Bananas are Bad for Babies...and Other Historical Infant Feeding Practices with Jennifer Traig

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<v SPEAKER_1>Think about the last time you ate a really dry food.

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<v SPEAKER_1>So I made these terrible pork chops the other night for dinner.

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<v SPEAKER_1>They were so dry.

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<v SPEAKER_1>I'm an adult and I even had trouble swallowing them.

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<v SPEAKER_1>For your baby, dry foods are definitely a choking hazard.

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<v SPEAKER_1>But adding a low sodium sauce or a dipper or a topper to soften those dry foods up can make them so much easier for your baby to swallow.

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<v SPEAKER_1>Although nothing was saving these pork chops, I'll be honest.

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<v SPEAKER_1>The problem for babies though, is that when it comes to commercial sauces, the ones you buy at the store, they have way too much sodium or added sugars that babies shouldn't have.

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<v SPEAKER_1>But don't stress.

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<v SPEAKER_1>I've got you covered with five low sodium sauce recipes for safe swallowing that are so easy to make and so delicious that your whole family will love them.

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<v SPEAKER_1>So in the five low sodium sauces, this is a free feeding guide.

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<v SPEAKER_1>I've got a low sodium marinara sauce, a chimichurri, which is a really easy way to do the new food, parsley, we have an aioli sauce for dipping, we've got a peanut satay sauce, easy way to introduce peanut protein, and then this really cool gomadare japanese sesame sauce.

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<v SPEAKER_1>We've been using this a lot on tofu lately at my house because, as I mentioned, I sometimes stink at making meat.

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<v SPEAKER_1>You can download the five low sodium Baby-Led Weaning sauce recipes inside of this free feeding guide on my website at babyledweaning.co/resources.

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<v SPEAKER_1>Again, that website babyledweaning.co/resources to get the sauces.

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<v SPEAKER_1>My kids are getting ready to go back to school, which means I'm going to be going back to work.

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<v SPEAKER_1>And one of the things that I want to be more prepared about this school year is having a healthy lunch for me, all ready to go on work days, so that I don't have to waste time prepping food when I'm trying to get all my work done in the few short hours that they're in school.

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<v SPEAKER_1>So this school year, I'm really going to be leaning into factors.

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<v SPEAKER_1>So no matter how busy you are, you'll always have time to enjoy nutritious, great tasting meals.

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<v SPEAKER_1>So if you are getting your schedule back in shape to make today, the day that you kickstart a new healthy routine, what are you waiting for?

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<v SPEAKER_2>All fruit was considered suspect, but bananas particularly.

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<v SPEAKER_2>And part of the reason is they weren't really familiar with vitamins, not really familiar with fiber.

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<v SPEAKER_2>So there doesn't seem to be any good reason to eat fruit.

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<v SPEAKER_1>Hey there, I'm Katie Ferraro, registered dietitian, college nutrition professor, and mom of seven, specializing in baby-led weaning.

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<v SPEAKER_1>Here on the Baby-Led Weaning with Katie Ferraro podcast, I help you strip out all of the noise and nonsense about feeding, giving you the confidence and knowledge you need to give your baby a safe start to solid foods using baby-led weaning.

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<v SPEAKER_1>Are there any parenting practices that you currently are engaging in that you just wonder, gosh, do you think future parents or my own kids or my grandkids are going to look back on me and wonder why in the world did she think that that was a good idea when I was a baby?

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<v SPEAKER_1>Okay, maybe all of these super regimented sleep schedules will turn out to be bad for babies, or kind of like how doctors used to recommend, you've got to start solid foods with white rice cereal.

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<v SPEAKER_1>Now we know, nope, it's totally laden with arsenic, and there are actually lots of other foods that could work ideally as a first food for baby.

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<v SPEAKER_1>Well, my guest today has a very interesting perspective on modern parenting.

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<v SPEAKER_1>Her name is Jennifer Traig, and she's the author of the book Act Natural, A Cultural History of misadventures in Parenting.

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<v SPEAKER_1>Now, as a rule, I do not love parenting books.

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<v SPEAKER_1>I think they're oftentimes too preachy or too opinionated.

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<v SPEAKER_1>I loved Jennifer's book Act Natural.

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<v SPEAKER_1>I was laughing out loud.

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<v SPEAKER_1>She has a fabulous sense of humor, but she's just done an amazing amount of research for this book.

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<v SPEAKER_1>And I, for one, don't have time to research historical feeding practices, so I would rather listen to someone read them to me.

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<v SPEAKER_1>I loved, loved, loved Jennifer's book.

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<v SPEAKER_1>It's a history all about the ridiculous things that parrots over the ages have done from things like restricting fruit because of the belief that it would harm babies to all of the variations in the introduction of solid foods and the ages and how that's changed over the decades.

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<v SPEAKER_1>I mean, there was one point in the 1950s when it was recommended to start solid foods as early as a few weeks of age.

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<v SPEAKER_1>So Jennifer is here today to share a bit about historical infant feeding practices.

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<v SPEAKER_1>She's got some great anecdotes from the book.

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<v SPEAKER_1>She's going to convince you that even though you might be worrying day in and day out about your parenting and that what you're doing is damaging your baby, you are actually doing a great job.

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<v SPEAKER_1>I hope you enjoy this interview with Jennifer Traig.

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<v SPEAKER_1>Please do check out her book Act Natural.

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<v SPEAKER_1>And with no further ado, here is Jennifer Traig to talk about why bananas are not bad for babies, but other historical infant feeding practices that will make you laugh.

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<v SPEAKER_2>Yeah, I guess the wake up call on how we were raising our kids was when my daughter's third and fourth words were Oprah and cake respectively, and made me question how we were spending our time.

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<v SPEAKER_2>That it was maybe time to start being a little healthier and watch a little less TV.

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<v SPEAKER_1>Well, does she still like Oprah and cake?

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<v SPEAKER_2>She still likes cake.

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<v SPEAKER_2>But yeah, but now she's more of a TikTok girl.

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<v SPEAKER_1>All right.

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<v SPEAKER_1>Well, like everybody else, the attention span is decreasing.

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<v SPEAKER_1>Actually, having longer attention span than most people on TikTok.

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<v SPEAKER_1>I read your whole book.

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<v SPEAKER_1>When I say read, I mean, I listen to it because I have a small children and don't read.

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<v SPEAKER_1>But I loved your book Act Natural, A Cultural History of misadventures in Parenting.

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<v SPEAKER_1>I have to tell you, Jennifer, I was laughing out loud at your take and your humor and your jokes about just some of the historical parenting practices that you cover in the book, because there was this theme, and I'm sure you didn't do it by accident, of throughout the ages, lots of old men telling women what to do about raising kids.

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<v SPEAKER_1>Then you told these stories about some of these so-called experts of literally having no children of their own or actually horrible parents, according to their eventually grown up children.

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<v SPEAKER_1>Do you see patterns in the parenting advice of yesteryear being reflected in today's culture and society?

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<v SPEAKER_2>That's a really good question.

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<v SPEAKER_2>Well, I'll say one thing, which is that parenting is very new.

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<v SPEAKER_2>The verb didn't exist until 1970, and that's because before then, parents just weren't doing a whole lot of it.

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<v SPEAKER_2>It was called child wearing and it wasn't necessarily done by the parent.

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<v SPEAKER_2>In fact, if you could afford to or if you could find anyone else to do it, you did.

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<v SPEAKER_2>You weren't judged for that.

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<v SPEAKER_2>Having children was your job, but raising them really wasn't.

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<v SPEAKER_2>If something went wrong, you would not be blamed.

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<v SPEAKER_2>It really wasn't until more recently that parents became more hands-on and then acquired all the things that come along with that, like guilt and resentment.

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<v SPEAKER_1>As I was reading the book, I started thinking about all the things that, and my parents are lovely people, but they said some stuff that probably doesn't hold up today.

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<v SPEAKER_1>One of which was, my grandparents used to say it, children are meant to be seen and not heard and the volume level at my house.

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<v SPEAKER_1>I have a singleton who just turned 10.

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<v SPEAKER_1>I have eight-year-old quadruplets and six-year-old twins.

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<v SPEAKER_1>So I had seven kids in three years and now they're just like very loud school-age children.

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<v SPEAKER_1>And I always think like, if my grandpa were here, he'd be like, children were meant to be seen and not heard.

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<v SPEAKER_1>But like, they would also say things like, go play in traffic, go play on the train tracks.

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<v SPEAKER_1>Like, we laughed about it and you would get slaughtered on social media if you ever said any of that stuff anymore.

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<v SPEAKER_1>But I loved, in your book, you pointed out that a lot of parenting's thorniest issues, like sleep resistance and picky eating, began when we started trying to fix something that wasn't particularly broken.

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<v SPEAKER_1>So considering how much anxiety parents have about things like starting solid foods, where do you think that comes from?

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<v SPEAKER_1>And what parenting practices are actually making, learning how to eat harder?

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<v SPEAKER_2>We've definitely made eating a problem, and I think we did that.

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<v SPEAKER_2>Before, in the literature, you almost never see complaints about children being picky eaters or not eating.

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<v SPEAKER_2>What you do see, and you see pretty often, is complaints about children eating too much.

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<v SPEAKER_2>And there's a lot of that.

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<v SPEAKER_2>There's a lot of concern about children wanting to eat grown-up foods.

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<v SPEAKER_2>There's no such thing as kids' foods yet.

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<v SPEAKER_2>There's no chicken nuggets.

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<v SPEAKER_2>There's no ketchup.

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<v SPEAKER_2>There's no yogurt squeezers.

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<v SPEAKER_2>And kids want to eat what their parents are eating.

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<v SPEAKER_2>And the literature is saying, no, no, no, no, no.

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<v SPEAKER_2>Children's stomachs are too delicate for that.

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<v SPEAKER_2>They shouldn't.

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<v SPEAKER_2>And around the turn of the century, a book comes out that changes things.

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<v SPEAKER_2>And it's by Luther Emmett Holt.

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<v SPEAKER_2>This is called The Care and Feeding of Young Children.

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<v SPEAKER_2>And all of a sudden, he introduces the problem and the cure, a feeding plan for children, that makes mothers, because mothers are the ones implementing it, very, very, very, very anxious.

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<v SPEAKER_2>He has this very incredibly strict regimen for introducing foods to children and what foods they can and can't have.

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<v SPEAKER_2>To modern readers, it's very, very surprising because he is so abjectly against fruits and vegetables.

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<v SPEAKER_2>He really wants you to stay away from them.

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<v SPEAKER_2>They're very inappropriate for children.

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<v SPEAKER_2>If you must serve them, fruits pretty much no and vegetables need to be boiled for hours and put through the sieve so that they're absolute mush.

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<v SPEAKER_2>Lettuce is okay only for older children and only if it's stressed lightly with salt, nothing else.

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<v SPEAKER_1>What was the deal with the bananas though?

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<v SPEAKER_1>I remember a part where you're like in historically bananas were supposed to be bad for children.

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<v SPEAKER_2>And this is all due to, again, Luther Emmett Holt starts the banana problem.

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<v SPEAKER_2>He came down against bananas.

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<v SPEAKER_2>He warned against parents serving them.

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<v SPEAKER_2>I think he's writing in about 1894 or so.

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<v SPEAKER_2>So bananas have only been available in the US for about 10 years.

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<v SPEAKER_2>So number one, they're very new.

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<v SPEAKER_2>Number two, they looked a little different.

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<v SPEAKER_2>So now we eat something called the Cavendish banana, which is more curved.

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<v SPEAKER_2>And the previous banana was maybe a little more anatomical.

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<v SPEAKER_2>And given fruits association with sin because of the Garden of Eden, that association was just too easy to make with the banana.

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<v SPEAKER_2>Women were reluctant to be seen eating them in public, and you certainly wouldn't feed them to your children.

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<v SPEAKER_2>All fruit was considered suspect, but bananas particularly.

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<v SPEAKER_2>And part of the reason is they weren't really familiar with vitamins, not really familiar with fiber.

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<v SPEAKER_2>So there doesn't seem to be any good reason to eat fruit.

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<v SPEAKER_2>There's no nutritional benefit.

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<v SPEAKER_1>If it tastes good, it must be bad for you.

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<v SPEAKER_1>But spoiler alert, the fruit is going to kill you message is like still persistent as a fallacy in the feeding space.

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<v SPEAKER_1>I hear parents all the time like, oh, my doctor told me that I need to feed the baby vegetables before fruit because the baby is going to develop a preference for sweet taste.

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<v SPEAKER_1>And I was like, have you ever tasted your breast milk?

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<v SPEAKER_1>The primary carbohydrate in their lactose is sweet.

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<v SPEAKER_1>Heads up, your baby's been already exposed to this.

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<v SPEAKER_1>Bananas never killed anybody.

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<v SPEAKER_1>But it's also a theme in diabetes education.

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<v SPEAKER_1>I was a diabetes educator for years and parents was, oh, I eat this fruit, but I won't eat bananas.

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<v SPEAKER_1>There's too much sugar.

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<v SPEAKER_1>And it's like, you know, your average serving of fruit has about 15 grams of naturally occurring sugar.

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<v SPEAKER_1>And this is totally different than high fructose corn syrup.

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<v SPEAKER_1>So it's funny, like we can blame him for starting it, but it hasn't gone away yet, the fear of bananas.

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<v SPEAKER_2>Yeah.

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<v SPEAKER_1>Okay, so-

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<v SPEAKER_2>And then like non-organic bananas are, you know, terrifying too, right?

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<v SPEAKER_2>What could be on them?

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<v SPEAKER_2>Yeah.

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<v SPEAKER_1>Well, I mean, I've been to parents like, you know, give me an idea of like a perfect first food for a baby.

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<v SPEAKER_1>There is no perfect first food, lots of foods that work for babies.

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<v SPEAKER_1>But bananas are fantastic because they come in their own like aseptic packaging.

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<v SPEAKER_1>You know, you don't have to do anything with them.

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<v SPEAKER_1>Just cut them into spears and the baby can pick it up and eat it.

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<v SPEAKER_1>But my favorite section of your book, Act Natural, was of course, like the feeding practices over time.

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<v SPEAKER_1>And I want to start with the very first taste of the first milk a mother produces, which is colostrum.

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<v SPEAKER_1>So colostrum was not always considered the liquid gold that it is today.

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<v SPEAKER_1>What was the advice about feeding colostrum in the past?

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<v SPEAKER_2>It was very bad.

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<v SPEAKER_2>And it starts with Galen and hippocrates and Aristotle.

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<v SPEAKER_2>And they all say, this is poison.

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<v SPEAKER_2>Do not have it.

00:12:10.780 --> 00:12:11.480

<v SPEAKER_2>For a few reasons.

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<v SPEAKER_2>So one, because they don't understand what it is.

00:12:15.680 --> 00:12:23.400

<v SPEAKER_2>And they think that milk is a menstrual blood that's been made white by heat or by the father's semen.

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<v SPEAKER_2>So they don't know what they're working with.

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<v SPEAKER_2>And then a little bit later, Plutarch comes along, a Saranis, who's a first century physician, and he continues to say, no, no, no, no colostrum.

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<v SPEAKER_2>They notice that it looks different from other milk, that it's...

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<v SPEAKER_1>Wow, how observant of you old men.

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<v SPEAKER_2>Right.

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<v SPEAKER_2>And they call it, they say basically, it's too cheese-like.

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<v SPEAKER_2>And little tiny babies aren't ready to have such rich food, such cheesy food.

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<v SPEAKER_2>So one of the things that they recommend instead is watered-down wine, which is not a great substitute for colostrum.

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<v SPEAKER_1>Hey, we're going to take a quick break, but I'll be right back.

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<v SPEAKER_1>What were some of the other?

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<v SPEAKER_1>I was trying to write them down, but there was just too many.

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<v SPEAKER_1>In your book, you go through just some bizarre infant feeding practices from the past.

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<v SPEAKER_1>I just want parents to hear about them and be like, oh, this is not the, this whole idea of feeding babies foods, it seems so controversial these days to have babies eat real food, but they did wild stuff back in the day to their babies.

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<v SPEAKER_2>Yeah, they really did.

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<v SPEAKER_2>And for the days of formula, if you couldn't breastfeed your baby, you did have options and you might choose a wet nurse, but there were times where there just weren't enough wet nurses, certainly in foundling homes.

00:13:40.475 --> 00:13:44.575

<v SPEAKER_2>And some foundling homes churned to goats.

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<v SPEAKER_2>Had the children nurse from goats directly in the crib.

00:13:50.175 --> 00:13:51.555

<v SPEAKER_1>I can't even imagine.

00:13:51.555 --> 00:13:53.635

<v SPEAKER_1>I thought you made that up, but that's real.

00:13:53.635 --> 00:13:59.995

<v SPEAKER_2>Wet nurses often gave their children syphilis, and goats tended not to have syphilis.

00:13:59.995 --> 00:14:00.575

<v SPEAKER_1>Oh, wow.

00:14:00.575 --> 00:14:02.075

<v SPEAKER_1>There's an advantage there.

00:14:02.075 --> 00:14:02.375

<v SPEAKER_1>Okay.

00:14:02.375 --> 00:14:06.175

<v SPEAKER_1>Other feeding practices that we might consider bizarre today that you can think of?

00:14:06.175 --> 00:14:08.295

<v SPEAKER_2>The 50s is really weird for a few reasons.

00:14:09.315 --> 00:14:14.215

<v SPEAKER_2>Part of it is that suddenly processed food becomes widely available.

00:14:14.215 --> 00:14:16.295

<v SPEAKER_2>One of the biggest markets for that is children.

00:14:16.295 --> 00:14:25.515

<v SPEAKER_2>Children's food hadn't existed before, and now there's sugar cereals, and there's candy, and tater tots are invented, and ranch dressing, and all this stuff that kids just love.

00:14:26.815 --> 00:14:31.215

<v SPEAKER_2>There's also food that's created just for kids.

00:14:31.215 --> 00:14:35.115

<v SPEAKER_2>Baby food comes along a little bit earlier, but it's being marketed more.

00:14:35.115 --> 00:14:44.155

<v SPEAKER_2>It's strange to notice that it's right around this time that the timeline for introducing your kids to solid foods suddenly accelerates dramatically.

00:14:44.155 --> 00:14:48.195

<v SPEAKER_2>Before, doctors said about a year, and now they're saying like four weeks.

00:14:48.195 --> 00:14:56.075

<v SPEAKER_2>There's one doctor in particular, Walter Sackett, who I think it's like by second or third week, he wants your kid on solids.

00:14:56.075 --> 00:15:04.835

<v SPEAKER_2>By nine weeks, they should be eating bacon and eggs, and he doesn't want them, weirdly enough, to have milk, because he says there's too much fat in it.

00:15:04.835 --> 00:15:10.295

<v SPEAKER_2>It's after one year, no milk, and instead wants you to serve your children coffee.

00:15:10.595 --> 00:15:14.535

<v SPEAKER_2>For parents who are uptight about the caffeine, he says you can substitute zdenka.

00:15:14.535 --> 00:15:22.235

<v SPEAKER_1>The history of the timeline and the introduction of solid foods, did you by any chance use Amy Bentley's book Inventing Baby Food as a resource for-

00:15:22.615 --> 00:15:23.035

<v SPEAKER_1>Okay.

00:15:23.035 --> 00:15:23.875

<v SPEAKER_1>That book is fantastic.

00:15:23.875 --> 00:15:24.815

<v SPEAKER_1>She's been on the podcast.

00:15:24.815 --> 00:15:29.855

<v SPEAKER_1>I wish she would just continue writing about baby food, but it's so fascinating.

00:15:29.855 --> 00:15:38.215

<v SPEAKER_1>She has a chart in her book, and actually if you look at the attribution, I think she had one of her kids draw it, but it was basically like average age of introduction of solid foods over the decades.

00:15:38.215 --> 00:15:40.655

<v SPEAKER_1>And yeah, back in the 50s, it was a couple of weeks.

00:15:40.655 --> 00:15:46.475

<v SPEAKER_1>And then every time I used that in her presentations with her permission, of course, and people would be like, oh wait, I think you have a typo there.

00:15:46.475 --> 00:15:47.855

<v SPEAKER_1>I think you meant like a couple of months.

00:15:47.855 --> 00:15:49.575

<v SPEAKER_1>It's like, no, no, no, that's not a typo.

00:15:49.575 --> 00:15:53.695

<v SPEAKER_1>They were literally recommending those foods at a couple of weeks of age.

00:15:53.695 --> 00:15:57.135

<v SPEAKER_1>And obviously things change and research changes.

00:15:57.135 --> 00:16:07.195

<v SPEAKER_1>I think right now I know as a breastfeeding advocate and specialist in introduction of solid foods, we always tell parents, breast milk is all your baby needs for the first six months of life.

00:16:07.195 --> 00:16:09.955

<v SPEAKER_1>Or of course, infant formula if you can't or don't want to breastfeed.

00:16:09.955 --> 00:16:13.115

<v SPEAKER_1>But parents are still so confused because they're still getting a lot of misinformation.

00:16:13.115 --> 00:16:18.375

<v SPEAKER_1>Doctors will say things, very outdated information like, why don't you go ahead and start solid foods anywhere between four to six months?

00:16:18.375 --> 00:16:23.495

<v SPEAKER_1>Well, a four-month-old baby can't even set up on their own, so they're not safe to swallow anything except infant milk.

00:16:23.495 --> 00:16:25.955

<v SPEAKER_1>Not to mention, that's a total anti-breastfeeding message.

00:16:25.955 --> 00:16:32.615

<v SPEAKER_1>Because if out of one side of your mouth, you're telling them to exclusively breastfeed for six months, and then the other side being like, but also start solid foods.

00:16:32.615 --> 00:16:35.435

<v SPEAKER_1>The parents, they feel like their breast milk is insufficient.

00:16:36.235 --> 00:16:48.375

<v SPEAKER_1>I think a lot of the anecdotes in your book, there's a lot of humor, a lot of tongue-in-cheek, but this is really anxiety-inducing stuff for parents, and they do get a lot of misinformation from the so-called experts.

00:16:48.395 --> 00:16:56.455

<v SPEAKER_1>I was just curious, did you interview current-day feeding practices, or was the book more just to look at historical practices?

00:16:56.455 --> 00:16:57.795

<v SPEAKER_2>Yeah, pretty historical.

00:16:57.975 --> 00:17:01.235

<v SPEAKER_2>I mean, I started this project because I teach at University of Michigan.

00:17:01.395 --> 00:17:07.935

<v SPEAKER_2>I don't have a lot of skills that turn out to be transferable to raising children, neither does my husband.

00:17:08.175 --> 00:17:10.755

<v SPEAKER_2>But the one thing we can do is a literature review.

00:17:10.755 --> 00:17:21.255

<v SPEAKER_2>When we were struggling with brand new babies and didn't know how to take care of them and didn't know it would be this hard, we started reading about what people used to do, and it was shocking because they did such crazy things.

00:17:21.255 --> 00:17:30.135

<v SPEAKER_2>The one message that came through loud and clear is the bar is really low, that people have done terrible things and we have survived.

00:17:30.135 --> 00:17:32.275

<v SPEAKER_2>I found that enormously comforting.

00:17:32.275 --> 00:17:34.135

<v SPEAKER_1>Then you decided to write a book about it?

00:17:34.135 --> 00:17:35.915

<v SPEAKER_2>Yeah.

00:17:35.915 --> 00:17:41.155

<v SPEAKER_2>Other people could know that our ancestors did much, much, much worse things than we're doing now.

00:17:41.315 --> 00:17:46.775

<v SPEAKER_1>I loved all the feeding stuff, but you really covered a vast area of different aspects of parenting.

00:17:46.775 --> 00:17:53.975

<v SPEAKER_1>One of my favorite parts was the research that you were talking about letting kids fight it out and why interfering in your kids' squabbles is an ideal.

00:17:54.075 --> 00:17:58.275

<v SPEAKER_1>I'm literally listening to this as I'm doing the dishes and hearing my kids fighting in the back.

00:17:58.275 --> 00:18:01.395

<v SPEAKER_1>I could just picture the sociologists in the studies that you were describing.

00:18:01.755 --> 00:18:05.295

<v SPEAKER_1>They would analyze the average number of fights per hour in a household.

00:18:05.295 --> 00:18:07.415

<v SPEAKER_1>They'd have listening devices in the house.

00:18:07.415 --> 00:18:11.035

<v SPEAKER_1>I just have to say it was making me feel pretty good about my own family situation.

00:18:11.035 --> 00:18:16.235

<v SPEAKER_1>But I kept thinking, how much time did Jennifer spend reading all of these source documents?

00:18:16.235 --> 00:18:18.015

<v SPEAKER_1>How long did it take you to research for this book?

00:18:18.015 --> 00:18:22.395

<v SPEAKER_1>Because you really covered quite the gamut of history and topics in parenting history for this book.

00:18:22.935 --> 00:18:24.195

<v SPEAKER_2>I spent about five years on it.

00:18:24.195 --> 00:18:28.095

<v SPEAKER_2>I wrote it when my kids were small, so it grew up with them.

00:18:28.095 --> 00:18:33.715

<v SPEAKER_2>Yeah, and I finished by the time they were in elementary school.

00:18:33.715 --> 00:18:33.975

<v SPEAKER_1>Okay.

00:18:33.975 --> 00:18:41.635

<v SPEAKER_1>Now that they're teenagers and they accuse you of doing something, do you say like, well, at least I didn't do XYZ like they did back in Aristotle's day?

00:18:41.635 --> 00:18:43.475

<v SPEAKER_2>They have absolutely no interest in my work.

00:18:43.475 --> 00:18:43.855

<v SPEAKER_2>Yeah.

00:18:43.855 --> 00:18:46.715

<v SPEAKER_2>No, they don't want to hear it.

00:18:46.715 --> 00:18:47.315

<v SPEAKER_1>Same.

00:18:47.315 --> 00:18:47.675

<v SPEAKER_1>Okay.

00:18:47.675 --> 00:18:57.175

<v SPEAKER_1>You conclude by saying, if I've learned anything, it's that barring the really awful stuff, things mostly turn out fine, and the ones that don't were beyond our control anyway.

00:18:57.175 --> 00:19:06.495

<v SPEAKER_1>Is there anything that you would say to a new parent who is stressing out about their baby starting solid foods that you think could alleviate some of their anxiety based on what you learned, researching for this book for five years?

00:19:06.495 --> 00:19:06.935

<v SPEAKER_2>Yeah.

00:19:06.935 --> 00:19:17.535

<v SPEAKER_2>When I got her a push present, which was very on-brand, my husband gave me a book by Jerome Kagan, who's a psychologist at Harvard called Three Seductive Ideas.

00:19:17.535 --> 00:19:20.735

<v SPEAKER_2>And it's basically about how hard it is to mess up your children.

00:19:21.215 --> 00:19:32.935

<v SPEAKER_2>And one of the Three Seductive Ideas is arguing against infant determinism, the idea that you're in this really crucial window and it closes, and that the choices you make now are going to shape the rest of their lives.

00:19:32.935 --> 00:19:39.815

<v SPEAKER_2>And the book really convinced me that, no, it's a special time, it's a magical time, but you're not going to scar your kids for life.

00:19:39.935 --> 00:19:41.855

<v SPEAKER_2>You're not going to make them a picky eater.

00:19:41.855 --> 00:19:43.635

<v SPEAKER_2>It's hard to really mess it up.

00:19:43.635 --> 00:19:51.415

<v SPEAKER_1>I know, but I think that I love how pragmatic that statement is, but I think it really flies in the face of what new parents today are hearing.

00:19:51.415 --> 00:19:59.035

<v SPEAKER_1>Everything's about trauma, everything is about, you are literally going to inflict lifelong damage on your kid if you feed them formula.

00:19:59.035 --> 00:20:00.535

<v SPEAKER_1>I mean, everything's so dramatic.

00:20:00.535 --> 00:20:04.275

<v SPEAKER_1>And also, by the way, people aren't spending five years researching topics like you do.

00:20:04.275 --> 00:20:09.935

<v SPEAKER_1>They're spending three seconds on TikTok, and like, oh, I know everything about colostrum, and it's like, really, from social media.

00:20:09.935 --> 00:20:14.575

<v SPEAKER_1>So I just have to say, I very much appreciate the work that authors like yourself do.

00:20:15.055 --> 00:20:17.355

<v SPEAKER_1>It was such a thoroughly well-researched book.

00:20:17.355 --> 00:20:22.195

<v SPEAKER_1>I did want to ask you before we go, Clara Davis, can you just...

00:20:22.195 --> 00:20:31.275

<v SPEAKER_1>Like, my dream goal is to go back in time and just be a fly on the wall in Clara Davis' experiment where she's letting...

00:20:31.275 --> 00:20:42.595

<v SPEAKER_1>I mean, I know it's not good that she was working with orphans, and obviously, you would never be able to reproduce her study today, but just letting them go buck wild, put the 100 foods out on the table and be like, which ones did they eat?

00:20:42.595 --> 00:20:48.075

<v SPEAKER_1>Tell us a little bit about that, because to me, that's the most fascinating historical study that will never be recreated again.

00:20:48.075 --> 00:20:48.455

<v SPEAKER_2>Right.

00:20:48.455 --> 00:20:56.055

<v SPEAKER_2>So this is in 1926, and it's a pediatrician, Canadian pediatrician named Claire Davis, and she starts this experiment.

00:20:56.055 --> 00:20:59.175

<v SPEAKER_2>She does it first in Cleveland, then it moves to Chicago.

00:20:59.175 --> 00:21:12.675

<v SPEAKER_2>She gets a cohort of babies, two of them she ends up adopting later, and she gets these babies from indigent teen moms and widows, and the children come to live in a hospital where the experiment is being conducted.

00:21:13.115 --> 00:21:25.595

<v SPEAKER_2>And basically, it just consists of caregivers putting out a wide assortment of, I think it's a list of 100 foods, which of course, the list of 100 first foods, I think there's probably a lot of overlap with that.

00:21:25.595 --> 00:21:34.055

<v SPEAKER_2>A list of 100 unprocessed foods, and the caregivers are instructed to just let the kids pick whatever they want.

00:21:34.055 --> 00:21:38.435

<v SPEAKER_2>And these are, I think they're like in the one to two-year-old range.

00:21:38.435 --> 00:21:40.395

<v SPEAKER_2>I can't remember exactly, but they're little.

00:21:41.055 --> 00:21:44.195

<v SPEAKER_2>At first, the children make some strange choices.

00:21:44.195 --> 00:21:50.435

<v SPEAKER_2>They seem to have a little trouble distinguishing between what is food and what isn't food, trying to eat the silverware.

00:21:50.435 --> 00:21:55.355

<v SPEAKER_2>There are children just grabbing handfuls of salt, and then they find the food and they'll go on jags.

00:21:55.355 --> 00:21:58.995

<v SPEAKER_2>Like one kid will eat a dozen oranges in a sitting.

00:21:58.995 --> 00:22:09.055

<v SPEAKER_2>But what they find is it really evens out, and that if you provide healthy, nutritious food for children, they eat a healthy, nutritious diet.

00:22:09.195 --> 00:22:15.575

<v SPEAKER_2>They, she called it body wisdom, that they would crave the things that their bodies needed.

00:22:15.575 --> 00:22:22.715

<v SPEAKER_2>The one thing it didn't tell us is if kids will eat a healthy, nutritious diet when they have a choice not to.

00:22:22.715 --> 00:22:28.775

<v SPEAKER_2>She wanted to do a follow-up study that would include processed foods, but the depression intervened and she never got to do it.

00:22:28.775 --> 00:22:30.535

<v SPEAKER_1>And didn't she lose all of her records?

00:22:30.535 --> 00:22:34.155

<v SPEAKER_1>Wasn't there a fire and you can't even find the original data sets and stuff now?

00:22:34.155 --> 00:22:34.855

<v SPEAKER_2>Yeah, that sounds right.

00:22:35.695 --> 00:22:47.295

<v SPEAKER_1>Oh, well, it was something again that we'll never see in our lifetime, but I appreciate you going and kind of digging that up and making it a little bit more palatable for parents today to be like, oh, okay, so I don't need to micromanage every single thing that my kid eats.

00:22:47.295 --> 00:22:50.195

<v SPEAKER_1>So what do you think about parenting in 2024?

00:22:50.195 --> 00:22:58.215

<v SPEAKER_1>That like what's happening right now that authors like you in the future will look back at and literally laugh at us for having believed or actually inflicted on our kids?

00:22:58.215 --> 00:22:59.635

<v SPEAKER_1>Like what's jumping out at you right now?

00:22:59.635 --> 00:23:01.215

<v SPEAKER_1>Because you got a 13 and a 15 year old.

00:23:01.595 --> 00:23:07.335

<v SPEAKER_1>If you have a friend at school or a colleague who's a new mom, you're like, oh my gosh, this is hilarious that you're doing this.

00:23:07.335 --> 00:23:07.595

<v SPEAKER_1>Yeah.

00:23:07.595 --> 00:23:11.695

<v SPEAKER_2>My husband and I play a game called How Are We Ruining Our Children?

00:23:11.715 --> 00:23:14.355

<v SPEAKER_2>I'm doing the things that we can't see it because we're in it.

00:23:14.355 --> 00:23:16.955

<v SPEAKER_2>The terrible choices that we're making that we just can't see.

00:23:16.955 --> 00:23:21.695

<v SPEAKER_2>Part of the reason we play this is because our parents who loved us and were good people make crazy choices.

00:23:21.695 --> 00:23:25.075

<v SPEAKER_2>But my father was a chest surgeon, my mother was a nurse.

00:23:25.075 --> 00:23:28.175

<v SPEAKER_2>She smoked while she nursed me.

00:23:28.175 --> 00:23:31.095

<v SPEAKER_2>They insist that they did not know that this was an unhealthy.

00:23:32.355 --> 00:23:43.615

<v SPEAKER_2>So the thing that we did with our kids that I now then continue to do with our kids that I think they later will wonder what we were thinking is the unchecked phone use.

00:23:43.615 --> 00:23:48.855

<v SPEAKER_2>That the screens everywhere all the time and we don't really know what effect it's having on them.

00:23:48.855 --> 00:23:52.135

<v SPEAKER_2>I think that's the thing that they'll judge us for and probably rightly so.

00:23:52.135 --> 00:23:54.695

<v SPEAKER_1>Hey, we're going to take a quick break, but I'll be right back.

00:24:03.320 --> 00:24:07.940

<v SPEAKER_1>Jennifer, what's the next project that you're working on, and are there any other parenting books in the future for you?

00:24:07.940 --> 00:24:08.520

<v SPEAKER_2>Sort of.

00:24:08.520 --> 00:24:12.980

<v SPEAKER_2>I mean, I work on History of Monsters, but it's domestic monsters.

00:24:12.980 --> 00:24:15.660

<v SPEAKER_2>So, Boogeymen and things like that.

00:24:15.660 --> 00:24:20.900

<v SPEAKER_1>So no like Loch ness stuff that you're sticking straight up to the US, or?

00:24:20.900 --> 00:24:24.780

<v SPEAKER_2>It's gonna be, there's a little Dracula, a little Frankenstein.

00:24:24.780 --> 00:24:28.380

<v SPEAKER_2>I think Frankenstein is really about pregnancy and motherhood.

00:24:28.380 --> 00:24:30.500

<v SPEAKER_2>So I'll be writing about Frankenstein as well.

00:24:31.260 --> 00:24:36.300

<v SPEAKER_1>We'll have to have you back on when that comes out, because I'd love to see you tell other moms that they're like Frankenstein.

00:24:37.800 --> 00:24:43.780

<v SPEAKER_1>Jennifer, I always like to ask authors, your book, Act Natural, A History of misadventures in Parenting.

00:24:43.780 --> 00:24:45.380

<v SPEAKER_1>Where do you want people to buy it from?

00:24:45.380 --> 00:24:51.260

<v SPEAKER_1>What's the most beneficial to you if we go here or there, or your website, or does it not really matter, just get the book?

00:24:51.260 --> 00:24:57.420

<v SPEAKER_2>Yeah, I have to say, it's good to put your local bookstore, but wherever you find it, I'm glad to have you read it.

00:24:57.420 --> 00:25:02.220

<v SPEAKER_1>You so obviously live in Ann Arbor, where they probably still have a local bookstore.

00:25:02.220 --> 00:25:03.280

<v SPEAKER_2>We just got one back.

00:25:03.900 --> 00:25:07.480

<v SPEAKER_2>We didn't for a while, but for the past five years, we have again.

00:25:07.480 --> 00:25:07.780

<v SPEAKER_1>awesome.

00:25:07.780 --> 00:25:14.700

<v SPEAKER_1>Well, thank you so much for sharing your time, and I really appreciate the anecdotes, and I'll link to the book in the show notes so people can check it out.

00:25:14.700 --> 00:25:18.440

<v SPEAKER_1>But it's really a great read if you're feeling at all overwhelmed by starting solid foods with your kids.

00:25:18.440 --> 00:25:19.580

<v SPEAKER_1>Don't worry, you're not going to mess it up.

00:25:19.580 --> 00:25:22.320

<v SPEAKER_1>They did way worse things back in the day, and we all turned out fine.

00:25:22.320 --> 00:25:24.480

<v SPEAKER_2>Thanks very much for having me.

00:25:24.480 --> 00:25:27.360

<v SPEAKER_1>Well, I hope you enjoyed that interview with Jennifer Traig.

00:25:27.480 --> 00:25:32.460

<v SPEAKER_1>She, you always wonder like when you read a book and you think someone's funny, like I wonder if they're actually really funny in real life.

00:25:32.460 --> 00:25:38.940

<v SPEAKER_1>She was hysterical, very dry, great sense of humor, really good recall too because she's just a great storyteller.

00:25:38.940 --> 00:25:47.800

<v SPEAKER_1>So some of the anecdotes that she told in the interview, they're a little bit longer and she kind of draws them out and puts all the historical references there, but they're there in the book too.

00:25:47.800 --> 00:25:50.480

<v SPEAKER_1>I can't recommend her book Act Natural Enough.

00:25:50.480 --> 00:25:54.220

<v SPEAKER_1>The subtitle is A Cultural History of misadventures in Parenting.

00:25:54.220 --> 00:25:55.520

<v SPEAKER_1>You can get it wherever you get books.

00:25:55.860 --> 00:26:00.320

<v SPEAKER_1>I will link to it on the Show notes page for this episode, which you can find at blwpodcast.com/458.

00:26:03.360 --> 00:26:06.020

<v SPEAKER_1>And a special thank you to our partners at Airwave Media.

00:26:06.020 --> 00:26:11.440

<v SPEAKER_1>If you like podcasts that feature food and science and using your brain, check out some of the podcasts from Airwave.

00:26:11.440 --> 00:26:14.100

<v SPEAKER_1>We're online at blwpodcast.com.

00:26:14.100 --> 00:26:15.900

<v SPEAKER_1>Thanks so much for listening and I'll see you next time.