The Growing Pains Podcast
Growing a business and a family? Join host Alyson Caffrey as she interviews mompreneurs who have scaled businesses and juggled life at home. Having it all may seem like a pipedream, but we are making it happen every day. Tune in and fold time in that carpool line!
The Growing Pains Podcast
Nourishing Your Body and Soul With Kim Shapira
Do you struggle to maintain a healthy relationship with food while juggling parenthood and entrepreneurship? Kim Shapira joins me this week to dish out some game-changing insights. As a renowned dietitian and author, Kim shares her journey from private practice to publishing and reveals how to nourish both our bodies and our ambitions. We dive into positive eating habits for kids, building business confidence, and even touch on women's health as we age. Get ready for a feast of practical wisdom that'll leave you feeling empowered and inspired!
Topics covered in this episode:
- Kim's journey as a dietitian and nutritionist.
- The importance of a healthy relationship with food.
- Parenting and fostering positive eating habits in children.
- Entrepreneurship and building confidence in business.
- Approaching menopause and hormone health.
CONNECT WITH KIM:
https://www.kimshapiramethod.com/
https://www.instagram.com/kimshapiramethod/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/kim-shapira/
RESOURCES FROM ALYSON:
The Kid-Proof Business Checklist
https://alysoncaffrey.com/checklist
Maternity Leave Planning Guide
https://www.mastermaternityleave.com/guide
Hey and welcome back to the growing pains podcast. I'm your host, Allison Caffrey, and today I sit down with Kim.
Speaker 2:Shapira Kim is a dietician and registered nutritionist based in LA.
Speaker 1:And she's also the author of the book. This is what you're really hungry for. You guys, we jump into all things growing a business, having a family, nourishing your body with food that actually doesn't make you feel bad in your mind and in your soul. She has, actually. I'm going to just read her bio because it is like super, super impressive what she's been able to do. So Kim's formal education includes a bachelor of science in kinesthesiology from Tulane University and a master's in human metabolism and clinical nutrition from Boston University. For almost three decades, kim has been helping people lose weight and keep it off, both in her private career practice, hospitals, sports clinics, addiction centers and universities, as a moderator or guest expert For Yahoo.
Speaker 2:Just Jenny Sky News, vanity Fair, popsugar podcasts and more.
Speaker 1:she's applied her education by running six simple rules, so we are breaking everything down in this podcast.
Speaker 1:We talk about getting kiddos to eat and make really, really healthy choices for their body, for their mind and for their souls. We talk a little bit about menopause. We talk about growing and running a business, the fear of stepping into a more public sphere. You guys, Kim brings it, and she's such a powerhouse mom. I cannot wait for you guys to hear this episode and I'll see you inside. Are you juggling the challenges of running a business while raising your little ones? Do you crave more ease in balancing your professional ambitions with the demands of parenthood? Well, sit tight, You're in the right place. I'm your host, Alison Caffrey, and I understand the growing pains that come with building a business while nurturing a growing household. Think of this as a soft spot to land when you feel like your ambitions are starting to become just a little overwhelming. Welcome to Growing Pains a little overwhelming.
Speaker 2:Welcome to Growing Pains, Kim. Thank you so much for joining me on Growing Pains. I am so excited to have you here. I'm so happy to be here. This is going to be a fun conversation, I think. Oh, I think so too. Honestly. I am so excited about asking you all of the questions. But before we really dive into your business and how you serve your clients and all of the fun nutrition stuff I really want to know before we kind of get into it, tell me a little bit about your business and a little bit about your family at home. Okay, so I'm 51 and I've been in private practice I'm a registered dietitian for over like 25 years and I see clients privately and in group settings, and my first book came out about a year ago, so it's a toddler. So I'm raising a book at the same time as I'm raising three children, and my book is called this is what You're Really Hungry For. So I have three children, a toddler, three teenagers, a toddler, a husband and a full practice.
Speaker 2:Did you always know that you wanted to work for yourself, or was this something that just kind of came up through your experience? No, I mean, I didn't always know that, which is a really interesting thing, but it turns out I'm much better at being my own boss than working for somebody else, isn't that true? I can't even imagine looking back now, like I've been on my own for seven years operations agency will be seven this year and I can't imagine looking back. I know I have one my oldest daughter's, 20, and she's a junior and the conversation is like are you going to create your own business when you get out? And what does that look like? Rather than like, what kind of company do you want to work for? Like, I just want her to have like that entrepreneurial mindset. And then my middle one, who's applying to colleges, I'm like do you want to be working with, collaborating with other people at the table, or do you want your own hours? And she's like I just want to travel. Like, oh no, I mean that's pretty entrepreneurial too. I mean I've gone some places for workshops and meetups and things that I never could have thought of. So I think travel, especially now right with remote and laptop lifestyle being a very accessible thing. I'm sure your middle child can find some sweet spot there. So true, so true.
Speaker 2:But I have to tell you, to be honest with you, I didn't really realize I had my own business or thought about that, until about four or five years ago. I just went every day Because I didn't have that green, that business mentality. What changed? I'm not entirely sure, I think burnout. I think burnout, yeah, because I was writing a book, launching a book, moving and doing it essentially alone. So that's when I started thinking about it. Yeah, that's interesting. So why the realization, I guess, that you have a business? Was it just like you tallying up and reconciling with all of the responsibilities that you had, or was there this moment of like? I can't let myself burn out like this. I am my business. Yes and yes.
Speaker 2:And I heard a quote that from one of my clients books, and the quote was something about being a farmer versus a miner. Miner is just somebody who goes and hits the same rock every day and a farmer is someone who plants seeds and kind of waters and watches them bloom. And it dawned on me that, oh my gosh, I've been a miner for so many years and I didn't. I wasn't educated and nobody guided me, nobody showed me that I could have been a farmer at the same time and you know, I've always kind of held myself back in the sense that I really never loved going to a dermatologist or getting a facial and they sold me products and I never wanted to be a salesman. So that kind of like really got in my own way a little bit, because there are so many things that I do believe in that every one of us should have and I could just talk about those things. But I got in my own way in so many ways. One of my coaches talks about selling like if you had the cure for cancer, would you go and beat down everybody's door that you knew had cancer, to literally be like you need this now and like connect people with that resource. With the same conviction and I agree with you, kim I had a really rocky start when it came to like selling in the beginning and like really owning the fact that, like I have a solution for problems that people have and like being so convicted about that it did.
Speaker 2:It felt challenging because I wasn't even sure like I believed in me yet, especially like in the very early days I was like how do I believe?
Speaker 2:So, how did you overcome some of that stuff?
Speaker 2:How did you start to really, you know, lean in? I'm, I'm, I think I'm what you call a late bloomer, right, you know? And I think I started doing a radio show regularly and it was hitting home to so many people and it really just kind of gave me more and more confidence because I had just been working privately, working one-on-one, and I knew I was, you know, had a very, you know, robust practice, and that was fine. But then when I started talking about it publicly and people started saying, oh my God, that changed my life or this is really working, then I started, you know, really getting more and more confident.
Speaker 2:But artists, it's very scary being an artist and you know, in my ego I was a dietitian who worked in a private practice and now I'm somebody who is talking on social media and also publishing a book, and my kids are all cringing at every different pivot that I'm taking, like, oh my God, mom, you should not be dancing on TikTok. Don't they know that's what it takes to grow an account, don't they know that? Yeah, it's all so fun it is, and you know it's super interesting. So I definitely want to back up for a second because I think you said something really, really great that I want to double click on is that it was when you started helping more people, like on a mass scale, that you really started believing.
Speaker 2:Right, okay, I have this process. Right, I know you have your Kim Shapiro method, which is amazing, right. And so was it then that you started to kind of stress test it. And then you're like, whoa, this actually could work outside of, like me being super involved in this one on one practice. Yes, and one of my clients dared me to kind of just start speaking more on social media, and it was. That was.
Speaker 2:That was a big moment for me. I'm a middle child and I never really felt super confident. I don't think you know which is really one of those like triggers, emotional triggers and if we go back into the psychology, you know, of my life. And so she dared me to go on Instagram and do a story and I was so nervous about it because, thinking, who wants to see my face talk about this? And then, when I decided I had something that was so important to say there's that conviction that it didn't matter and nobody had an expectation of what I was supposed to look like I really had to, like reconcile that and put that together and once I did, I decided I wasn't going to go back and look at my story. I wasn't going to judge or critique anything I put on social media. I was just going to do it, even if it was glitchy, even if I wasn't like whatever expectation I had in my head. And then all of a sudden I started like lowering my expectations because I stopped worrying what people were thinking, because I wasn't paying attention to it. Yeah, you know, I struggle so much with the social media thing, transparently, because I am super regimented and so if I don't have it locked into my calendar to contribute on social media, it just literally does not happen because I don't think about it, and so adding in a regimen with inspiration feels really, really challenging.
Speaker 2:So did you strike a balance there somewhere? Give me the good because I need to. Well, I mean I hired a team. So I mean so yeah, once I started seeing, okay, this is actually worth talking about and sharing, then I, then I hired a team, I got an assistant and then, you know, in the process of writing my book, I, my publishing house had a publicist. Like it all just became so much more and I had so many people supporting me that it really it became much easier. That had to be a light bulb moment too, right, everyone is behind this thing. I was talking about this on the pod, I think, a couple episodes ago.
Speaker 2:But, like, when you have conviction, it's so much easier to attract other people who will support and follow, versus if you're like, hey, we kind of support people with how they nourish their bodies, and if you don't speak convictedly about what you're doing and the problems you're solving and the lives you're changing, then it's hard to attract people like publishers to back your book, or teammates to back your idea, or social media experts who are going to generate new ideas and filter questions people are asking into new pieces of content. So do you start to feel that flywheel effect? Once you got really convicted, as soon as I sold my book, I was like, oh my gosh, this is happening and you have to start telling people you're actually an author. Once you kind of step into it, everything changes.
Speaker 2:But it's really funny because we do develop these emotional triggers in the first six years of our life and I am exactly what I teach. I am exactly learning along with it, if that makes sense, and so I don't believe in perfection. Yet I did hold myself to this like higher accountability, until I realized I was doing it. But I think, like you know I let me put it this way I was at a party a couple of years ago with somebody I went to high school with, who I didn't really talk to in high school, but she was in my friend group and she was never really that nice to me, and the only thing she said to me at the party was wow, kim, you got confident. It was the best compliment I'd ever heard in my entire life.
Speaker 2:It's such a silly thing to say and it's like not that nice even, but like it was the nicest thing I've ever heard. But it's a little thing, right, because they can observe you leaning into what you're really, really great at and holding that conviction which is so great it feels. You know, we don't often get, I think, those like external validations of like something we know to be true in our hearts, but it's really really juicy when we do yeah, yeah, I mean I've been leaning into that ever since I'm like, look at me, good, well, let's. I want to talk about too, like fostering the entrepreneurial spirit with your kids, right? So you've, you've now gone through. You've obviously got a very successful practice. You've been able to change a lot of lives with your material, which we got to talk about food at some point. So we'll get there. We'll get there. But you know, talk about that with your kids. So you know it's hard, right, it's hard in the beginning. You've got lots of self-doubt.
Speaker 2:I've always said that that entrepreneurship is like one of the most incredible practices in self-awareness and you know personal growth that literally exists out there, and so are they having some of those feelings, you know, as your kids are thinking about maybe working for themselves. Are they really troubled and confronted by that lack of confidence or the maybe I can't do it mentality? Really interesting. I think you know my whole person only had different parts that were not confident but like putting my face forward felt not confident but like the way that I was in my personal life and in my practice was fully confident. And so when I to backtrack a little bit, I never really cared so much about food and all of the things about food I ate when I was hungry and I didn't worry so much about my weight and food. I didn't have that going on in my mind or in my life.
Speaker 2:But when I was 12, I was sick and I ended up in the hospital having multiple reconstructive surgeries. 12, I was sick and I ended up in the hospital having multiple reconstructive surgeries. And for about four years, all through high school, after that eighth grade year, I would go and see my specialist at UCLA and somewhere in high school and this is really where my lack of confidence you know it kind of stemmed from and my older sister used to always tell me that I was really really ugly and unlovable and adopted Like she would just kind of, you know, brutal. But so anyway, somewhere in high school one of my mentors he a doctor said to me you know, food can make people sick and healthy. And it was something I latched onto very, very early when I was young, that I was just going to be healthy, I was no longer going to be sick, and it was something that I wanted to also give to the rest of the world, because I had so many amazing doctors who had helped me that I didn't want to be a doctor, but I wanted to pay it forward. And so this is the kind of the way I chose my profession.
Speaker 2:And I started my profession before I became a mother and early on in my practice one of my very first clients was a therapist and she was older than me and had a bigger business than me, and I put her on a diet and she lost 30 pounds and we changed her metabolic dysfunction. Her cholesterol went down, her blood sugar is regulated, everything normalized. And then she said at the end I'm going to gain the weight back. And it triggered me on every level and I thought why, why would you do this? And she said my husband wants to be intimate with me all the time and I was molested as a child, and so it was one of those pivotal moments for me in my practice where I was like I can no longer put people on diets and I didn't know that diets were harmful because I didn't ever diet and so.
Speaker 2:I realized I really needed to understand what people were going through in their life, and it became more about spiritual psychology and quantum physics and neuroscience for me, and being mindful and knowing where your mind was and was it in the same place as your body? And so then I had my first child and I had always wanted girls. I have three daughters. I feel so blessed in that and I feel like there's also a cliche with a dietician and daughters. And my father-in-law always would say things like talk about body weight, and he would talk about his own weight and he would use the word fat. These were not words I grew up hearing or talking about. I knew about eating disorders. I fully understood that, but they weren't part of my normal conversation and I wasn't a judge. I didn't think about things, and so very early on in my marriage I laid down the law and said these words are not usable in my house and if you use them you're not welcome here. And so it became really easy for me to influence my children, because we had a pantry full of any kind of food imaginable and we just called it food. We didn't call it good, bad, junk, healthy, unhealthy. We didn't talk about anything other than you eat when you're hungry and we'll provide all the food that you like, without judgment, and it's always available, right. So I can't even remember the beginning of this conversation, but the point is is that I have kind of been teaching my kids to be in their own body and to have their own journeys in life. I'm there kind of to support them, but I can't save them right. I can just give them the tools, and that's kind of how I parented them, in the same way that I've been kind of in my own practice and in my own life, if that makes sense, I love that. Giving them tools but not saving them is definitely something I pulled from what you said, especially as they get older. Giving them tools but not saving them is definitely something I pulled from what you said, especially as they get older, because I mean, I have two little boys mine are four and two.
Speaker 2:Like I can only let Frank do certain things before he makes a total mess of the kitchen or break something right, and so, like, when did you know it was time to move the boundary right when, like, you were doing something for them but now you're not, because they're capable of doing it on their own. Was it like a? I remember when we moved Frank, my older son, to the crib out of like the bassinet in our room and all of our friends were like we're keeping our kids in for six months, we're keeping our kids in for 12 months or whatever, and I'm like I need my space, like kids going in the crib, like he's totally safe in there. So we did it at eight weeks and it was just like a overnight decision. But none of the other areas have been that cut and dry ever since, like not one.
Speaker 2:I think each one is different, right, like I definitely screwed up the sleep with Olivia, who's 20.
Speaker 2:And then when Sophia came, I separated really early and gave her, you know, a blankie and just did it differently. But she also I had to hire a second nanny because she wouldn't take a bottle, so she had to come with me to work because she's always been very strong and you know she and I are very similar energies and so we can immediately go into an anger place if we don't like breathe when we're trying to communicate, you know she's the one that always is a little tricky for me and I didn't. It took me about three or four years into her life before I realized we can change the way we respond to each other and we have a tool for that Right. But, like for, I think, for each one of our, my kids, it's different and they have to be open to it too, but I'm constantly trying to better my relationship with them and the way that I respond to it. I am so far from perfect. So far from perfect, but I mean it's a work in progress.
Speaker 2:Right it always is, sophia will say to me. She has in fact said to me in her she's in high school and she said to me my psychology teacher is going to be such a good mom. She like knows all the right things to say and do. And I'm like, oh yeah, I'm like, how do you think I'm doing? And she'm like, oh yeah, I'm like, do you, how do you think I'm doing? And she's like, oh, please, you know, but she has no idea that all the ways in which I protected her and taking care of her around food and her relationship with food and you know that'll at some point in her life she will see it she did say to me at one point, like, why do people worry about being fat? So like, so it's all so interesting it is.
Speaker 2:I think our relationship with food for sure I agree with you has so much to do with how we're wired as a human being, and I've got to ask for the moms listening, because it's something that's top of mind for me is like the good bad, right? I mean, there are foods that are not healthy for you, right? We can all agree that with that at least. Maybe I see your face like, and I really want to hear what your take is on this because, honestly, my half of what we do when we fill our pantry is I'm just like reading labels and reading labels and reading labels, and always trying to eliminate, eliminate, eliminate but then fill up with any food that feels like it's easy to consume when we need it, but it feels like it has one, maybe five ingredients, right, like really really simple stuff, and so that feels, I mean, my husband, bless his heart, he takes like the actual brunt of this, Like he's made it his actual job to make sure that we all are like nourished human beings and like all the time we're like this is good, this is bad, this is good, this is bad.
Speaker 2:So how do we get out of that? And why is good, bad or healthy, not healthy, challenging, oh God? So everything that we hear and think and act and do is a projection of what someone else thinks and feels and hears and acts, and so we don't really know what's ours and what's theirs. And I grew up with, you know, ding-dongs and Twinkies and like a million different things in my pantry. I didn't eat them.
Speaker 1:I didn't eat them.
Speaker 2:But they were in my pantry, and you know who ate them the people who couldn't eat them because. But they were in my pantry, and you know who ate them the people who couldn't eat them because they weren't in their pantry. And so, like we, my pantry is full and my kids will say we have no food. But their friends who come over, who don't have that food, they see it differently. And so if a parent is labeling a food, which is what happens, right, then the child feels shame when they eat it, and that's what we're trying to avoid. And so I'm going to give you an example. Olivia, very early on we would go to the mall and she would ask for a pretzel. Dietitian side of me is like eh, I wish I had brought like something else, but here I am living my life, and so I'm like great, let's go get a pretzel. And she would say you know what my stomach hurts? And then I would say to her huh, I wonder if it's a pretzel, let's try eating half and see if you still get a stomachache next time. And she remembered that because I didn't say no, I didn't say it was bad, I didn't talk about the butter on the outside of it. I didn't talk about the salt, I didn't talk about it. I said let's just try it next time. The next time we came, she said I'm going to try eating half and see if I get a stomach ache. And she did. And she said I don't think I'm going to eat that pretzel anymore. And I said let's find something else to eat. And we moved right on. And you know she's 20 years old and she really doesn't make the decision to eat those pretzels anymore. Sometimes she'd be curious to see if she would still get a stomachache and that's how it goes. So we don't have to say it's bad because it might not be bad for somebody. And if you eat a really well-balanced diet, your body knows how to handle that and it just gets rid of the chemicals, as long as you're consistent. It's the inconsistency and the way that we think about food that actually creates more stress in our body. Yeah, cause I'm thinking I have a really similar story, but we're like in the thick of the transition right now.
Speaker 2:My son, frank, ate something that didn't agree with him and then he got we'll call them. He calls them spider poops. So we're going to get we're going to get pretty serious here, pretty gross. So it's just obviously an unwanted or uncomfortable poop, right, it was not sitting well in his stomach, so he names it spider poop. And so whenever we have something that might not sit well in his stomach or whatever, we say, hey, maybe this is going to give you spider poops, and then he'll be like I don't want spider poops. So then, but am I like encouraging fear of foods that are going to make him feel bad, or should I really just pull back and be like go for it and then we'll deal with the spider poops later? Yeah, I mean, I would.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I would try and see if there's like a pattern with the types of food that are doing it. So you know, it turns out Olivia is sensitive to gluten Now, not everybody is sensitive to gluten and she doesn't have celiac, but she does have a sensitivity. And so you know, I saw it where she had reflux as a baby. I saw it where she had rashes, right, I didn't know what was going on at the time, but it was there. And you know, all three of my kids are C-section babies, so they missed out on like that vaginal like you know all of them.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, who knows? And so there could be sensitivities temper like, are very temporary, where food allergies never go away, and so if we do things to heal our gut, in general it should be better. But it usually can be like an Achilles and it can come back if we're not careful. But I wouldn't, I don't know For you. I would just say like I just want you to be mindful and see how you feel now and then I want you to pay attention to how you feel after. I would just say like I just want you to be mindful and see how you feel now and then I want you to pay attention to how you feel after. But the problem is the food could affect you up to two to four hours after you eat it and for three days, and so you might have something for breakfast and then have lunch and then feel sick and think it was your lunch, it was your breakfast, or it could have been your breakfast two days ago, so it gets so wild.
Speaker 2:So how do you pinpoint, like when you work with your clients? Is it like lots of testing, lots of journal, like food journaling, that kind of thing? Or what's your process like? I mean it can be, I work more, like there's a food sensitivity test that I love, but I also love like adding foods to people's diets, like anything with omega threes, like flaxseed, chia seed, hemp seed, fermented foods. Like anything with omega-3s like flaxseed, chia seed, hemp seed, fermented foods.
Speaker 2:Like having a diverse amount of fruits and vegetables and definitely having whole grains so it can weigh, because the last thing I want to do is make somebody feel restricted because they're like there's this emotional part of us and our physical part of us and our physical body, if we feel restricted, is going to cause us to feel like our survival is at risk and then we're going to end up binging. Yeah, do you have people that come to you? I mean still probably, like I want to lose weight or I want to lose 30 pounds, like how do we go from that to let's get a better relationship with food? Like I feel like that's such a different mindset. Same mindset, I hope you know I have one client that I've been seeing for four years. Mindset, I hope you know I have one client that I've been seeing for four years and she is in her forties and she's had a raging eating disorder her entire life and you know she's neurodivergent. She has anxiety. She never thought she could do this and she has managed to lose 50 pounds. It took about a year, I think, it was like during COVID, and I still see her once a month, sometimes every eight weeks, and we just do check-ins and you know, to maintain, and she's constantly still working, you know, on on that relationship, as am I, as am I, and things change all the time. Yeah, it's so incredible, I think.
Speaker 2:What is the difference been? I think, with your practice specifically? I know we talked about like your business and the confidence and all of that. But like, once your books started coming out and like really getting into the hands of people that you may never work one-on-one with ever or even know about, you know, what was that pressure Like? I mean distilling down some of these very personal right, very personal experiences, very personal backgrounds, and then being able to kind of apply a set of logic via a book to kind of help all of these folks.
Speaker 2:Like, what, what was that like for you? I mean, writing the book was hard, editing the book was painful, harder, yeah, the hardest, and my agent and my publisher said to me we're not looking for a bestseller. So they lowered my expectations immediately. And then they said we're not looking for a bestseller. So they lowered my expectations immediately. And then they said we're looking for longevity. And then, when my book was born, it came out, they said today is the birthday and now you treat it like a baby and you have to make sure that you're taking care of it.
Speaker 2:And so for me, like that part was like really fun to watch get into people's hands who have suffered at all around food or their health. The title is called this Is what You're Really Hungry For, and I think that everyone is hungry for health. They want to be well, you know, and it's very complicated and there's a lot of noise, but it's really not that complicated if we could just listen to our own bodies and shut out the noise. We've we never really paid attention, honestly, until we were trying to conceive with our first son, frank. It took us quite a while, and so I read a couple of books about like bodily health and egg quality and all the things, and so we really started looking more seriously at our diet and what we consume, the products we were using, all of these different things, and I remember from basically that point on, like in the beginning and then forward, being almost addicted to being healthy.
Speaker 2:Like I was, like there was this, like instant gratification of knowing that I was making a choice that was good for my body, right, I know we talked about good, bad and that being a challenge, but like it, just, it just felt to me, like I was like whoa, I felt like I got awoken to something. Yeah, pardon me, well, it's interesting and and I think that there is this awoken piece. If you could say that, like I think you have to have that solid foundation, but I think there has to be and I say this word in my a lot of my clients have asked me to start using a different word. So I always say normal eating, and they've asked me to use the word neutral eating, which is interesting. So I'm working on that right now, but in my mind, I think it's really normal to have birthday cake. I think it's really normal to have pizza. I think it's really normal to be away and to eat more than you normally would.
Speaker 2:Those are normal things to me, and if you can allow yourself to live and feel normal or neutral, then what's happening is you're creating more stress in your body, and that is the piece that I'm trying to prevent, right? So stress can be perceived like there's somebody who is walking with a knife and that scares me. It can be imaginary, like I'm afraid of what my travel is going to look like in two weeks. It can be physical, like I'm in pain and all three of those stresses. Your body can't tell the difference and it puts you in fight or flight and like, honestly, we are, we're spending like 90% of our day in fight or flight, when we're supposed to be spending 10% of our day. We're supposed to be resilient. So, like in your scenario, like it would be great to know that I can make these changes in my body. But it's also more if you're having fun in the process, and that's the paradox.
Speaker 2:People who are looking at people who are healthy or living the life or doing the thing, they're seeing it being hard. But the people who are living the life like you, let's say, are finding it fun, and that's great. That's how it should be are finding it fun, and that's great. That's how it should be. I'm having more fun being healthy than I would be if I was sick.
Speaker 2:It's incredible that that one comment from that doc really is just like the is the foundation, right, or the bedrock of, of how you're viewing food, because it really can be that simple. Yeah, I think it is that simple because you know almost every disease is a metabolic dysregulation and so just by losing weight, you're putting your body back into normal, regulation, right, and it doesn't necessarily matter what you're eating when your body fat and your weight are normal, obviously, like I have one client who eats a frappuccino and chewy bars and cake pops and you know, yesterday we were talking about what you were talking about earlier, like reading a food label. Most people don't know how to read a food label. They don't know what to look for, and the truth is, what you should be looking for are the things under the second bold line, which are the vitamins and minerals and then fiber. Is your food actually giving you nutrition? And the fact that we need 100% of all of these vitamins and minerals and your food is giving you 1% or 5%. I wonder if this is contributing to the way that you feel what would happen if we started manipulating our diet with things that you still loved but had these nutrients in them?
Speaker 2:How do you deal with folks who have really hard like, who need hard boundaries, like those addictive personalities, the people who are like well, if I have one slice of pizza, it's going to turn into sex, right? How does that work with diet, cause I imagine that's gotta be it. How does that work with diet, because I imagine that's got to be it. Yeah, so that's such a good question. But you know, one thing that I always love to use my kids also find cringy would also be to say, like, where's your body? And then to say it's right here. And then to say where is your mind? And it's on the six pieces of pizza. And if your mind is over there thinking about six pieces of pizza, but your body's over here, like how do you even know you need them? And you know our mind, as soon as we feel unsafe, jumps out and tries to like save the moment in the most pleasurable way. And so then we have to look at fear and FOMO and joy of missing, like missing out all the things. Right, but if you've restricted pizza, you're going to, of course, binge it, but if you're allowed to have pizza every day of the week, you're no longer going to want the pizza you are. But what if you had a salad? And what if you knew you were having it again tomorrow. There's a trust that comes in. It makes total sense. I got to ask you, kim, and then I want to hear about what's next with this stage of life and the kids and the business. But trending really well right now is zero alcohol, super high trend.
Speaker 2:Lots of folks who are really, you know, loud voices in the health and wellness industry are like alcohol is poison. We're going to look at this like we looked at cigarettes, you know all those years ago. Talk to me about that. How does folks relationship with alcohol? Cause I mean it is nutrition right In some form or fashion. What's your take?
Speaker 2:Well, I mean, I love synchronicities, first of all, and I've done three different like what are they Workshops this year with? Like non-drinkers, so not calling themselves alcoholics, but are in the non-drinking space. And I've never had a label. But I'm not a huge drinker at all. I mean, you know, back in the day, but at this point I might have like there could be years where I'm not drinking. I just don't think about it. Poison is interesting, interesting choice of words. I don't think it's that far off from that. And as we get older we actually make less alcohol. Dehydrogenase, which is the enzyme that we need in our body to break it down. So most people are starting to recognize I used to be able to drink, but now I can't drink and that's missing that enzyme. And alcoholics actually have a very high amount of alcohol dehydrogenase, which is really interesting, interesting, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:So, as far as like, from a health perspective, it comes down to sleep for me, and alcohol 100% interferes with the quality of your sleep and I'm always making a choice of, like how am I going to feel after I do this? And alcohol, if it's going to increase the you know my sinus passages and make it hard for me to breathe, that's then I'm not going to want it, cause I don't. I don't want to feel hung over tomorrow. I don't want to feel sick. Yeah, I don't even know where to go with alcohol. It's. I love this, this mocktail world, I think. But I'm also worried about, like, the consumption of, like, empty calories.
Speaker 2:But, also like I think having that option is amazing. It gives people permission to not have alcohol and I think we need that. People need that permission. Yeah, I think it's been something that I've seen so much more recently, like we don't need alcohol to have a good time. So many barbecues and parties and things I've gone to, it hasn't been like bring your own. It's just like we're not going to mention this anymore because people really don't like this is great, I love it. Yeah, it's, it's been so fun.
Speaker 2:So tell me about what next steps are. I know that you're like I mean, you're probably in a new season, right? Your kids are older, you've got your books are out, you've got this toddler that now you're kind of nurturing into the world. So, like, what's next for the business? What are you really excited about? Well, now I'm in a farming business, so I'm very excited about farming, right. So you know, like you were talking about the cure that can you know for cancer. I feel like I have these like how do we age well? Ideas and these products that are coming, and I'm just excited about all the farming that I'm doing and the collaborations with people. So I think there's so much to come. That's incredible. So did you purchase a farm or you've partnered with a farm? The farm is, in my two, related to your mind, okay. Okay, we're on the analogy of the farm because we are actually planning to purchase land and start a ranch. So I was like, oh my gosh, this is incredible. Another farmer. But I agree with you. I love that analogy, the farmer analogy of planting the seeds and seeing what grows and just like being creative and watering the ideas. So products. On aging Well, that's so exciting.
Speaker 2:I was actually just talking on a podcast with another mom on growing pains who was talking about like we talked so much about, like our hormones and what happens after we give birth, and then, all of a sudden, we just like stop talking about our hormones. I feel like there's really no information. My mom just is on the heels of menopause and all of the things. Once you, I feel like, get to that age, everybody is just like, okay, go figure it out. It's a hot and heavy topic, so much research is coming out finally.
Speaker 2:But menopause is one third of our life. Every woman goes through it. We can't avoid it. And perimenopause starts almost a decade before menopause, and this is yes. And so you start seeing changes in your mood and irritability and your sleep and your bone health and your heart health and your gut health and you're just thinking it's nothing. But it's actually hormones. It's a decline in your hormones. So there's so much to talk about with hormones and I would say around 32 to 35 is when the conversation needs to be taking place with your doctor. There needs to be a plan. That's so interesting, I think so I'm 32. I'll be 32 next month.
Speaker 2:I can't even say to you how far menopause was on my radar until, literally, that sentence just came out of your mouth. It feels like something that I don't have to worry about until one morning. They always say like hot flashes, right, like all of a sudden you're going to start having hot flashes, and so I figured as soon as I get a hot flash I'll know yeah, yes, but that's already. Like you got to talk about vaginal health, the lining of your vagina. People are not talking about it and, like you know, there are tiny little cuts, there are dryness and like as it ages, just like our skin. We can't reverse it, but we can stop it.
Speaker 2:We can stop the aging process, you know, and that in stopping that aging process really will prevent future UTIs. And when you think about being intimate with your partner, it's almost impossible when your vagina hurts. I mean that would be the worst, the worst. But like, there's hundreds of symptoms that you could have and it could be, you know, bone pain, frozen shoulder, joint pain. I mean there's hundreds of symptoms and they really in your mid thirties. That's so wild. That's so wild.
Speaker 2:I can't wait to hear what else you have on this topic, particularly and just like nutrition at large. I thought this was a really cool conversation because I think it unlocked a lot of simplicity, honestly, like I think, a lot of the ways that you position things, because food feels so complex sometimes to me. I really didn't grow up, like you know, with the food forward and nutrition wasn't really heavy in my household. We didn't grow up with a ton of money, so my parents were like this is what we can afford today, so this is what we're eating, and so it was always like that for me. I was always trying to find like the cheapest deals at the grocery store and then all of a sudden I was like, oh my gosh, this other stuff. So I really appreciate your take on this, especially for moms listening, because it can actually be really really stressful to feed your kids Like I'm sure you went through this, and especially as they're little like and now, with social media being so big like I see these memes about like boxed lunches back in the 1990s versus boxed lunches now moms are sending their kids to school with sushi. For god's sake I have, and it's so wild to me, but there's so much pressure now to be your kids and there's all of this information we can consume. So I hope that any mom who's listening got a lot of just like, like feel very supported by this conversation, because I sure did. Okay, good, that makes me so happy to hear.
Speaker 2:I want to just leave you with like one thought that I that changed my life when I, right after I had Olivia, it was in mommy and me, so she was about 18 months and the mommy and me teacher said when your baby falls on the sidewalk and they start crying, don't tell them not to cry. And she said because you can't see the pebbles in their knee. And I remember thinking this is so much like for everything, like I don't know how hungry my children are. I can't tell them how much they need to eat. I need to trust them and I need to, like, respect their own feelings. What I can do is distract them and say the food is right there. We can come back if I think that they're eating because they're bored. I can't, I can't know how they feel. It's. That's super encouraging.
Speaker 2:I think it's so tough with the kids, right, cause I say we say this all the time to our son, frank, that we don't, we want to lead with that. We believe him. So, like, if we sit down to dinner and he's like I have to go pee, he's stalling Cause he doesn't want to eat dinner, and so we're like do you have to go pee? He's stalling because he doesn't want to eat dinner, and so we're like do you have to go pee? And then we always lead with okay, let's go to the bathroom. And then we'll ask him one more time Do you have to go pee? And he was like, and he'll be like no. And so we do want to lead with that. Trust, right With okay, you can make the decision. You tell me how you're feeling. So I really am encouraged by what you said. I think we can practice so and so many more areas of our life, leading with that trust and being like you know what you're feeling and we're just going to maybe go from why. Why doesn't I know? We're going to run, we're hanging up, but why doesn't he want to eat dinner? Why doesn't he want to eat dinner? Honestly, it's a great question.
Speaker 2:Frank is really interesting. He's really motivated by external factors. So like if you tell me he does a good job if you give him a cookie or something like that, right, always ask me, mom, is this a cookie dinner? And I'm like no, it's grilled cheese. Like this is what you wanted for dinner. Like we, we did that. And most of the time the kids eat what we eat, but then here and there they'll get whatever it is that they've requested. It's usually anything beige, right, like quesadillas, grilled cheeses, noodles in butter or something like that. They'll grow up, promise yeah.
Speaker 2:But you know, I honestly don't know Kim. I mean, really, I think he just loves to be in action, like he's a really high energy kid. I think he doesn't want to stop playing. I don't think he wants to sit. So that's something that happens a lot. When we were fully furnished here in our home we had like a little table that they could come and go from their seats and then like meet and then sit down. But then once we started kind of like sitting down as a family when they got older, we were like, okay, we're all going to sit and eat together. So I think it has to do most of it with sitting in the chair. Honestly, that's what I think yeah, could be. I know you didn't ask for my advice, but this is what I'm going to tell you and your kids go for it.
Speaker 2:But when my kids got home from school, every time, every day, there would be two or three fruits cut and two or three vegetables cut. They would be chopped, beautifully waiting on the table, and then we had a snack tour. They can go in, pick anything. Sometimes there was cookies, brownies, whatever, but always fruit, always vegetables. So I never worried that they were deficient because they were always getting it and we, when we see food, we tend to eat it. And we have to see food sometimes 10 times before we feel like encouraged to eat it. And when I never said you need to eat that, I never said you have to finish that. It was just always there if they wanted it, and sometimes they participated in preparing it, which also helps them want to eat it.
Speaker 2:And then when the snack was done, the kitchen was closed until dinner, so there was no way that they were going to ruin their appetite. And then we made calendars. So Olivia got Monday night, sophia got Tuesday, natasha got Wednesday, I got Thursday. We had movie night on Friday. Matt didn't get a night, maybe. He went in my family.
Speaker 2:Natasha always really. She liked the beige foods in the beginning and we never said anything. But she got the beige food for dinner. But her dinner on Wednesday always included her top choice and one fruit plate that had three or four fruits on it, a vegetable plate that had two or three raw vegetables. We always served a cooked vegetable and whatever beige food she wanted. So if Olivia didn't like her beige food, she still was eating the other things. So she never went hungry. And when Olivia would pick, like chicken, whatever, and Natasha didn't eat that, natasha had all the other things. So we never worried about it and it was a settlement. I don't know if that will help, but I love that. I think we can easily start to have Frank pick meals, because he does. He has a much more varietous choice. Jack will just eat peanut butter and jelly three meals a day forever.
Speaker 1:He'll outgrow it, he'll outgrow it.
Speaker 2:I promise, yeah, I'm hopeful, I really am. I have lots of wonderful families and friends who have been very encouraging. On the food side, kim, this was an excellent conversation. I feel like so many incredible moments. I hope that so many moms listening feel, like I said, comforted, and that their stress levels are a little bit lower. About food, about showing some options to our kids. Where can listeners continue to follow along with your journey? Grab your book and learn more about what you're doing? They can grab my book everywhere that books are sold. It's called. This Is what You're Really Hungry For, and I am on all the social sites at Kim Shapira Method, so please come say hi to me. That is so amazing. I really encourage you guys. Grab Kim's bug. I'll put all this information in the show notes too, kim.
Speaker 1:Thank you so so so, so, so much for joining me. Thank you so much for tuning into today's episode of Growing Pains. I know that you have so many things vying for your attention right now, so I am so grateful that you just spent the last hour or so with me. So I hear all the time from mompreneurs Allie, allie. What systems do I need to have in place in order to thrive in business and in parenthood? If you go over to allisoncaffreycom slash checklist, you can grab my kid proof business checklist and it will get you started in the right direction around making sure that you build a business that doesn't steal all of the time away from your family. If you loved today's episode, I would be so, so, so honored if you would leave a review on the podcast that helps us reach even more incredible mompreneurs just like you and give them the resources they need to be wildly successful in business and wildly present at home with their families. Thanks so much again and I'll see you next time.