What if I Don't Eat the Same BLW Foods as My Baby? with Katelynn Sasaki, MS, RDN

Katelynn Sasaki (0s):

You are not damaging your baby. If you cannot model all a hundred foods that are on that list, just being willing to expose your baby to the different tastes and textures. You're giving your baby so much that they can take with them as they develop their own relationship with food.

Katie Ferraro (15s):

Hey, there Im 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, leading you with the competence and knowledge. You need to give your baby a safe start to solid foods using baby led weaning All right. Maybe you've heard that it's beneficial. If you're doing baby Led Weaning to eat the same foods that your baby eats, right? Like you have to list off the pros of baby led weaning. It's like Babies can share in the same meals that you are eating.

Katie Ferraro (55s):

So we always talk about the benefits of a modeling, the foods that your baby's trying by trying them and eating them with your baby yourself. But what if you don't eat the same baby led weaning foods as your baby? What if you don't want to? Or what if you can't, this is a question we actually get pretty frequently. And so I wanted to bring on one of our team members, a dietitian that works here at baby led weaning team with me, her name is Katelynn Sasaki, and she helps us answer a lot of the workshop questions. So many of you know, I teach a free online workshop each week called baby LED WEANING FOR BEGINNERS. It's all about how to get your baby to eat 100 foods before turning one, without you having to spoonfeed purees or buy pouches, we do big Q and A at the end and the questions we can't get to when they come in by email, me and Kaitlin split them up and respond.

Katie Ferraro (1m 44s):

And we're always like, dang. Some of these parents are really freaked out about drying new foods. Well, Kaitlynn also happens to be an eating disorder, dietitian she's part-time with us. So her other job is working in eating disorders. And she's got a lot of great skills and tips for helping parents who don't eat the same baby Led Weaning foods as their babies. So she's going to run you through a few different scenarios when you might not want to, or can't eat the same foods as your baby. She's going to let us know. We literally get questions like, am I doing irreparable damage to my baby? If I don't eat these foods and spoiler alert, the answer is usually no, but she's been talking about the different scenarios when you might be limited or not able to. So I am so excited to bring you guysKatelynn Sasaki.

Katie Ferraro (2m 27s):

She also works a ton on the podcast and on our Instagram. So I think she's really excited to be like involved in the content in a different way today. And I'm so excited to chat with her cause she's one of my most favorite people. And most she's like the most talented person everyone we work with is talented, but she's incredibly gifted. She's creative, she's an artist. She makes a lot of our stuff look good. And she also knows a ton about baby led weaning. So she's going to share some of that with you today. So with no further ado, let's dive in. What if I don't eat the same baby led weaning foods as my baby with Katelynn Sasaki, Registered Dietitian.

Katelynn Sasaki (3m 2s):

Hi Katie. Thank you for having me. It feels a little weird to be on the side of the content, but I'm happy to be here.

Katie Ferraro (3m 8s):

Awesome to have you here. I've been piling up these questions for you. So before we dive into, you know, sharing baby led weaning foods with your baby stuff, could you give us a little bit of background of why did you decide to become a dietictian? And then what do you currently do as a dietitian in your other part of the job? That's not baby Led Weaning.

Katelynn Sasaki (3m 26s):

So I became a dietitian. I feel like as a lot of us do, because I love food. I love talking about food and I love trying new foods, which goes perfectly with baby Led Weaning. And then it also goes perfectly with my other job. So full time I work in adolescent eating disorder recovery. So my patients are ages like 10 ish to early twenties. And a lot of that involves helping them overcome some obstacles when it comes to trying new foods, if it's ARFID or dealing with restriction, bingeing purging, we cover a spectrum of eating disorders for that age group.

Katie Ferraro (4m 4s):

What ARFID

Katelynn Sasaki (4m 5s):

ARFID is avoidant restrictive food intake disorder. And so it is having extreme reactions and fears to food. So whether it be a fear of throwing up or getting sick or a fear of choking, a lot of these things can happen for various reasons, but it can make it really difficult to have a variety of food, which limits nutrient intake.

Katie Ferraro (4m 30s):

And I've learned so much from you about eating disorders, just like every time Katelynn comes on our meetings, like how was work today? What happened? And obviously without divulging any patient information, it's really kind of amazing how a lot of the patients that you work with are overcoming some of the same issues that may be babies will have all the while be it in the kind of more extreme situation. I know you've been a part of our team for about five years now. You working eating disorders, of course, full-time plus you do this on the side. You're a busy lady professionally, but you also have a ton of baby Led Weaning experience in your personal life. So you are like the super auntie. You have adorable nephews and a beautiful niece. They're all really close in age. They've been doing baby led weaning. So we've all been following their journey. Can you tell us a little bit about your experience helping your sisters with therefore kids who've been doing baby led weaning, and they've all been doing the hunter first foods approach too, which is pretty cool.

Katelynn Sasaki (5m 19s):

Yeah. So I have been lucky enough to have four nieces and nephews over the past two years. So it's been quick. It has been so much fun doing baby led weaning with all of them. I am really lucky that my sisters were super open to that approach. So one of the most interesting things has been watching the progression of my family's acceptance that Baby Led Weaning from the first baby now to where it, the fourth, who is about to start this month, actually. So the first Jordan, my sister was like a little bit. I'm not so sure about this. Her pediatrician was also not so sure about it, but eventually she started getting more comfortable.

Katelynn Sasaki (6m 1s):

She tried the purees for a few days and that really helped ease some of her concerns. And then when my second nephew Luke started and we had the two of them doing it together, it was much easier to gain some confidence for not just my sister, but also my parents who were taking care of the kids since they're like this, what is this? Why can't I just put the spoon in the baby's mouth did it all you guys, you guys are all fine. We hear that quite a bit, but it really raised the competence of my whole family, watching the two boys do it together. And so by the time they are, by the time Jaylin started, which was just a few months ago, a couple of months ago, she was, my sister is ready.

Katelynn Sasaki (6m 46s):

She was like, okay, what are the foods? How do we do it? Let's go. And Jaylin was jamming on food. And just the other day we had a Hanukkah dinner and Jaylin was sitting at the table, eating her matzoh ball soup with everybody, enjoying herself and loving it.

Katie Ferraro (7m 2s):

That is so cool. And Jayleen was a little bit different for you guys because I know she had a couple of food reactions and I think she's passed 50 foods at this point. Can you share just a little bit, cause I think this was also your first experience with one of your family members having food allergy reactions in infancy while doing baby led weaning

Katelynn Sasaki (7m 19s):

Right. Jalyen reacted to milk protein, a egg peanut peanut actually led to an emergency room visit and then salmon, she's still waiting on a referral for a pediatric allergist, but even waiting for that, I was very nice to see my sister have enough competence where she continued introducing the foods. And that's how now should I think she's up to like 60 foods and loving the process still.

Katie Ferraro (7m 46s):

Oh gosh. They're so stinking cute. And I'm kind of a stocker creeper. Cause my phone is like full of pictures of Katelynn's nephews in Houston. They're so adorable. And then now it's so cute to watch the brothers who are a little bit older, like kind of helping Jaylen eat. And you sometimes like will Rog calls. You like have all four babies there and your parents are there. It's so cool. And I've just like loved getting to know more about your family through baby led weaning as well. And then of course like sending them every single baby led weaning gear thing that I ever find. Cause I just like love watching them eat.

Katelynn Sasaki (8m 13s):

Oh yeah, Bruce is ready to go. And I love how your color coordination has trickled into my family. Cause I've noticed you have a side, Bruce Green, all of the ezpz stuff.

Katie Ferraro (8m 25s):

I love it. You got to know where it goes. Exactly. He's number four. I'm so excited to see him start baby led weaning. So thank you for continuing cause you use your nieces and nephews a lot for our content to help us, especially with the allergenic stuff now with Jaylen having some allergies. So just a little background of Katelynn's background. I kind of have to brag on her for a second because for those of you guys who are in the hundred first foods program that I co-teach with my speech language pathologist colleague, Dawn Winkleman, we do this a few times. Each year. Katelynn is a free hand illustrator and she did all of the design for the a hundred first foods program. So she basically drew all the a hundred foods that's on all of the imagery and the whole beautiful looking program. So not only is she good at eating disorders and maybe Led Weaning, but she also makes all of our content look amazing, which I'm so grateful for because I'm not a creative person.

Katie Ferraro (9m 10s):

So thank you for all you do Katelynn.

Katelynn Sasaki (9m 12s):

Thank you so much, Katie. I love making this content. It's been so much fun. Learning a new side of the dietetics and Nice using my creative side as well.

Katie Ferraro (9m 22s):

Well, we're going to use some of your professional expertise too, because I know you have a lot of experience in nutrition counseling and working with adolescents who have eating disorders and other issues surrounding food and swells working with their parents. I'm so surprised. You know, how closely the family relationships comes into play with eating disorders. I don't have a background in eating disorders to be honest, they freak me out. So everything I know I've learned from you. And the reason why we decided to do this episode is we want to talk about what happens. If mom is scared that she can't eat the same food as her baby or dad or caregiver, a grandparent, but it comes up a couple of different times. And so I'd like to go through kind of each of the scenarios that we tend to see where the parent's like, you know, am I doing a reparable damage to my baby?

Katie Ferraro (10m 2s):

If I can't eat these foods with them? Cause right. One of the benefits of Baby Led Weaning is yes, you can enjoy in meal time with your baby and they can eat modified versions of the same foods your baby can. But let's start by talking about picky eaters. So recently on the free workshop that we were doing, one of the questions was from a mom who said, I've struggled with picky eating my whole life. And I don't want my baby to have the same issues. That's why I'm doing baby Led Weaning. But I'm so worried that I won't even be able to prepare the new foods that I want my baby to eat. So any tips here, Katelynn for parents or caregivers who are picky eaters and trying to reduce picky, eating by doing baby led weaning, but like scared of the foods that they're going to introduce.

Katelynn Sasaki (10m 43s):

So my suggestion would be start with something that is scary to you, but seems doable. So for example, if Bulger is sounding a little too wacky for you start with something that may be, you may be more familiar with like say farro, that looks more like rice and try that way. If you really just cannot get yourself to try the food, that's okay too. But watch what you say about the food and how you're talking about it. Because even if you're not actually eating it, you can still sit there and model a positive reaction to the food you can like, wow, this texture looks so interesting.

Katelynn Sasaki (11m 25s):

Look at this color, it looks so appetizing. You can still talk about the food in either a positive or a neutral way

Katie Ferraro (11m 32s):

And then like turning your nose. That of either. I mean, I feel like for me, I'm not a picky eater, but like I can't handle beets, but every time it comes to feed my baby beets, I'm like gagging and almost throwing up in my mouth when I'm even the smell of them. It's so vile, but I want my baby to enjoy beets and they do. They love them. And it's actually sometimes inspiring for me to be like, oh wait, they've never been had beets. And they like them or they're at least trying them, like maybe I could try a food that I historically don't like actually try beets once a year just to make sure I don't like them. I still don't. But you make a good point. Like if it seems doable, if you can put it in your mouth, but I know not everyone can do that. Is it the end of the world? If a picky eater, parent can't eat the same foods that their baby can though,

Katelynn Sasaki (12m 9s):

It is not the end of the world. If you cannot model a specific food for your baby, your baby overall is seeing you eat food and they're seeing you maybe try some other foods and it's okay if that one food, your baby's eating it and you're sitting there being supportive for them.

Katie Ferraro (12m 27s):

And if you can't participate in that food, it's okay. But don't give up on offering a variety of foods to your baby. Even if you yourself have a pretty limited repertoire. And one thing we do hear from parents right, is like, okay, I kind of like baby led weaning because it actually makes me as a picky eater, try some new foods as well. And sometimes we just don't try foods cause we don't even think to try them. But if you've got the a hundred first foods list and you're running down the list of whole grains and you're like, all right, I gotta do spelt or I got to do sorghum and you get it and we show you how to make it safely. You might be inclined to try it too. So you might be surprised picky eater, parents. This might actually help to expand your horizons as well.

Katelynn Sasaki (13m 0s):

Yes, I agree. Definitely

Katie Ferraro (13m 2s):

Let's talk about parents or caregivers with medical conditions. So I mean, picky eating is not like a clinical diagnosis, but I'm thinking of that mom recently SITA who was on the podcast. We did a BLW Q and A episode recently. She had a question and I'll read it again because I thought this one was so interesting. She said, my husband has ulcerative colitis. So his diet is very limited. His diet is also salt based and fat-based because of his condition. So for my son, when I do baby led weaning for him, if he sees his dad not eating all of the foods, will he become a picky eater as well? How do I prevent that is what the mom asked any ideas here, Katelynn?

Katelynn Sasaki (13m 39s):

I think that if the mom of Sita is willing to try the foods, that baby is still getting some exposure to somebody modeling the food. So if there is at all possible to get a parent or a caregiver or an older sibling, even trying the food with the baby, I think that can be a great source of modeling. But again, as we said earlier, if there's any reason that you medically cannot try the food that is okay, do not endanger yourself. It is okay for your baby. Not to see you eat that.

Katie Ferraro (14m 10s):

What about the parents that have food allergies? If you have an existing food allergy, we know that in first-degree relatives, that puts baby at higher risk for having a food allergy, but it doesn't necessarily mean they're going to have it right. And so we encourage parents try those allergenic foods. But what if, like, for example, remember when we were working with baby Cambria, her dad had a severe cow's milk protein allergy, and he couldn't even like be around the foods that had it. So what do you do in that case? If you want your baby to try the allergenic food, but you're allergic to it yourself as a parent

Katelynn Sasaki (14m 39s):

In the event of a severe allergic reaction, I would say you to very carefully introduce that food into your household and know where it is in case the sibling or parent a reaction to the food and to not contaminate other things. If it is a less severe reaction, for example, I, myself am allergic to shellfish, but for our Instagram, I have prepared many,

Katie Ferraro (15m 6s):

Sorry, I always forget. I'm so sensitive. I'm like, Hey, can you make this new shrimp recipe for babies? And she's like, well, I'm allergic to it, but sure.

Katelynn Sasaki (15m 14s):

So I have still been able to prepare the shellfish dishes safely with my own safety in mind and offer it to the baby. I'm not trying, not food that day.

Katie Ferraro (15m 25s):

No you're allergic, but like, is it airborne for you? Is it ingesting it? Like, can you feed it to the babies and watch them eat it? Or can you like, not even be in the same room

Katelynn Sasaki (15m 34s):

luckily, I am not super antiplectic or allergic and the airborne is okay touching it. I just have to be very careful wash my hands before I'm touching my eyes or my mouth or anything like that. But I can sit next to them while they're eating it. If this instance, since it's not my baby, I can always send the food home with my sister who can introduce it with them. But if it were the case where a parent was allergic, could another caregiver introduced the food to the baby? I think that might be one of the safer ways to go if you're not quite sure how allergic you are or what would set it off.

Katie Ferraro (16m 11s):

Okay. Great tips. Now let's talk about working parents. We have so many working parents who are in our programs because the reality is they don't have time to hunt and pack all over the internet and pick up information here and there about baby LED WEANING from like random blogs or other Instagram pages. So they're working right. They're busy. They're also concerned though, because they want to do baby led weaning, but they're not going to be there for every meal time. So if you're a parent and you have a different caregiver, like a nanny or a grandparent who was watching her baby, or in many cases, the baby goes to daycare. So mom or dad, the primary feeders are not going to always be the ones repairing the food. Do you have any tips for these working parents on how they can instill the best practices for baby led weaning when they might not be the ones monitoring or introducing the food,

Katelynn Sasaki (16m 52s):

Working parents, they can show whoever the caregiver is exactly how they want food prepared. They can give them the guidelines of what they're looking for in terms of size, in terms of texture and softness. But they can also refer their caregivers to resources that we have available. For instance, the free workshop, it's a free workshop. There's a Q and a at the end and they can give their whoever's taking care of their baby for them, that resource as well to join because we love gettingcmments and questions from people saying like, I'm a grandma. I've never done this before ever.

Katie Ferraro (17m 27s):

My daughter-in-law is making me take your free workshop, Katie and you guys that's called baby LED WEANING FOR BEGINNERS. It's all about how to get your baby to eat 100 foods before turning one, without you having to spoonfeed purees or buy pouches. So if you want to sign up, if you had to baby led weaning dot, oh, you can sign up for this week's workshop times. And we also do a big Q and a at the end where Caitlin and I share the answering the questions, but we actually make a point to answer every single question. And we give everyone on that workshop, our free hundred first foods list. So if you're down with baby led weaning, but you need like grandma to get on board, send her to the workshop. And I love what you're saying, Katelyn, that we can support those who are helping support us and watching our kids. But my recommendation is always that if it's a new food, you mom or dad, or the person who was really taking the horns on baby Led Weaning, you need to be the one.

Katie Ferraro (18m 13s):

Introducing the new food. You cannot expect someone who's already a little bit reticent about doing baby led weaning to do like starting for the first time. If they don't even need those foods. So you do the food. When, as Caitlin said, then you show them how you want them to feed them. And we do that a lot with daycare, you know, requesting an appointment to sit down with the daycare providers and be like, here are five foods that baby is already familiar with. And here's exactly how I want them sitting in the high chair. Here's the tray I want to use here as a splash Mount. Here's the bib. Here's how you put the food out. Here's how you help with the preloaded food. Here's how you help with the open cup and seeing really is believing, right? Caitlin. Like I know even with your own parents, like the more they see it, they're like, oh my gosh, of course the baby can feed themselves.

Katelynn Sasaki (18m 52s):

Yeah. Cause now it's just, this is what we do. We all sit down and they're eating.

Katie Ferraro (18m 56s):

It's less work for the caregiver as well. Like I think when they get to that point where like, yeah, they want to help you. But if they think it's a lot of extra work, but once they realize it's not a lot of extra work, baby led weaning really does work well. If you are a parent who relies on other people to watch your children, we actually have a wonderful free handout. All about how to be a baby led weaning advocate at your daycare. This has really great language about what to say to your daycare provider. If they say things like, oh, we don't do baby led weaning, or I don't know how to, it's all about the steps that we recommend taking to make baby led weaning work and to be an advocate for it. And an ally for baby led weaning at daycare. And I'm going to link to that in the show notes for this episode, if you had to be LW podcast.com186, you can download that free resource.

Katie Ferraro (19m 39s):

And we spent a ton of time on that one, but parents love it because they're like, oh, this is what I needed. You know, for explaining baby led weaning to my childcare provider. Caitlin, what about vegetarian and vegan families? Right? Our programs of course do include meat. And we both as dieticians value meat, first nutrition, of course it's taste and texture and flavor opportunities for babies, but for vegan families, for example, half of the big eight allergenic foods are animal foods, right? So what if you're a vegetarian or you're vegan and you don't eat these foods, but maybe you want your baby to have them, especially with like the allergenic foods, because of all the research showing that early introduction of these foods may help prevent food allergy. So maybe you personally don't consume cow's milk, but you want baby to be exposed to that protein.

Katie Ferraro (20m 19s):

What should the vegan families do if they're like, oh, I'm not really sure about all these animal foods that are a good idea for my baby. What are some strategies that work

Katelynn Sasaki (20m 28s):

The work is if you first reduce food waste and purchase what your baby will need, because it may not be helpful for you to have a giant Costco size container of yogurt in your fridge. But introducing the cow's milk protein to your baby will be beneficial in reducing the risk of food allergy. So you can still sit with your baby. You don't necessarily have to eat it. As we have been talking about it will not be the end of the world. If your baby doesn't see you eat the yogurt, but supporting your baby and try and get will make it so that they are able to experience that taste, that texture and that potential allergies.

Katie Ferraro (21m 7s):

And I know, especially for our vegan family, so some of them are like hardcore, Nope, not gonna do it, no animal products that are going to pass this baby's lips. Other parents are like, Hey, listen, I'm aware of the research that shows that early introduction helps prevent food allergy. And with these animal foods, maybe, you know that protective window you guys had ends around 11 months of age. So it's not like, well, when they're 15 and they decide that they don't want to be a vegan, then we can try peanut like, Nope, the opportunity is lost. So a lot of vegan families are increasingly getting on board with bending the rules. Yeah. It's okay for the allergen protection piece. I'll let my baby try these animal foods early and often in order to help prevent food allergy maybe later in their life, that child decides they don't want to be vegan. And you've offered them that protection by doing the introduction early and often.

Katie Ferraro (21m 50s):

And I think as more and more vegan families are talking about this, like, oh, okay. In some cases, yeah. It may be beneficial to try these animal foods. So again, it depends what sort of family you are for vegetarian families. I mean, Katelyn, I know you work with a lot of families that have all sorts of restrictions. If you're not inclined to eating a lot of meat, but you're like, okay, I'm not like opposed to it ethically or religiously or morally, what are some tips for, you know, let's say you don't cook meat a lot and you're like, I gotta do this now for my baby. How can they eat more meat?

Katelynn Sasaki (22m 18s):

I think starting with a slow cooker for baby Led Weaning is the way to go. We do have recipes available for slow cooking meat, but it'll guarantee that it's going to be soft instructable you don't really have to touch it that much. You just kind of put it in there, water low sodium broth and let it go.

Katie Ferraro (22m 37s):

Yeah, you don't have to touch it. I think that's like a big thing, especially with people that aren't inclined to cook a lot of meat, you know, and it's hard, right? Because when in the regular nutrition world, we talk about being less reliant on animal protein and eating more plants. And that's wonderful. Except the reality is it's the animal foods that have the type of iron that's more readily absorbed by the baby's body. So if you're a little skiddish about animal foods, we sometimes can offer you like those starter meat, like ground meat is a really good one. We call that our starter meat for families that are like, I'm not doing strips the lamb on day four, but then we have some families that are like, Hey man, just show me which, you know, what type of lamb roast to buy and what to put it with in this low cooker. And I'll do this, but you're right. There's not a lot of like actual cooking going on. So it's like pretty easy to handle. Yeah. So Caitlin, can you think of other situations, or do you hear from parents who are scared to, or not able to model trying these new foods with their babies who are doing baby Led, Weaning?

Katie Ferraro (23m 24s):

What are other reasons that might cause it?

Katelynn Sasaki (23m 26s):

So leaning on my other professional experience in dietetics, it does happen where parents themselves have an eating disorder. One that would really impact being able to model food might be ARFID because they might have a very visceral reaction on their face. And they may not be able to sit there pretending like they like that food. And for those instances, it is okay to just lean on your providers and they will know your particular situation and they will be able to give you a coping skills to challenge yourself, to help your baby, because they do also want increase your variety to help your baby try new food and also helping you get comfortable with introducing new experiences to your baby.

Katie Ferraro (24m 11s):

And I don't know if you remember, but a while back we had Grace Wong on the podcast. She's an eating disorder dietician. And if you guys are interested, it's episode 46, it's called parents in eating disorder, recovery. What to know before you feed your baby with Grace Wong. So you can check that out. I'm going to link to it on the show notes for this episode, which is BLW podcast.com/ 1 8 6. And then we also had another eating disorder. Dietician. We don't actually have a ton of dieticians on the podcast, but especially when it comes to eating disorders, I really just love to lean on their expertise because you are a part of a team based approach to dealing with eating disorders. There's no one medical profession who's qualified to handle the very multifaceted array of factors that play an eating disorder treatment.

Katie Ferraro (24m 55s):

So Jessica Sputnik, who is an eating disorder, dietitian and a friend of both of ours, she was on in episode 135, talking about how to create a pressure free feeding environment. I think there were some really good tips in there that you guys gleaned so many helpful, like behavior around mealtime skills when you're an eating disorder, dietician that translates pretty well to baby led weaning. Like I'm always surprised at the overlap between what you do for counseling and then the advice that you can give to parents. And a lot of it's like prevention, you know, don't do this. We know that this leads to that. And if we want to prevent that, let's look at the way we can behave around the baby. So for parents that maybe do have a history of eating disorder or disordered eating Caitlyn, any final tips about how to talk about food or not talk about food as they're transitioning their baby to solid foods,

Katelynn Sasaki (25m 41s):

I would really try to concentrate on using either a neutral or positive language around food. Even if you yourself are not modeling the food, you can control how you're talking about the food, which is a great way to still bond with their baby, expose them to the food. You may not be eating it, but make it a positive experience for the family as a whole.

Katie Ferraro (26m 4s):

I know for me, that neutral language is really hard to get doesn't come naturally to me, I know it was just saying, oh, we don't have dieticians on, but I'm just thinking of another dietician who was recently on the podcast. And that was Riley Peterson who works as a body positivity coach. And she was in episode 1 74. It was called fostering food neutrality from baby's first bites. She's at raising body positive kids. And I think she had some really good at tips in there as well. So Caitlin, thank you to you. And all the other dieticians who kind of teach us the appropriate language to use so that we don't replicate some of the issues that we have with food as adults on our babies, right? They're like this beautiful blank slate. And it's a great idea to model and try to eat the foods and share the foods that you're eating with your baby.

Katie Ferraro (26m 44s):

But if you can't Katelynn, could you just give us some final words of encouragement? Like the moms who always right, Lily, am I doing irreparable damage to my baby by not eating the same food? Like that's literally a question we get at least once a week in our workshops,

Katelynn Sasaki (26m 56s):

You are not damaging your baby. If you cannot model all a hundred foods that are on that list, just being there, being willing to expose your baby to the different tastes and textures you're giving your baby so much that they can take with them to as they develop their own relationship with.

Katie Ferraro (27m 14s):

All right, Katelynn, thank you so much for sharing your time and your expertise with us and making us feel a little bit better. If we're not totally down with eating all the same foods, I know people are going to want to know where could they go get more Caitlin information

Katelynn Sasaki (27m 26s):

In the feet. I am going to be sneaking in lots of pictures of my nieces and nephews within baby led weaning team. But if you want to really want to find me, join the workshop, ask some questions. I'm probably going to be there answering some emails and that's probably the best way to find me or

Katie Ferraro (27m 40s):

Agree. Katelynn, thank you so much. I really appreciate your time.

Katelynn Sasaki (27m 44s):

Thank you so much for having the Katie.

Katie Ferraro (27m 46s):

Well, I hope you guys enjoyed that episode with Katelynn Sasaki. She is one of my favorite people on the planet. I think she was a little bit nervous to do the episode, but she did a fabulous job. I'm going to link to everything that you mentioned and some of the resources that we have for you that can help you get over some of these fears. If you're struggling a little bit with starting solid foods, they're going to be on the show notes page for this episode, which you can find@blwpodcast.com/186. I really liked this format. I think I'm going to bring some more of our team members on the podcast and have them talk about things because they do so much to bring all of this content to life for you guys, Katelynn, especially because she is a freehand illustrator. As I mentioned, like an amazing artist, she's so talented and she's like literally the most adorable nephews and niece.

Katie Ferraro (28m 30s):

And I'm just so grateful for her contributions to our team, but I'm also so glad that she can bring expertise from her other area of practice, which are eating disorders because a lot of parents with eating disorders, they're like, I don't want to replicate these same issues in my babies. And there's some things we can't do to prevent eating disorders, but there's some other things that we can do. So I'm grateful to Katelynn for sharing a little bit of that with us. So all of the resources from today, online BLW podcast.com/186. Thank you so much for being here and Katelynn, thanks for all you do for the baby Led Weaning team.