Calming an Upset Baby at Mealtimes with Aliza Pressman, PhD

Aliza Pressman, PhD (1s):

We know this. If you think you can control what goes in a child's body, where it comes out of their body, you have got to come to terms with that. Not being true, like in no universe, you cannot, you also can't control how somebody feels.

Katie Ferraro (14s):

Hey, there I'm Katie Ferraro, Registered Dietitian college nutrition, professor and mom of seven specializing in baby led weaning here on the baby led weaning made easy podcast. I help you strip out all of the noise and nonsense about feeding, leaving you with the competence and knowledge. You need to give your baby a safe start to solid foods using baby led Weaning. All right, you got the baby in the highchair. You're offering a new food and they start freaking out and they're not enjoying the experience and your stress level goes up. And then how do you respond when your baby is upset at mealtimes? Well, my guest today is Dr.

Katie Ferraro (54s):

Aliza Pressman. And I'm not saying she has all the answers, but oh my gosh. Does she have some really actionable tips for us about how to respond to baby behavior at mealtimes? So Dr. Aliza Pressman, many of you may be familiar with her because she is a host of one of my absolute favorite podcasts. It's called raising good humans. It's consistently a top rated parenting podcast, and I've learned so much from her podcast about not only my own children, but then also working with the babies that I work with in my business and feeding practice as well. So Dr. Pressman is a mom of two children, Penelope and Vivian. She has over 15 years of experience working with families. She has a PhD in human developmental, psychology from Columbia university.

Katie Ferraro (1m 35s):

She's certified in parent management. She's a co-founding director and the director of the clinical programming for the Mount Sinai parenting center. She's an assistant clinical professor in the department of pediatrics at the Icahn school of Medicine at Mount Sinai, even though she's based in Los Angeles. And I had like the most enjoyable conversation with her, she's here to talk about Calming an Upset Baby at Mealtimes. So with no further ado here is Dr. Aliza, Pressman.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (2m 4s):

Thank you so much for having me.

Katie Ferraro (2m 6s):

Okay. I am sorry. Fan girling right now. I'm a huge fan of your podcast. I am so excited. Like have been, since we set up this interview, before we dive in to talking about kind of Calming an Upset Baby at Mealtimes, could you tell us a little bit about your background and then the path that you took to becoming the parenting expert that we all know and love you as today?

Aliza Pressman, PhD (2m 23s):

Thank you. I get so uncomfortable with parenting expert, but I know that is technically what I am.

Katie Ferraro (2m 28s):

I hate being an influencer Alisa, but I technically am

Aliza Pressman, PhD (2m 32s):

So right. I just have to adapt to the, this world. So I am a developmental psychologist. I was planning on doing clinical psychology and I decided this very like mid-year that I was really interested in children and just how they work and what I could do to help if there were problems basically. And my mom is an educator and I think it was probably at some point inevitable and my family's kind of wacky. So psychology seemed interesting and it was the middle of the year. So I went to look up like how to apply and I couldn't apply maybe until fall and I wanted to do something.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (3m 14s):

And so I took four classes per this professor at NYU because I lived nearby. Who said, why don't you take the fundamentals? Like the intro courses, just so you have spent some time and then apply here in the fall. So I took abnormal psychology, which is basically clinical. And I took developmental, which is what I became and I took counseling and social psychology. And when I took them, it was like a little bit like dating and I just fell in love with developmental psychology. I just was like what? There's like all these reasons that we came to be who we are and so many beautiful ways that development unfolds that are similar in everybody. And then some they're so different.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (3m 55s):

And my mind was so blown with all the theories and all of the research. And it's from one intro course, it was just such a fit. So I went to Columbia and I was totally like, it just reinspired me and reinvigorated me. And then I ended up working in a lab there and I did the PhD program in developmental psych, but I also had this strange masters in adolescents and risk resilience and prevention. It's just that, as I was learning about adolescents, I also realized I wanted to do babies, toddlers and younger children for my PhD program. Because every year that I like exploring earlier in development, it felt like there was more possibility for prevention and support sometime after graduate school.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (4m 40s):

Now it was during graduate school at some point when I was pregnant. And one of the postdocs that I was friends with was pregnant at the same time. And we were like, what do people do when they don't have a friend? Who's a researcher to call to ask these questions too. And so we started these mom groups and then they became parent groups for babies. And then they would just grow with us. Some have minor, you know, have high schoolers now and they have not let go of our group. So I, I found a way to interact with parents directly and I really loved it and that's, I still have a private practice, but then I also really felt like I was right after graduate school. And I think during my, probably while I was writing my dissertation, I went to teach behavior and development at Mount Sinai.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (5m 23s):

I couldn't understand, like I was just like, okay, what do you want me to teach? And I just didn't understand that there was no standardized American Academy of Pediatrics program or curriculum for behavior and development. And I just didn't believe it. Like I was like, this is so ridiculous. How's that even possible

Katie Ferraro (5m 39s):

You should see nutrition, it's the exact same thing. There is a standardized curriculum and like 90% of physicians have never had a nutrition class in this country.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (5m 46s):

Totally. And it's so bonkers because when you, the only access you have as a parent typically is with your pediatrician, you depend on them so much. And they're so wonderful, but it's just not part of the training. And so I started to think about that with the physicians that were in charge of the program. And we started a parenting center where we could integrate parenting and child development into the water in healthcare systems. So that was really like now most of my work, I stopped teaching child development courses at like I was teaching at Columbia and infant development and child development and adolescent development. And that's much more traditional for folks in my field.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (6m 28s):

And I completely only do teaching in hospitals with physicians and social workers and, you know, family medicine and any healthcare provider really that interacts with families. We try to find ways to make sure that there's support for behavior and development, because of course, everybody gets asked that I'm sure that this happens all the time for you,

Katie Ferraro (6m 47s):

Elisa. I love your podcast, but also your email newsletter is amazing. And I learned something new from you each week. So I appreciate that you're teaching and lots of different avenues. I know sometimes as someone who sends out a lot of emails to a lot of people like, is anyone actually reading this? I am.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (7m 1s):

I hear that. I wonder the same thing. I'm like,

Katie Ferraro (7m 4s):

I know I'm like my open rates sometimes are in the toilet yet. Some people write back and like, Katie, thank you so much for that recipe. I'm like, thank you. But you recently did a summary of practical tips for discipline at all ages. And I love that you included the part about babies with the reminder for us, that babies are too young to calm themselves. And so when babies get upset at mealtimes and by babies for the purpose of our audience, I mean an infant age, six to 12 months when they're making that transition to solid foods, when they get upset at meal times, does it mean they don't like food? Or does it mean that they don't like learning how to eat? What's going on developmentally,

Aliza Pressman, PhD (7m 36s):

Thank you for appreciating that. I said discipline for babies, because I think you know this, but I'll say it for everyone discipline just as the, you know, Latin root to teach and we just want to, or comes from that and if you think about it as teaching, you're not going to start later, you start out of the gate and also it, you know, whatever you practice in your own parenting behavior and strategies gets stronger and stronger. And so of course, the minute you're talking to your babies, you want to start using the language that will support discipline throughout their life and that positive connection. So in this case, when you know babies, can't, self-regulate, I mean, I'm not going to get too technical about this because it's probably too much, but there are some schools of thought that they can self-regulate in very technical senses.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (8m 27s):

Like for example, if you shine a light on a baby in the bassinet, when they're a newborn, they'll still like close their eyes. And like, that is somewhat in some ways self-regulation because you're figuring out what you need to get that light out of your eyes. But in general, we really co-regulate as people and plenty of scientists feel like co-regulation is really the more important way of thinking about it. And it's like, if you're passing a ball back and forth with you and the baby, which you wouldn't be at six months, necessarily particularly easily, but if you can imagine this ball back and forth and the ball is, you know, if you throw it gently or like roll it gently, then you'll probably get a gentle roll back.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (9m 7s):

And if you, you know, throw it hard, then that's what you're getting. And you really want emotions to be, they are contagious in many ways. And so if you can regulate yourself as a parent, you are much, much more likely to support your baby in their own regulation. They borrow your calm, so to speak. So because of that, if they're having trouble at the table or they're crying and hard to soothe, they're not going to learn that they should stop doing that because you tell them to stop or because you ignore them because they don't have capacity to support themselves yet. They're just little babies, their prefrontal cortex exists, but it's quite undeveloped.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (9m 49s):

And so while they are miraculous and brilliant, they're also like not at all fully developed. And since we know adults. So if the prefrontal cortex, which houses your capacity to self-regulate is not fully developed till between 18 and 27 years. And there are some studies now that are pushing it even later, and we know plenty of adults for whom self-regulation is difficult. Then when you think about it, that way, it makes so much sense that a baby who's struggling, they don't know what to do, so they just lose it. So it may be that they just don't like the color of the food or the texture of the food, or they just don't want to be confined in a chair right then, or there's a strange sound like you don't necessarily have the right, like the understanding of what they need until you pause, regulate yourself and observe what's going on for them and what might be happening in their reaction right now.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (10m 40s):

And the only way to do that is to, and of course, caveat, if they're in danger, you don't want,

Katie Ferraro (10m 46s):

Is there an overt distress? Okay. Actively choking. We intervened.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (10m 50s):

If they're actively choking, you intervene. You don't pause to see what's going on.

Katie Ferraro (10m 53s):

You pause to self-regulate and you make a very good point is oftentimes we're so reactionary. The parents will be like, so I think she doesn't like green. So I decided to stop doing broccoli cause I'm only going to do pumpkin. But then I feel like she is texture averse. And I'm like your baby's six months old and doesn't know how to eat. Like our reactions need to be like, let's acknowledge that babies need a really long runway here to get this skill set down, both from the cognitive standpoint. But also just from the physiological standpoint, learning how to use those motor skills. He just freaking learn how to sit up. Now you're trying to sit and suck and swallow and breathe. And, and your mom's freaking out about the green broccoli versus the texture that they think you're reverse to. Like it is a lot for parents.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (11m 31s):

It's a lot. And I think that that's the key is the reason why co-regulation is such an important thing to keep in mind is that when you get in your distress of my baby's gonna, like, they're not eating this

Katie Ferraro (11m 45s):

Kind of the teachers. The parents literally asked me that every day, like I have terrible eating habits and I don't want to protect this onto my child. And so now I'm freaking out. It's like a lot of times it's the parent and I love, you're always reminding us, like, it's not just the baby's behavior that we're reacting to. Like, how are we reacting to the baby's reaction? The baby eventually will react to that. Like it's this codependent loop.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (12m 3s):

It really is. And so the best thing we could do for our kids, whether it's during feeding or sleep or anything, is like first attend to our own self-regulation and what this is doing for us. So you're absolutely right. If your six month old is rejecting something and freaking out, and in your mind, you have not come to terms with eating is going to unfold. As it's going to unfold, you're going to support as best you can with a positive environment, you're going to give a range of foods. You're going to do whatever it is that you set out to do. And I'm sure there are many episodes on your podcast where people can explore that. And also it's not going to go great every time. And this isn't a process. It's not on you.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (12m 43s):

Like we know this. If you think you can control what goes in a child's body, or it comes out of their body, you have got to come to terms with that. Not being true, like in no universe, you cannot, you also can't control how somebody feels. They will. You can only control that. They won't tell you how they feel. If you try to control how they feel, but you're not controlling how someone feels, what goes in their body, what comes out of their body. Full-stop in no universe. The only slight control is that you buy the groceries and you put the options on the table, but you're not beyond that. There's absolutely no control. So the minute that we can get to a place of acceptance of that lack of control, which again, doesn't mean that you're not motivated to and inspired to choose a menu.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (13m 24s):

That's going to be supportive to provide the choices that will hopefully promote good eating habits. But like, that's it. Then you have to let go and figure out, like, why is this triggering me so much? And I know trigger is so overused, but what is it about my baby's reaction that is freaking me out so much? Is it? I don't like seeing my baby in distress. Is it as simple as that? Very natural. Like we're supposed to make sure that our babies do not seem distress. That's like what we, our instincts are like, oh my God, there's something going on. It makes sense that it would freak you out, reminding yourself, are they in danger now? Okay. So they're not in imminent danger.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (14m 4s):

Can I handle their big feeling? Because if I can't, I've got to deal with that. Like we need as a gift to our kids to be able to put in their whole system for the rest of their lives. Like this person that I count on, as my anchor in life can handle my feelings. And they might sometimes be hideous and that's not too scary. Like, it's like talking with a friend, you don't open up to your friends who start crying when you tell them a story and can't hit. And they're like, I can't hear this. You know? Cause it's too awful. You go to the ones who are like, I've got you. I can handle it. Tell me what's going on for you. I'm not going to make this about me and how I feel. And so if you remind yourself of that, it feels like easier.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (14m 45s):

I think, to handle your kid's big feelings and your baby's big feelings because you you've been thinking of it like, oh, it's a gift. I'm not, you're not neglecting them. You're not saying like, go figure out how to stop crying. And then we're going to feed you. You're just saying, I've got you, my nervous system. I'm breathing. Like I can take three deep breaths. There's time for that. And my nervous system will help your nervous system regulate, not maybe today, but it's going to take awhile, but that will be part of the interaction. And it's just physics. Like it really does work. It's just define how work, you know, like what that means. It's not going to work today. And I think part of this is feeding. Like all things. It's a slow game

Katie Ferraro (15m 26s):

And your baby doesn't magically learn overnight. Never how to eat. I teach a hundred FIRST FOODS program. We teach babies, eat a hundred different foods before they turn one, but they don't wake up on their six month birthday. But also they don't wake up on their 12 month birthday and magically know how to do that. If you haven't spent that weening period practicing and giving them space to mess up and make a mess and have that full sensory experience of learning how to eat. And I think too often, we live in this just like immediate gratification society. I mean, you and I were talking about TikTok before we came on, it was like, dude, I can't keep someone's attention for longer than five seconds. But like sometimes that trickles down into parenting, like, oh my gosh, I did not eat this sardine. And I gave him 17 seconds to do it. It's like,

Aliza Pressman, PhD (16m 5s):

And that's the thing is like you're as a parent, so pressured to feel like you've got to get this done. And it's otherwise, are you telling yourself a story of like what's happening in their future because I didn't get this done for them. And that doesn't help your kids because there's now pressure on, on the feeding. And we all know what it feels like when somebody is like hanging over you with the weight of the world for like, if you taste something like, think about again, if you think about an adults and they're fully developed, hopefully, and somebody is like, I just, I worked all day on this meal and I can't wait for you to try it. And you just stand over and watch them. They're going to be like, oh my God, hopefully it's delicious. But what if it's a new taste?

Katie Ferraro (16m 44s):

I know. But then you add like the other layer of grandparents or mother-in-laws the parents are like, oh my gosh, I'm dealing with pressure of the baby. Not wanting it. And the pressure of other family members telling me, like, that's not how you start solid foods.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (16m 53s):

And

Katie Ferraro (16m 53s):

It does get to be a lot because you've never done this before. So it's a mutual learning experience between you and your baby. But I always encourage if someone's not there supporting you, you can, if you can't get them out of the picture, please do

Aliza Pressman, PhD (17m 3s):

Totally. I mean, they don't need that. But on the other hand, if you can't get them out of the picture, you don't need to feel compelled to teach them your way. Correct. Let it go. Like they can have the influence of different styles. If you're the primary style we have at the hospital, a sign that says parents were born here in the, in the neonatal unit because we're born as parents at the same time as our kids are born. We don't, it's not like we've been around. If you have a six month old, you've been a parent for six months, this is new stuff. This is hard. So, you know, you have to build in space to mess up and it's totally fine.

Katie Ferraro (17m 39s):

You mentioned kind of overused terms. And I think one that gets used a ton in parenting kind of makes my skin crawl a little bit, is the use of the word anxiety, which can be a real true diagnosis. But yet it gets ascribed to everything. Especially in feeding. I feel like so much of our content is just talking to parents anxieties. But the reality is this generation is open about talking about the things that they're scared about. They're not into pretending like they know everything and we appearance everyday. We're like Katie, this makes me nervous. Introducing foods, doing the allergenic foods. I get anxious when my baby gags on foods. And so for the parents who are anxious and nervous, do you have any suggestions for practices or tips to avoid during mealtimes that could inadvertently stress your baby out? Like, yes. I know we should all be talking positive.

Katie Ferraro (18m 20s):

That's really hard for some of us to do. Like what should we not be doing that, you know, would stress your baby.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (18m 26s):

We are wired to hunt for the negative. That's how we survive. And that is where anxiety is a good thing, right? Like if, if we lived in the jungle and we're staring at the rainbow, we're going to get eaten by a tiger. Anxiety is a good thing because you're vigilant. You're like, I'm not going to stare at the rainbow and appreciate the rainbow. I'm going to protect my baby and make sure, you know, they don't need to poison his Berry or they don't have, you know, a tiger chump them. So it's not a bad thing. It's just, if nobody's in imminent danger, you don't need to be so vigilant. And so one practice to keep in mind is say to yourself, something that just resonates with you. Like I do this and I still do this to this day.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (19m 8s):

I'm not being chased by a bear. Nobody's being chased by a bear. And in that moment of just saying that it reminds your whole system to say like, this is not a fight flight or freeze moment. This is just like a moment. And when you remind yourself, I'm totally safe and you can use some levity. Like I, you know, I think some people might gag at the thought of being like, I am safe. My child is safe. I am okay. We can do this.

Katie Ferraro (19m 33s):

I like, I am not being chased by a bear. I'm going to start using

Aliza Pressman, PhD (19m 35s):

That. But I'm not being chased by a bear. And you can add, you can remind yourself of that so that you can then figure out how to move forward without the heaviness of the anxiety, because you've lightened it. You said, Hey, you know, another way to think about it is figure out the passcode to your internal alarm system. So I live in California. I got an alarm for the first time ever. Cause I did not. I lived in New York city in an apartment and only two people in New York does New York feel safer, but I feel much safer.

4 (20m 4s):

What are you getting? Yeah. You moved to a safer part of the country

Aliza Pressman, PhD (20m 7s):

Now. But in my mind I was like, ah, like there aren't people everywhere. And I can't like just scream. And my neighbor will say like, are you okay? And so I got an alarm system. And when I walked in the house, I had this realization that there's this beep for like however many seconds. And then if you haven't punched in the past code, the alarm goes off and the security comes and things feel pretty intense. But if you know your code, when you get a warning, like, oh, I'm going to freak out. You just punch in your passcode and you regulate again. And so if you can figure out what your passcode is for most humans on this planet, breathing is your passcode because you cannot have a stress response while breathing, because it's just like in conflict.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (20m 53s):

So if you can say, I'm not being chased by a bear, my babies are being chased by a bear and just take three breaths. You have your passcode. And then you can go along with your day and not, you know, and the broccoli and whatever it is. And it just is not as that, the anxiety is just alleviated. And then remember anxiety is not all bad. So you also don't have to freak out. There's like a new movement of panic over the panic. It's a moment where you're just freaking out, it'll pass and then your child will still go on to have a happy life

Katie Ferraro (21m 25s):

And Aliza. I can really see the passcode to your internal alarm code analogy, working in feeding. Cause one of the things that is the biggest pain point for parents with the baby led approach, or whenever you transition to solid foods is the gagging on food and developmental standpoint. We teach parents, you know, gagging is a good thing, is a natural and necessary part of the learning, how to eat process. It's remarkably different from choking. Yes. Educate yourself about choking, have CPR skills down so that in the event of a choking incident, you would know what to do, but the vast majority of the time what's happening is gagging. And if you can recognize that and repeat to yourself, gagging is a good thing. We teach parents to sit on their hands because we don't intervene in a baby's gag. If you intervene in a gag and you start all the baby and they suck in air because they're scared, it could cause a harmless gag to turn into a harmful choke.

Katie Ferraro (22m 8s):

And so having that mantra, which is so for some people, it is, I am strong. I am safe, but for other parents, it is gagging. And as a good thing, maybe for some that is my baby is not being chased by a bear, but I love that internal reset. And the way we react so often sets the stage for them, what the baby will do next or how they react,

Aliza Pressman, PhD (22m 24s):

Right? Because essentially you're, they're getting wired in these mealtime experiences for how to associate mealtime and joy and comfort and or stress and whatever. And I say that with the understanding that it's UN you know, multiple experiences, repeat experiences, too many opportunities to have meals per day. So it's not like you're going to get them all perfectly. And then if you don't, your kid's going to associate mealtime with negative experiences and it's all a mess, but just on balance, do you feel like more times than not, it's a peaceful experience.

Katie Ferraro (23m 0s):

You have such a deep background in parenting, and you've seen a lot in your experiences, both as a parent and as a professional, as an educator, which I think is why I know that your podcast really resonates with me because I'm like, I have never done this next step in parenting. Let me hear from someone who has, so it's very comforting and I'm curious, very, I always struggle with, so this is partially self-serving is like the positive language piece. Like it does not just come naturally. You need to be like, oh my gosh, how wonderful. When like the baby's freaking dropping all the food that I just made on the floor. I know they're not doing it to be as their quote unquote bad, but like tips on positive language. Cause for a lot of us, I have to practice and I have lots of parents who say the same thing. Cause the positive language stuff does not come naturally.

Katie Ferraro (23m 40s):

What verbiage should we be sharing if possible, to speak to parents of six to twelve months old babies when that babies, you know, and again, I know a 10 month old baby dropping food is having a much different experience in a six month old dropping food. But if you want to just generalize in late infancy for positive language.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (23m 54s):

So yeah. I mean take with a grain of salt, everything that I say or anybody else about positive language, because yeah, if it's not your natural thing, then it's annoying. And I totally understand that. Like I recognize that some of the scripts that folks in my field and probably in your field and you know, anybody who's looking for any of this, some of it's kind of like, oh, you're so annoying.

Katie Ferraro (24m 17s):

Yeah. But there's something for everyone. That's the beauty of the world, right? I'm not everyone's cup of tea, but for some parents, you know, I think, Hey, you might think this annoying language is annoying. I'm like, well, that's actually genius. I'm going to give them

Aliza Pressman, PhD (24m 26s):

It might be helpful. So one way to look at it at is, and part of this really matters that you, you know, if you can start at six months, great, if you start at 10 months, totally great too. But the longer you have practice where your baby's not quite understanding the language, they just get your vibe. I have been in California too long. And I said that, but that if you can do, what's called a positive opposite. You tell your child what to do instead of what not to do it, trains your language to be more positive. So it's like, let's say in your brain, you're you want to say, don't throw your food on the floor. Of course you want to say that that's a natural thing to want to say. So what you train your brain to do is what's the opposite. That what's the positive opposite of that.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (25m 6s):

It's please keep your food on the table or in your mouth and is a six month old. Like what six month old understands what's going on? It's not that it's just that you're practicing language a 10 month old. Absolutely. And you know, you use your hands and gesture to make sense of your words because that's going to matter until they're completely using language fluently, but you really just want to practice positive opposites. You can do that. I recommend doing that with adults, with kids just in your own brain, because it just helps you get fluent in this language of, of approaching babies and thinking about what do I want them to do? And the reason you want to think about what do I want them to do is because if you just said, don't throw your food on the floor, then what if they throw it on the wall?

Katie Ferraro (25m 52s):

Yes. Right. That analogy works so well in feeding too, because my idea is to say like, don't throw your food on the floor. And it's like, well, what do you want the baby to do? Food is for staying on the plate. We eventually eat food and put it in our mouth. I love that you're exploring the food and it does feel kind of fake at first. But I think you get a way of doing it. I hope my kids are older. My quadruplets or kindergarten, they totally realized what I'm like. You're fake smiling. Now what you're saying, doesn't match. What's coming out of your mouth and like, oh shoot, maybe I didn't start this like positive opposite stuff early enough because now they know I'm lying. Like so fair warning. Start as early as you can.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (26m 24s):

Absolutely.

Katie Ferraro (26m 25s):

Right. In my approach to baby led weaning, we really helped parents back away from their concern, which is inherent about how much their baby is eating. Right? There's this pressure of, oh my gosh, they're not eating enough. They're not getting enough iron and not getting enough calories. We teach them to build in space and time for the baby to practice learning how to eat. So I'm curious if you could share a little bit about the learning process that babies, especially earlier six and seven months are going through like a parents feeling stress. Oh my gosh. They're not getting a lot of the milligrams of iron because they don't know how to eat yet. Like developmentally, what should parents be aware of? So they don't get stressed when their baby is taking this deliberate, slow approach to starting solid foods that feels like maybe they're not getting enough.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (27m 2s):

First of all, the first couple of months are not about the nutrients.

Katie Ferraro (27m 7s):

See, you know that with a PhD and a background in psychology, I can't tell you how many Registered Dietitian are like. So I tried to calculate how many milligrams of iron from my breast milk the baby is getting. And then I like crossed, multiplied that by the amount of iron in the meat, they were dropping on the floor. I'm like, that's not what it's about. That's

Aliza Pressman, PhD (27m 22s):

Not what it's about.

Katie Ferraro (27m 22s):

It's kind of no offense, but it's sad that like child development, people sometimes get it more about the nourishing, the baby's body than the like clinical nutrition people. And I'm speaking like about my own profession.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (27m 32s):

I think it's, the fields are so siloed, but they're serving the same people. And so if everybody did more, I have gotten so much more out of working in a hospital where there are different experts in multiple fields. And when we have conversations, I'm like something that I say that I think is super obvious. They're like what? And vice versa. And I'm just like you can't, whatever you're explaining to me is not English to me. So can you back up for a second? And they're like, what do you mean? That's the thing we learned day one. So I think part of it is just having conversations like this with people in fields that are siloed, that really shouldn't be siloed. But also I think developmental psychology as an umbrella fields for, for social, emotional and cognitive development.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (28m 12s):

And so we do have a bigger picture approach to everything because we understand development that way. So yes, the, one of the best ways to feel mellow about those first couple of months of solids is that it's not relevant. Nutrition-wise it's relevant experience wise. And so you just want to have whatever experience is going to make this something you want to keep doing.

Katie Ferraro (28m 38s):

Yeah. Because I hate to break it to, you have to feed this small person for at least the next 17 and a half years of your life. So like honestly in the parents were like, oh, you know what? It kind of makes sense. I'm going to do the work now to help them build a foundation for a helpful relationship with food that as adults, like, again, this is a totally different conversation, but a lot of us would readily admit we don't have, and parents do feel that they don't want to replicate that stuff in their

Aliza Pressman, PhD (28m 58s):

Children. Horrible.

Katie Ferraro (29m 0s):

But yet you're responsible for feeding a 15 and a 12 year old every single day. I mean, I know they are making their own food choices, but at the end of the day, like you're still in charge.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (29m 9s):

It would say, I just want you to know that on mother's day I got a card that was like, mom, your hour. And then it's like a list of all the things that moms are. And one of the things was best chef. And then they crossed that out. And last year on mother's day, they gave me a rock that said like mothers are, and it was like number one, you know, again, list of bunch of traits. One of them being cook and they crossed it out. So my kids know I have destroyed that part. You know, like they caught on quickly that I was not the chef of the house. And I wasn't raised like that. Like my mom was working in a single mom and she gave me TV dinners and just terrible

Katie Ferraro (29m 52s):

To tell about it.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (29m 53s):

Aliza, I lived to tell I did, but I mean, I would never give that to my kid. Like I was like, mom,

Katie Ferraro (29m 59s):

Maybe you've also been in LA for too long of your life because I feel like sometimes I'm like, heck yeah, whatever I can find, I would give it to my kid.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (30m 5s):

But other

Katie Ferraro (30m 5s):

Parents would be like, why what's wrong with that? It's like, no, we're not judging the food choices that you're making. But we do have to acknowledge from a child development standpoint that the practices that a baby has experienced and exposure to with those first bites, they do matter. Are they? Everything is irreversible. No, but we can't say they don't matter. Like we don't feed six months olds flaming hot Cheetos and regular Dr. Pepper. Right. For a freaking reason. Right. Like, right.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (30m 28s):

I probably was. But again, am I did live to tell the tale, but I would say that one of the things that we just have to keep reminding ourselves is that we can't cling to micro moments and mealtimes are like each bite when we're invested in that micro moment, we're actually counterproductive because our kids are feeling that the weight of that, whether there's six months or 10 months, and it's unnecessary because we're trying to wire these habits, but not at the expense of everybody's mental health.

Katie Ferraro (31m 4s):

Oh, we can't cling to micro. I know you don't intend to speak in soundbites, but this is amazing meals are micro-moments and we get, we put so much pressure on herself about them now, overtime, humanly. Yeah. They do matter. But if you have a bad meal or a bad day, or you drive through, I'm not saying to buy your baby drive through because people will take that clip and say, that dietitian said to take your baby to McDonald's. I'm not saying that is at the end of the world. If you don't have a perfect organic meal with three well-balanced food groups, like now it's a micro moment. Don't clean to the micro moments. Elisa, thank you so much for sharing your time and your talents, your expertise with us. Tell us where can our audience go to learn more about you and your work and to support your business.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (31m 41s):

Thank you. Well, you can listen to raising good humans podcast, or I try to give some reason Instagram, which is raising good humans.

Katie Ferraro (31m 49s):

She does her own Instagram. It's amazing. I'm going to link to all your stuff in the show notes, but I was like, also get some help with your Instagram

Aliza Pressman, PhD (31m 56s):

Right now. I got

Katie Ferraro (31m 56s):

It's fabulous. I don't know how you do it all though.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (31m 58s):

And the, you can go onto the Mount Sinai parentingcenter.org. We have a lot of resources online and I have a newsletter, at draliza.bulletin.com. And I think those are the best ways to reach me. There's an email, you know, for people who want to reach me via email there's it's, I think you can click on Instagram. I'm not really fast with it, but I, I get the word

Katie Ferraro (32m 20s):

Is your email newsletter, a paid subscription. I can never remember who I'm paying for and who I'm not. I love yours.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (32m 25s):

Thank you. Okay. So I have a free subscription and then there's a premium subscription. That's 4.99 a month. And that's more because it includes like

Katie Ferraro (32m 34s):

and stuff,

Aliza Pressman, PhD (32m 36s):

Right? Yeah.

Katie Ferraro (32m 37s):

I Mean, I don't understand where you get all the time. I need to have a separate time management.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (32m 41s):

Well, I mean, I'm not entirely sure that I do manage my time properly, but I have teenagers who close their door a lot.

Katie Ferraro (32m 48s):

Oh, dress themselves and go to the bathroom by themselves a little bit of time there. I'm not saying

Aliza Pressman, PhD (32m 53s):

No, it's giving me so much more time. Like, I just want to say this because these, the, your audience has young babies. I wasn't doing this. When I had young babies, I was doing one thing

Katie Ferraro (33m 2s):

We're also studying with young babies. And that is like, to me, the hardest thing, like to use your brain when you have children, I'm sorry, I can't do it. You were talking about like, it was talking with a fellow when I was pregnant. I was like, I was like eating chips and listening to podcasts that I was pregnant. Just try not to throw up. I really, really appreciate your time and sharing with our audience. And I loved what you were saying about, you know, the different professions, not needing to be siloed. A child learning how to eat is not strictly a nutrition or an occupational therapy or speech language pathologist, or a developmental psychologist. Like there are all of these issues at play and it doesn't hurt to learn from the different areas, what our babies are going through at the different ages and stages. So thank you so much for this conversation. It's been a real pleasure speaking with you.

Aliza Pressman, PhD (33m 40s):

Thank you so much. And I'll have to have you on when we do baby led weaning,

Katie Ferraro (33m 43s):

I would love to come and talk about baby led weaning. I hope you guys enjoyed that interview. I love it. Dr. Pressman, I've always loved her podcasts, but she's so lovely to speak to you in person and just a real life person. Cause I've spoken to a lot of developmental psychologists over the years, and I just think I love this like approach. Now. They're just more real kind of, I feel like and less scary from the psychology side. So I really enjoy connecting with her both on a professional level, but also as a fellow mom and someone kind of working in the same space. It's funny how there's a lot of overlapping issues or situations that we see in both of our lines of work. And I love what she was saying about the professions, not needing to be siloed when it comes to addressing, you know, really big milestone related things like transitioning to solid food.

Katie Ferraro (34m 26s):

So I'm going to link to all of the particulars that Dr. Pressman was mentioning as well as her podcast, which again is raising good humans with Aliza Pressman. That'll be on the show notes page for this episode, which you can find at blwpodcast.com/234. Thanks so much for listening.