging conversations with our kids, we’ve been talking about teachers. So what are some other tips for navigating that? 

Jess Sherman:

So I have some real concrete tips that I think will help. The first is — the thing you don’t want is conflict. You don’t want conflict around this. Everybody’s going to lose out when this blows up into an explosion. So if you feel that coming on, someone’s challenging you and attacking you and you feel that conflict coming on, the best thing I think you can do is create a time to talk about it. Not engage in it right then and there because right then and there you’re getting all hot and flustered, you’re getting all angry — it’s just going to turn into — you’re not quite sure what’s going to come out of your mouth. You don’t have time to pause and express yourself the way you want to. So the best thing you could do would be like, “Listen — you clearly have some strong opinions. You’re on my parenting team because you’re the dad or the grandma, or the teacher or whatever. So it’s really important that we have this conversation, but I can’t have it right now.” Set a container and an expectation about when you are going to have that conversation so you can collect your thoughts. Does that make sense? 

Dr. Nicole Beurkens:

Makes perfect sense, and I think that right there a lot of people went, phew. Okay, I could handle that — I don’t have to feel put on the spot or thrown off at the moment to give ourselves permission to pause, to think about it and then to approach it another time. 

Jess Sherman:

So the other thing that I think really helps is that often, when people challenge you, it’s because they feel in some way attacked, right? They feel in some way like they are not doing a good enough job, they’re doing something wrong and so it comes across as an attack. So look for that and when you open up this conversation, it’s very hopeful to lead from a place of appreciation and say, “Listen, you are a wonderful teacher. I love what you did here, X Y Z.” If you could have practical, real examples — bring them up. Or “You’ve been an awesome dad. I love how the other day you made time for, you know, so on — because she had a really tough day” Or something appreciative to just pull them into the conversation that way so that they don’t feel — it kind of diffuses the “You’re not doing a good enough job.” 

Dr. Nicole Beurkens:

I think you’re so right. The defensiveness and to maybe give an example that people can relate to outside of their kids — that’s like the issues you run into with anyone as an adult who decides to change their eating or exercise habits, right? We know from the research that if they try to do that in isolation without a support network, that is a real fail most of the time because other people feel their own guilt, their own shame, their own stuff around you. When you’re eating healthier, you’re shining a spotlight for me on the things that I know that I need to change or maybe I’m not willing to change or maybe I’m not willing to face it and that makes me uncomfortable. So I like it better when you go out to eat with me and have two glasses of wine and eat the cake for dessert and whatever, then I don’t have to face my own stuff, right? When you’re sitting there and eating a salad and lean protein and you’re taking a pass on dessert, that makes me uncomfortable. And I think a lot of adults can relate to that. And that’s really the same thing that’s going on here with our kids, right? When you say people feel attacked, it’s sort of shining a spotlight for them — not that we mean to do that, but that’s how they’re perceiving it like, “Oh, maybe I should be thinking about what I’m feeding my own kids, right?” 

Jess Sherman:

Yeah, and I see this so often between parents. Whether they’re living together or not — More so when they’re not living together, but even when they’re living under the same roof, it shines a spotlight. This parenting thing, it is the most intense personal development journey that you’ll ever be on if you choose to look at it that way. And it’s beautiful in that way, because I mean our kids are just master reflectors, right? That can really get our defenses up, but if you let them teach you — man, it’s a journey and a half. But it brings up a lot of baggage. 

Dr. Nicole Beurkens:

So I love that tip around lead with appreciation, make the person that you’re having the conversation with feel like you appreciate them and there are things they’re doing well. That tends to cut down then on maybe the instinct to have a defensive reaction when you start talking about the food, right? 

Jess Sherman:

Yup. And then another piece that I think is helpful and it kind of goes along with that last one, is that most people don’t like to be schooled, they don’t like to be taught. So in coming up with all these facts — “Omega 3’s are really important for the brain, so our kids should be on fish oil!” Like, fact, fact, fact — a lot of people will go right back into the defensive zone, like they were just appreciated and that’s all gravy, “But it’s like we’re not doing this and this and this!” So just watch yourself for that, you might know lots of facts, but just hear it from their perspective — and this is something that we can also do with our kids. When you’re nearly barking at your kids, how does that land on them? So just being mindful of your language around — are you teaching? Or are you sharing something that you read? Are you pretending to be an expert in all of these things or are you sharing an article that you found interesting. That can really soften things as well. Again, keeping this a conversation rather than me telling you what we’re going to do next — which contradicts what I said earlier. At the very beginning, yes. You need to stay confident and be like, “Yeah, this is what we’re doing.” But that was because you were feeling attacked and you needed to own your authority. Now you’re into the conversation part where you can really pull in gentler, softer communication strategies, I guess. 

Dr. Nicole Beurkens:

So tone and the approach makes a difference, is what you’re saying, in whether these conversations are sort of a setup for conflict or argument or if it’s an opportunity for just sort of sharing and having some supportive dialogue. How we approach it in terms of our tone and our perspective makes a big difference. 

Jess Sherman:

It does. I find that it really does, because it so quickly becomes like we’re just talking about — it so quickly gets shifted to being about us as parents, that we’re not doing what we should be doing. I wish that could just get banished. Mom guilt, dad guilt — It does not serve us. What serves us is to stick to the facts, like, “Listen, we’ve got a kid who’s struggling with X, Y and Z. We’ve tried A, B, C and it’s not working. Let’s try W, X, Y.” Keep it about your child’s wellbeing, I guess is another piece of this puzzle. Keeping it about your child’s wellbeing and just constantly redirecting it, because if it turns into about us, we need to take that elsewhere. If I, all of a sudden, recognize that, oh my gosh — this isn’t a food example, but you know sometimes we’ll realize that, oh my gosh, I’m snapping at my kid all the time, I’m yelling. Why is this such a trigger for me? That’s my own stuff and contemplate and journal and figure that out. What matters most is that I don’t snap at my kid and I can maintain that relationship. So, does that make sense? I kind of feel like I went on a bit of a tangent, but do you see what I’m getting at?

Dr. Nicole Beurkens:

Absolutely, and I think it’s that piece about keeping it about the child, the child’s health and wellness, this is why we’re doing this. This isn’t an indictment of how you parent or what you serve in your classroom or it’s not about you or about me, this is about the child — and bringing it back there and keeping our stuff out of it, right?

Jess Sherman:

Yeah.

Dr. Nicole Beurkens:

So what about ideas for approaching it like when the child is saying, “I don’t want to do this!”, this is done when we’re concerned about our child’s opinion — that can cause us to waver in our confidence too. Like, I don’t want my child to be unhappy, or this is going to cause unrest or some issues — what are some tips there? Because that inevitably will happen.

Jess Sherman:

Absolutely, yeah.

Dr. Nicole Beurkens:

Did you actually meet a kid who’s like, “Oh, you know what mom? I’m so glad you raised the issue of me not eating as many vegetables and not having gluten! I’m really glad you brought that up, I’ve been meaning to talk to you about that!” Right? That’s never how that goes!

Jess Sherman:

It’s not, but when that part comes in though, and I have seen this in really miraculous ways is when kids start to feel a difference. Then they’re just like, “Maybe it’s the sugar!” I’ve had kids as young as four years old say, “Momma, I don’t think I should eat that, because it’s not going to make me feel good!” It’s miraculous when it happens. I’ve also seen kids be like, “We don’t have enough vegetables on the table.” It sounds ridiculous but I have literally seen that happen. And it happens when kids start to feel the difference in their bodies and they start to experience something different. And when the parent then can make for them that connection. 

So that’s our job. It is not our job to keep our kids happy. That’s a trap we always fall into. I tell my kids, “It’s my job to keep you healthy and safe until you’re able to do that yourself.” That’s it. “Until you can show me that you can make healthy and safe decisions, that you can keep yourself healthy and safe, I’m going to take that job on because that’s my job. That’s my role.” And then when they make a decision that is not healthy or safe, I can be like, “Ok, you’re clearly not ready to do that yet”, and this is really helpful when you get into the teen years. They have to show you that. They have to demonstrate capability in order for you to hand over the reigns. But at the same time, we can’t expect them to make decisions that are healthy and safe if we don’t teach them how to do that. There’s no reason they would know why vegetables are important. There’s no reason for them to know why sugar is so bad for their brain if we don’t teach them.

Dr. Nicole Beurkens:

So this confidence applies to how we talk about it with them too, not just our interactions with our partner or with other adults, but this confidence applies to how we talk about it with them too. Not just our interactions with our partners or with other adults, but this confidence with our kids, as you were saying before, they sense if we’re wavering, right? So even if we think that they’re going to be unhappy with it or whatever, to still have the confidence to say this is what we’re doing for this amount of time, and to just move forward with it even if they want to argue, negotiate, whatever. 

Jess Sherman:

Yeah, and to know what you’re looking for, right? So you can start to draw some conclusions, because it might not be that, “Oh, look, the tantrums disappeared.” It might be much more subtle than that. It might be that, “Oh, they’re sleeping better.” Or “Oh, they’re pooping better, well their skin cleared up. So know what you’re looking for and here’s just another little tip I’ll throw out there for people is that generally speaking, this is very general, but I like to boil things down into simple: Look at the skin, the bowels and the behavior. Right? That’s usually when we start to make diet changes or changes around the home, that’s where — and look at all three: Skin, bowel and behavior. And with behavior, that includes sleep. So know what you’re looking for and be the one you can start to — I think this came from my experiential education background, which is with experiential ed, we’re always about you. Immerse a child in an experience and facilitate their understanding of what that experience means. So as facilitators. They can draw some of their own conclusions, but we can also help them distill meaning out of an experience — that’s what you can do as parents is, “Hmm! Interesting! You pooped three times today when usually, you don’t poop everyday! Interesting!” Not as a schooling thing, but just as a curiosity. 

Dr. Nicole Beurkens:

Right, and even with older kids, I’ll say, “What are you noticing?” Or “Boy, you just had that interaction did you notice anything different about that?” Often, they do notice it. I know it happens with my own kids, I know that with kids in the clinic. I love what you’re talking about giving them the experience, which is up to us to do. That’s the piece of us having the confidence to say, “This is the experience we’re going to have. We’re going to try doing X, Y or Z for four weeks.” And then allowing them facilitating their discovery along the way of how that is for them and what they experience with that. It’s a really powerful process. To me, it comes at it from more of a curious point of view, as opposed to a punitive or whatever, because so often, that’s how kids and adults immediately internalize that, right? You’re taking things away from me, you’re making everything hard, you’re saying that I’m bad or that the things that I eat are bad, and it’s more about just getting curious, I think, about how these dots connect and how our bodies and our brains are working — and that’s a much more supportive and beneficial way to go through the process, as opposed to “You’re taking everything away.” 

Jess Sherman:

Yeah, and there are a couple of things in there I’d love to pull out. One is that my kids have taught me and my students taught me this too, and it hit me like a ton of bricks when I had kids — that when you have an experience, so let’s say a child has tummy pain, and then they poop, then their tummy pain is gone, instead of me saying, “Oh, well that’s because you were stopped up in your lower colon and the microbes were doing this or that”, if me just saying, “Huh. Interesting.” It is so much more powerful — and my kids have done this, two days later. They’re like, “Hey, you know what, mom? I think when I poop, my tummy doesn’t hurt!” Like, “Oh, really!” It’s so much more powerful, where if I was to teach them what’s going on with their gut — shutdown. 

Dr. Nicole Beurkens:

For adults too, but especially with children — when they connect the dots, when they make the discovery for themselves, so much more powerful than when we try to tell them. So I love that you’re commenting on that, yes. 

Jess Sherman:

Yeah, you’ve said something else too I’d love to pick up on. It was something about nourishing, paying attention to what we’re eating, rather than what we’re taking out and that is such a key point, and it’s something that’s become a cornerstone of how I work with parents, is that we always start with what are we eating?, versus what are we taking out? And this connects with that conversation we were just having about challenging conversations. They’re very challenging. When you’re talking about taking stuff out of someone’s diet than when you’re talking about putting stuff in a child’s diet. So the conversation of “Listen, I think we should try eating more vegetables at dinner. Let’s maybe put three choices out and make sure that the kids try at least one of them”, that is a much easier thing to agree on than “We’re going to take sugar out of our home.” So we always, always start with “How are we nourishing our kids?” As I mentioned at the start, there are irritants. There are lots of irritants that are causing stress to the body, so it’s at some point worth exploring that, but it’s very very rarely where I start.

Dr. Nicole Beurkens:

Right. And it’s because that’s the harder piece of it and there’s so much judgement on the part of everybody around that, so even with those challenging conversations with extended family members, friends, school people, whatever — to be able to focus around, “Here’s what we are eating. Here are all the things that my child is still eating/here are the new things that we’re eating”, that often I think too, takes people out of that punitive or defensive sort of posture and talks about, well here are all the things that we can do, here are all the thing that are okay for my child to eat at your house. Here are all the things that we can do for classroom treats, and focusing on what we can do as opposed to people getting overwhelmed or defensive when we talk about what we’re not going to do. So I like that too. The focus on what we can do, what we are going to do, what is included in the food plan. 

Jess Sherman:

Yeah, it’s a whole lot easier, and the whole exclusion piece too, that’s where you get gaslighted because of the over research. Because there are studies that sugar is okay, there are studies that it’s not. There are studies that gluten is okay, there are studies that it’s not. So I’ve got lots on my blog about that, but yeah, you will be challenged for sure when you suggest you’re going to take something out of your child’s diet — you will probably not be challenged when you focus on what you’re putting into your child’s diet.

Dr. Nicole Beurkens:

So an easier place to start. I love that. As we wrap up, any other tips or thoughts that we didn’t get to that you want to make sure to share around this idea of supporting people with challenging conversations?

Jess Sherman:

Well, I think really maybe just leaving on the note that this will happen, this is a part of the journey. Having these challenging conversations is a part of the journey. I can’t really imagine it not — because it’s a change. And best case scenario is that you have everybody in your child’s sphere of influence on board with what you’re doing — that’s awesome. I definitely see faster, deeper progress when that’s the case. Second best case scenario is they will tolerate it. Like the people around you don’t quite understand it and think you’re a little nuts but they’ll tolerate it and they’ll do the best they can to support you. If you’re in that — a third category which is you’re a lone wolf trying to scream from the rooftops that this matters and everybody around you is sabotaging your efforts — that’s a very challenging… challenging isn’t even a strong-enough word. It’s a challenging place to be in. 

So if you’re there, you need some support, because if you find yourself saying, and I get these emails a lot: “I know that this matters, I know there is something going on with my child’s brain that is food-related with their gut — but everybody is sabotaging me left right and center”. Then you can’t make changes from that place. It’s going to be hitting your head against the wall. So you’re going to have to have some of these really challenging conversations, and I hope that some of the tips here help. Some practical ways to have those conversations because like I said at the start, this matters so much. I would love for us to get to a point where it’s just the norm. As soon as a child struggles or starts to struggle, it’s like — what are they eating? How are they eating? How are they connecting? Are they eating something that’s irritating them? What’s going on in the gut? The research is, again, we have — there’s no reason that we shouldn’t be doing that kind of an assessment for kids, but reality is that you have to look for it if you want it. 

Dr. Nicole Beurkens:

I think these tips have been really helpful and give people some practical things that they can take into these conversations or some ways of thinking about it, and that’s awesome. And I know that you have a website filled with resources for families. You mentioned a couple of blog articles, I know you’ve got videos, you’ve got some handouts, just all kinds of things. So I want to make sure that people know where they can find out more about your work, where they can access these resources. 

Jess Sherman:

So a couple of different ways. So my blog is at jesssherman.com. If you search the blog for “Family” you’ll find a couple of blog posts and videos, just on this topic. Because this is such a big stumbling block for parents, a couple of years ago, I really tackled it and did a bunch of Facebook lives on it and stuff and I wrote a summary. So you can find that at jesssherman.com/family and it’s just a summary, a — literally, script that you can modify to your own reality. Some talking points, some things to look out for for these conversations because this will stop your project dead in its tracks. And then the third place you can find me is in our Facebook community, which is a free community, it’s raisingresiliencecommunity.com and that’s just a place to get curious about no matter what stage you’re at with this. It’s parents who want to up level their children’s health. A lot of them are struggling with neurodevelopment or anxiety or learning issues. Some of them aren’t. Some are just exploring food and nourishment. That’s where we’re having our conversations. 

Dr. Nicole Beurkens:

Love it. And the book Raising Resilience is available where?

Jess Sherman:

raisingresilience.ca, is my book, which is called Raising Resilience.

Dr. Nicole Beurkens:

Yeah, an awesome resource available where books are sold too. Fantastic! Jess, I can’t thank you enough for taking the time to talk with me today. Really, really great information and helpful tips, so thank you so much. 

Jess Sherman:

Thanks so much for having me. 

Dr. Nicole Beurkens:

And thanks to all of you for listening to this episode. We’ll see you back here next time.