Speaker 1: Difficult time for parents with the stresses of back to school and the pandemic. So how can you keep your kids healthy this fall? Dr. Erica Steele from Holistic Family Practice in Virginia Beach joins us now with some advice. Dr. Steele, your glowing, it’s so good to see you.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much for having me again. Thank you.
Speaker 1: I know parents, they’re stressed. What can they do to ensure their kids are. As some of them are going back to school.
Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly. And I think the tendency is to go towards fear rather than logic and reason and what can I do and that sort of thing. So my goal really, and my intention is really to shift parents out of. The fear mindset and more into the, okay, what? What are the practical skills and tools that we can do? Because children are gonna model behavior. So if the parents are like, oh my gosh, the kids are gonna be like, oh my gosh. And so we really wanna make sure to model, model that healthy behavior.
So we really wanna teach them how to be well, how to be healthy, and do that by first making sure that we’re healthy and we’re well. That’s very, I.
Speaker 1: That’s a great point because if one of us has anxiety, then the kids are gonna pick up on that anxiety and that’s gonna cause more problems and have that snowball effect.
Yes. So you wanna teach them to be well, and that includes eating too.
Speaker 2: It includes eating well. And so if you’re like, oh my gosh, I’ve gotta go to this, I’ve gotta go to that, let’s go through this. Drive through, throwing the chicken nuggets in the backseat, those are not healthy habits.
Those are habits that are actually now being a part of what that child believes is health. So I find that if we start talking to children about Oh, what’s a vegetable and how, what does it mean to be healthy and how do you be strong? They pick up so quickly. It’s amazing what they, pick up.
I have a 16 year old daughter and she knows about nutrition. She knows about eating healthy. She knows how to. Stay. She knows about exercise. So much to the point that she really owns that information and that’s what we want. We want our children to own their health and not just wait for somebody else to say, eat your vegetables. That’s an old paradigm. .
Speaker 1: Yeah, you don’t wanna hear that. That doesn’t get you anywhere. I think the role that you play as a holistic healthcare provider is crucial to children, and a lot of people are now starting to think outside the box. We’re relying that, so go into that a little deeper.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So as a holistic doctor, our role is really that, that public health education, teaching parents how to be better parents, more efficient parents, healthier parents. I oftentimes will work with mom initially and teach her what it means to be healthy and then work with the kids. I always say too, like in my practice, the parents have all the rules.
The kids are good, they pick up so quick. So we teach ’em about drinking water. We teach ’em about eating healthy. We teach ’em even about emotions. And so as they start to build that communication, cuz we often forget that children don’t have language, like we have language. They haven’t learned that.
So they haven’t connected with the Body Mind connection in terms of, oh, I feel angry, or I feel. Frustrated or I feel sad. . And then also too, we’re so busy in survival mode that we really forget, oh wait a second. Dad has to work out of the home a lot. How is that impacting the kids? Have I sat down and talked to the kids and said, Hey, the reason Daddy you know goes here and goes there?
It’s not because you’re bad, you’re wrong cuz children are still in the ib. They think the world is revolving around them, which in a lot of ways it. But we’re so busy in survival mode as parents that we forget to stop and say, wait a second, how is this child perceiving this? And what stories are they gonna make up?
Yes. Unconsciously yes. About what’s actually happening. So important. So we tend to break all those core beliefs down.
Speaker 1: Absolutely. And really quick before we go, I know you’ve got some classes you wanted to highlight.
Speaker 2: We totally have some classes coming. I think one’s on a Monday, one’s on a Wednesday, and we have Saturday. They’re all virtual right now, just to help with easing, the spread of the virus and being able to really be supportive. So an hour of your time and I educate you more how you can make sure that your children get off to the good start. And
Speaker 1: Dr. Steele, you’re the best. Thank you so much.
Speaker 2: Oh, thank you so much for having me. It’s always a pleasure.
Speaker 1: Aw. All right, we’ll see you soon.
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