S2EP15-Alicia Mazari-Andersen-Food, Fun, & ADHD: How to Make Veggies Your Kids' Best Buds! 🥦💚

Herb: 00:00:19

Today, I have the pleasure of introducing Alicia Mazari-Andersen. Imagine unlocking the genetic secrets behind ADHD.

Armed with a PhD in botany and 30 years of teaching higher education, that's the foundation Alicia stands on as a holistic nutritionist deeply attuned to the biology of DNA.

Together with her business partner, they have written a book and created online programs, both in English and Spanish, which illustrates the path to individualized care. Her experience doesn't just live in academia.

It's enriched by a personal commitment to healthy lifestyle, supporting her body according to its genetic needs. As a person with ADHD that was never diagnosed. Welcome, Alicia. It is a pleasure to have you back. Thank you for joining us again.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:01:04

Well, thank you so much. I love you guys. I love what you guys are doing. And I believe, I believe it's so important to understand ourselves. And that's where I come from.

Kristina: 00:01:17

Absolutely. And we say welcome back because this is actually Alicia's third appearance on our podcast.

So after you get done listening to this one, go back and find the other two because guess what? We've had great conversations each and every time. So, yeah, welcome back. This is so much fun. We always have so much fun together.

And it's all about food. And people are like, oh, wait a second. How can balancing good nutrition and food and family life be so much fun to talk about?

Well, part of it's the people you talk to and part of it is the great information that you get. So let's dive into the book. What was the emphasis for the book? We've been talking good nutrition, but all of a sudden this book is around.

We know there's a program connected and stuff. Why the book?

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:02:04

Well, why the book? Because, you know. Well, let me tell you my own experience about the book. Okay. What I have discovered since I started working with epigenetics.

d working with epigenetics in: 2017

So I was scared of sharing it. Then we found a mentor and her name is Dr. Penny Kendall Reed. She's a naturopathic doctor in Ontario. She's so busy, she has a four month wait list.

Like, she is so busy, the amount of people want to talk to her. And we started learning from her and we started implementing it and we started finding out. I started finding out who I am to start with.

Well, guess what? I. I have ADHD. According to my genetics, I was never diagnosed. I'm 64 years old, and it's like, are they going to give me a medication right now?

It's like, absolutely no, but I can explain you why. So anyway, so when I. What I really got out of the book was understanding myself from this genetic perspective.

When we talk about epigenetics, we talk about changing the environment and getting your genes to express in a different way. And so we started reset. Resetting my genes around roughly about two years ago. I've been studying people's genetics for about two years. About.

I probably seen 250 people. I don't talk with people unless I see their map in front of me. I created a map on one page, and I can know right away, right away.

For example, one of the first maps I created, I was in awe because I'm like, oh, my gosh, this lady has hormonal problems and she has not slept through her life. Sure enough, I get a message. It's like, can we talk? I have hormonal problems. I haven't slept in my whole life.

And I'm like, Like, it's as simple as she reading my. You know, she reading my. My mind. It's not like that. It is really understanding yourself from a different perspective.

And why do I say that I have adhd? Because, you know, I have. I produce. Well, we all produce dopamine. Problem is, I don't break it down. I have a lot of dopamine.

This is the why I'm a motivator. I can be one of those cheerleaders. You can do this. You can do this. You know, change your diet and you'll be happy. And the reason why. Why is that.

Well, it's great to have a lot of dopamine, but it comes with a cost. I don't break down noradrenaline and adrenaline, meaning my stress level is always really high.

So when I started resetting, my genes started optimizing because I already had a pretty good, you know, a pretty good diet, a pretty good lifestyle and stuff like that. I started optimizing it according to my DNA. And I'm like, oh, I'm feeling better. I'm feeling more focused. Oh, I.

My stress is coming down, and I'm like, I've never been here in my whole entire life. It feels so, so nice to take down that stress. Feels so valid. It just. It just feels like validating who you are.

And so the book started, actually, there was an event with A teenager. And we were thinking about writing the book and that event with the teenagers, like, I got to write this book. I got to help families like this one.

Kristina: 00:05:46

Yeah.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:05:47

And at the same time, you know, my business partner, she has a daughter with ADHD who was. She's now in her 30s, and she was actually nice enough to let us tell her story. So the book has a lot of science in it, but it's a story.

It's my story and Rachel's story, and it's combined to take you into what is possible when you understand your genetics. But most importantly, how can I change the environment to get my genetics work for me?

Kristina: 00:06:22

Yeah.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:06:23

And this is the most beautiful thing. So we structured the book into seven, basically seven core steps. And of course, guess which one is the first one.

You've heard of him here about so much about food, right? Yeah. Food is number one. Okay. So food is number one. But then we talk about move. Are you moving your body? How much are you moving your body? Sleep.

These three things are key, and these are things that basically cost you nothing. It's just your mindset to start implementing them. Because you go to eat anyway, right. You go to sleep anyway. We'll do that. Right.

And then I get into peeing and pooping and all that stuff, which is really fun.

Herb: 00:07:06

But.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:07:06

But these three things are normal. I want to do everything. Yeah.

Kristina: 00:07:11

I want to jump in there because whenever parents would come and ask me about their child and their activities and not being able to learn very well and stuff, those are the three things that I would ask them a lot about as well. What are they eating? How much are they sleeping? And, you know, just making sure that they're moving and everything.

So those are, you know, so key, like you said, across everything. But you add ADHD on top of a learning challenge, and then it even compacts even more.

Herb: 00:07:37

Yeah. And I also do, you know, life coaching and psychospiritual coaching, and that is also one of the key things that we talk about is, is what is your.

How is your diet like?

Kristina: 00:07:48

Are.

Herb: 00:07:48

Are you eating properly? Are you getting enough sleep? And are you. Well, for us, it's getting out and getting sunshine in the morning because the.

The sun has such a huge impact as well. So. Yeah, what you're talking about is so important in so many areas of life as well.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:08:03

Yeah, yeah, no, absolutely. I mean, those are the first three core steps. Now the fourth core step, I mean, four or five, six, seven are also important. Why?

Because we talk about detox. How does your body detox? According to your genetics, is your body getting rid of the toxins, you know, and are the toxins.

So that's another core step, detox. Another core step is calm. And within calm. We talk about neurotransmitters, we talk about the dopamine I was talking about, we talk about serotonin.

You know, are you sad? Do you tend to be depressed? Are you producing enough serotonin? Are you transporting enough serotonin? And stress. So calm is really a big one.

But then we move on into inflammation and repair.

And why inflammation and repair is because a lot of times, you know, when there's medications, sure enough those can cause detox problems with detoxification. But if there's inflammation. And it's not that we have changed our genes overnight to say, oh, nowadays everybody needs to be medicated.

No, no, no, it's we have changed the environment in which we have to much toxicity. So your body doesn't detoxify, but that makes your brain be inflamed. And when your brain is inflamed, guess what? The message doesn't get through.

Kristina: 00:09:28

Yeah.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:09:29

And so, so all of these core steps, combination of them, you know, it really made us do kind of a roadmap for people and try to make it available, you know, to as many people as we can. And writing a book was just truly a blessing. I never thought I would write a book with my adhd. Absolutely no way.

I have great ideas and all of a sudden I burst with ideas. But you know, I have a really nice business partner that grounds me, that keeps me, keeps me aligned because I can go off without a problem.

But also understanding that our environment has changed, it has changed us. You know, like even the amount of toxins we're exposed to, it's not the same as when I was born. I mean, I was born in Mexico city.

There were 3 million people in that city. Now there's 23. You cannot even imagine what that is.

You know, it's like it's in everybody, you know, everybody just talks about traffic because that's all they live every day, traffic. But you have to think about the pollution of the air, the water, you know, the food, where's the food coming from and all of this stuff.

So it's a combination of things. And that's why we divided into seven core steps.

Now it's not just telling you what the seven core steps are, but what can you apply at every step of the way. And something important that we make a lot of emphasis on is that it's not to Be perfect. It's to progress.

Kristina: 00:11:02

Yeah.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:11:03

For example, kids with ADHD have a hard time eating vegetables. And I've heard this over and over again.

Oh, I have a picky eater or whatever, and I'm like, yeah, what are the strategies we can give you to start implementing? To start giving them, you know, like, cucumbers and tomatoes and make them really, truly love broccoli. Because I'm a broccoli fan.

And, you know, how can we make them love the food? But they need to love themselves first.

Kristina: 00:11:37

Yeah. Let's stop right there for a second, because I'm one of those people.

You put broccoli, you put green things in front of me, and I'm like, not gonna happen. I'm not crazy about that. So tell the parents one of those things that we can do to help kids like that food a little bit better.

Herb: 00:11:52

And actually, before we get into that, why.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:11:56

Oh, so why the vegetables?

Herb: 00:11:58

Yeah, why vegetables? And you said specifically, it's hard to get ADHD people to eat vegetables. Why? And is that related to their genetics? Is there.

You said that you've been. You can tell someone is. Is ADHD with their genetics? And is there like a diet or not? Diet is in.

You go on a diet, but diet is what foods you should be eating. What is a diet somebody with ADHD should be on? Because you just jumped right into vegetables without any sort of an explanation there.

And let's give a reason for that.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:12:30

I'll move back. I'll move back a little bit. Okay. Well, you know, when your child is hungry, this is the first thing it's going to eat. Whatever is there. Right.

Actually, I had a mom who, who told me, you know, my kid hasn't eaten a vegetable in two weeks. I don't know what to do. And I said, you know what? When your child is hungry, he will eat, eat them.

And also in five minutes later, I'm talking with the mom, and then the boy says, can I finish it? I'm like, yes. And like, what did you give your child? I gave him cucumber because he was hungry and he ate the whole thing.

Well, when your child is hungry, and when you are hungry, you will eat whatever is in front of you. So step number one, have vegetables at home, have them ready, start tasting them. Also, picky eaters, when you start eating, it's.

It's harder to start eating than to. To learn how to swim, because all five senses are involved. Your ears are involved, your. Your taste is involved. The smell is involved.

You know, everything. Your eyes, everything. Is involved into. Into eating. So start basically having them available and having them ready to go and get them.

Be part of the process. I always tell parents, the kids need to be part of the process. It's not like you have to eat your vegetables. No, no, no.

Make them part of the process. I'll give you an example. There was this girl who would not eat broccoli.

She was three years old or something like that, and she would not eat broccoli. And I said, mom, do you eat broccoli? Oh, yeah, I do. I said, do you eat broccoli in front of your child? And she goes, no, I never do.

I always feed the kid. And then we eat with my husband.

I said, okay, you start eating in front of your child, you start eating broccoli, and you start saying, oh, my gosh, look at this beautiful green forest. They're so green. Make sure they're not overdone. You know, make sure they're still chewy. They make sure they don't smell like sulfur anymore.

Like, there's tricks. You can put butter on top. You can put some type of nice dressing on top. And the mom started like, oh, my gosh, this is so delicious.

And the girl started eating. And now guess what the girl eats every day. Broccoli. She asks for broccoli every day.

Kristina: 00:14:45

There we go.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:14:46

And it's a lot of limiting beliefs, right? It's like, why, oh, I did not eat broccoli as a child. Why should I eat broccoli now? Or it was not given to me as a child.

And so parents, your kids, are mirrors of you. Look at your plate. I love rainbow plates. Put every single color you can find on your plate. Make it visually appealing. And that doesn't mean.

If you think about meat, potatoes, rice, all the carbs, nothing has color. It's a beige color, what you're eating.

Kristina: 00:15:26

So.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:15:26

So instead of that, start with, let's try putting new colors. What are you willing to taste? You know, are you. What about purple? What can we do? Purple? Oh, maybe, you know, maybe red cabbage. Maybe beets.

Find purple. Blue is very hard to find. Except for blueberries, which are more purple. Blue is very hard to find.

But green, oh, my gosh, there's green greens everywhere.

Herb: 00:15:54

And I. I have got her eating green. I have learned. I have learned how to cook brassicas and ways that make them taste better.

And like, with broccoli, most people like to. Oh, they go for the broccoli florets.

I like to find broccoli with big, huge stalks and peel it and then take the center out of it, and I can get her to eat that. So, yeah, So I have. I've got her. I've gotten her eating sprouts. Yeah. So I found ways to cook foods that. That make it so that she will eat them.

So she's not as bad as when we first got married because, you know, broccoli was one of my favorite foods.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:16:30

Yeah. Oh, yeah, absolutely. And you. And you feed your kids with what you're used to, and that's the whole thing, right?

Kristina: 00:16:37

Yeah.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:16:38

Another thing you were asking me is, like, according to our genetics, can we optimize our diet? Yes, absolutely. You know, for example, we are addicted to. To starches.

Everybody, like, everybody likes their rice and the rice and breads and tortillas. You know, I'm from Mexico. Everybody loves their corn. Everybody loves starches. Yeah. Okay. However, starches can be inflammatory.

And so it's recommended, number one, that you need to optimize the amount of protein according to your genetics. And then if you look, for example, at your. I don't know, a piece of chicken. Right, Right. I eat a piece of chicken.

But the amount of simple carbohydrates or rice that I can have is two thirds the size of that protein.

Kristina: 00:17:24

Okay.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:17:25

If I go for Italian food, right. They give me pasta with a little bit of meat and maybe some red sauce and maybe a green. A leaf that looks green. That's good for nothing. Okay.

That is so inflammatory for me. I will come out of there like, oh, my gosh, what's wrong with my stomach? Oh, my gosh, I'm bloated. Everything hurts.

I'm in a bad mood because too many carbohydrates, simple carbohydrates, starches are inflammatory. Now, people tell me why, but I can't eat. Oh, my gosh, I cannot eat all my potatoes. I cannot eat my mashed potatoes. I'm like, you know what?

Eat less mashed potatoes and finish your plate with the colors of the rainbow. Lot of color, lots of greens. And guess what? When you finish eating, not only you're grateful, you feel amazing. You just feel light.

You just feel full of energy, mental energy, physical energy, and very importantly, good moods. None of these explosions. You know, it's like.

Because what happens when you feed your child, for example, cereal with milk before they go to school or you're doing homeschooling, it doesn't matter. Your sugar goes up, it goes up, but it comes down like that. I think I've mentioned this before.

And when it comes down, like that there's like tantrums, like, oh, I'm angry anymore. I don't have energy. I want. Give me, give me, give me more of that sugar instead of that. When you optimize your starches, your protein, your. The fats.

Fats are very important. There's some myth that fats make you fat. That's an absolute myth. You, what you do is you balance your blood sugar like this. So there's no tantrums.

There is no, there's no, no like explosions. You know, I hear parents all the time. It's like, I'm a such a bad mom.

Oh, my child, you know, he had so bad tantrums or he was expelled from school because he had a fight or whatever.

Kristina: 00:19:26

Yeah.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:19:27

All of that changes the minute that your blood sugar is like that instead of having these huge peaks of junk food.

Kristina: 00:19:35

And that's actually one of the things I talk about, especially around like the holidays and things like that.

When your child's routine is off and they're not eating, their blood sugar spike and then you wonder why they're having a meltdown in the middle of the Christmas party or they're having a meltdown when they're supposed to be having fun looking at Christmas lights and things like that. Right. Or whatever holidays you're in. So, yeah, I bring that back. Like keep those blood sugar as, even as possible.

Herb: 00:19:59

Yeah. And here's the out of the box stuff.

Is, is the food pyramid that we've been taught for so long with grains at the bottom should make most and the proteins at the top.

It's like that was created by an industry that was subsidizing the agriculture market and it was never actually scientifically proven and that's actually being found out and changed now.

So the food pyramid and the way we're supposed to be eaten, eating in the United States has led to like the highest level of diabetes, of overweight, of sick children.

It's like we have one of the most unhealthy populations in the world right now because of this food that we were told, oh, this is how we're supposed to eat. And it's almost exactly backwards. So coming back into it, work with genetics showing this.

It's like this information is, is coming out now and diet is so. Our diet is so messed up in the United States that we do need to bring it back. And it's like kicking and screaming however you have to do it.

It's like we have to make our population healthy again. It's for the best of everybody and it starts with food.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:21:12

It starts with food. And one important thing when we talk about ADHD is the following.

Besides being having inflammation, sometimes some people don't produce enough dopamine, which is the. It's.

It's this, the dopamine thing right now, you know, it's this neurotransmitter which gives you motivation and, well, you don't have enough dopamine. Well, I have too many, too much of it. So people don't have enough. But how do we produce dopamine? Dopamine, actually, it.

The precursor of dopamine is called tyrosine. Tyrosine is an amino acid. It's a little bit of protein. It's a tiny little piece of a protein. This protein comes from food.

If your child does not eat the right amount of protein or the right type of protein, they are not producing enough dopamine. So they give men medications to tell the cells, hey, I need more of it. Keep producing dopamine.

Well, how are they going to produce dopamine if they don't have the precursor of that? Sometimes we use supplements. Yeah, some kids need that dopamine, that tyrosine to produce dopamine.

And it's as simple as if I need to increase my dopamine. Why don't we look back into what we need? For example, serotonin. Where is serotonin? Where does serotonin come from?

Serotonin, which is, you know, it's this beautiful neurotransmitter that is the one that makes us feel happy. You know, it's an antidepressant. You want to call it whatever you want to call it. What is the precursor of that is tryptophan. What's tryptophan?

Tryptophan is an amino acid, comes from protein.

And so if you don't have the enzymes to produce this, why are they giving you an antidepressant when you can find a natural way of producing enough serotonin? Now, your child doesn't eat. Why? Because melatonin is produced from serotonin. So everything comes hand in hand.

Your child is depressed, they're not going to sleep, they don't sleep, they don't produce enough serotonin. And so it is holistic. It is. I cannot put enough pieces of the puzzle together. I need to put them in order. Yeah, just.

Herb: 00:25:02

Just a little help for. For people out there. Most antidepressants, if you hear them, they're called ssri, which is a supplemental serotonin reuptake inhibitor.

It doesn't help your body Create more serotonin. It makes it so that your body doesn't reabsorb it, so that it stays in your system longer.

But if your system isn't creating it, then the ssri, which is supposed to keep you from reabsorbing, it doesn't have anything to reabsorb anyway.

So a lot of times, if you're not creating the serotonin you need, the SSRIs aren't going to be effective because it's not doing anything except for the side effects of the medication that you're on.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:25:43

I love that. And you know that same. A similar mechanism for SSRIs, right? Yeah, it's a dopamine inhibitor. They're dopamine inhibitors.

It's almost exactly the same mechanism.

Kristina: 00:25:55

And I wanted to touch on something really quick that you said that not only do they get the right amount of protein, but the right kind of protein. And that really hit home when Herb had his genetics done, because his doctors were saying, oh, you know, eat the good meat, the.

The fish and the chicken and the things like that. But after his genetics were done, the doctor's like, oh, you actually need more red meat than most people. You're one of these people that.

The red meat, the steaks, you need to have this a little more often than most people.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:26:25

Yeah. Well, through genetics, we can calculate the amount that you need and. Yeah. The type. And what is a precursor for all of these.

What is your precursor for serotonin? What's your precursor for tyrosine? For. For dopamine? And, you know, I. I had people. Like, I had somebody that was vegan. I'm like, oh, I don't.

You know, I'm vegan. And I'm like, okay, let's find out if you get enough amino acids from your vegan diet. And it's like, oh, guess what? You don't. You don't.

So either you move on a little bit to have a little bit of chicken, which she did. She finally did. She goes like, I'm much better having some chicken than being vegan.

Or we add a supplement that will give you those amino acids that you need that you're not getting from your diet.

Kristina: 00:27:12

Okay. Yeah.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:27:14

So there's different ways we can deal with, you know. Yeah.

Herb: 00:27:18

So I'm kind of curious about something I did. So I went on an all meat diet, the. The lion protocol. And I did that for eight months. And I did it for eight months twice.

And during those eight months, I felt really, really good. So I cut out all vegetables, the Only thing that I was eating was actually red meat, water and mushrooms and salt.

So nothing on my meat except for salt. And I felt really, really good. I got really healthy. I, I felt great.

But then we started traveling, we started doing other things and it's really difficult to have that kind of a diet when you're traveling. So it took me off of the diet and then I got addicted to foods again would be a good way to put it. So what do you think about that?

Because, and again, part of the reason behind that is, is there's a lot of vegetables that create compounds to keep them from being eaten by insects. And they're natural inside of the, the, the vegetable and the fruit because, you know, they're, they're defensive mechanisms.

And so we're eating these defensive mechanisms. And so by going onto a more of an all meat diet, that reduced some of those inflammations and some of the reactions to those kind of things in fruit.

So where do you fall in that? What? Because when I said that, you gave me this weird little look like, no. So just, just throwing that out there. How do you feel about that? And what.

I just kind of brought what I said.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:28:46

All right. Okay. Yeah, absolutely. You know, it depends on your genetics. How much protein you can eat, including fats is important.

Depending on your genetics, if you can do a ketogenic diet or not, or a diet like the one you did. Okay, what happens with vegetables? Vegetables and fruit have something different because.

Sorry, I'm going to go here a little bit on my biology background. But plant cells are surrounded by a cell wall. That cell wall is made out of cellulose.

We don't, we don't eat off the cellulose, but the cellulose feeds are normal flora. So when you extract all of these cell walls from your, your diet is like no vegetables, no fruit, just animal based whatever. Right.

You are removing all of that fiber from your gut. So that is probably not affecting you, but it's affecting your normal flora. Your normal flora probably changed completely from going to that diet.

Now, sure enough, there's plants. Plants are amazing. I mean, when you understand them. I'm a blood physiologist, so it's like, don't come and tell me about plants.

Yes, they produce compounds to help themselves survive because every plant needs to survive now. Plants also produce many compounds which are very important for us.

They give us, you know, they give us, for example, the sulforaphane that we find in broccoli. All, all, all of the antioxidants that we find in like blueberries and things like that, there's many compounds that are very important for us.

And so when we talk about vegetables, it's very hard to say, hey, go for the organic, because we don't want pesticides, we don't want fertilizers, we don't want chemicals in it. It's very hard to actually find clean vegetables. But when you go for clean vegetables that are grown, you know, like, how did our ancestors grow?

They went and gathered what was there. They understood the plants that were out there. They grew plants that were, that were made to be eaten.

So more than moving into just being a carnivore, 100%, we're omnivores. We need a variety of food. We need to, we need to eat vegetables, we need to eat protein, we need to have fats.

And when you have a balanced diet, and probably you have heard this, right, a balanced diet, you really need to balance that diet into having all kinds of, of food, not just animals. Right. There's some places in the world, for example, up north, right. The Inuits, well, what they have, they didn't have vegetables in the winter.

They just relied on, on animal, on animal protein and on fats. But that was for some part of their, of their diet. They got used to that.

But it's been generation after generation after generation that they were able to do that. Can we see that in your genetics? Yes, we can.

Kristina: 00:31:45

So maybe you have some of those up north people in your genetics that help you do that better.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:31:51

Yeah. Where are your ancestors from? I mean, some amazing things I found about me. You know, sure enough, I was born in Mexico.

I only have 16% native, which I love. I'm 30% Ashkenazi Jewish. And that's from my parent, my, my father's mother.

And so the important thing about that is that they don't have a lot of genetic variation. And when you don't have a lot of genetic variation, that's when you have a lot of these, what we call diseases. I call them clinical manifestations.

But there's no genetic, there's no genetic diversity. There is a lot of problems that you may encounter.

Kristina: 00:32:28

Yeah.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:32:29

So again, has to do where, where we're from, right?

Kristina: 00:32:33

Yeah.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:32:33

How did your ancestors eat? My grandma used to go to the market every single morning to buy the food of the day. Why? Because they didn't have a fridge.

Kristina: 00:32:42

Right.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:32:43

You know, and so do we do that? No. Now we go to Costco. And I remember having a family who had like three freezers to have everything frozen.

So they didn't have to go shopping often, and then they finally sold their freezers because now they're eating, you know, real food. And so eating real food is the most important thing is like how, how much nutrients your food has. Right.

And probably, you know, when you just were eating meat, you were missing a lot of other things in your diet.

Kristina: 00:33:16

Yeah. Awesome.

One thing that you mentioned earlier, and we wanted to talk about this a little bit, because of course with adhd, there's almost always a doctor or somebody saying, oh, how about this medication? Can we put your child on medication and that will help them do it?

And kind of like what Herb was talking about, if the medication has a specific purpose and you were saying, you don't have the precursors, you don't have the stuff there to help fuel it. It doesn't work. Right. Talk to us a little bit more about the ADHD medication, the foods and things that parents should consider.

We're not saying don't use medication, but guess what? Could there be an alternative that might help your child better?

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:33:57

Oh, that is, that's. I love that.

I mean, our last, Our last, actually, our last chapter in the book is about medications, and it's about understanding medications from the genetic perspective. So there's different things that happen with this dopamine on serotonin, okay, One, it is produced.

Then we have enzymes that break it down or don't break it down. Then we have transporters that transport the message to the next cell. Then we have transporters that send the message back.

You know, the, the, the reuptake inhibitors are. That's where the medications, most of the medications work. And so it all depends on your genes. Is the message going through? Is it going back?

You know, it is like the cry wolf story is like, oh, the wolf is coming, everybody comes, and there's no wolf. And, and you know, oh, the wolf is coming. Everybody comes. There's no wolf. Oh, the wolf is coming. There's a wolf. Nobody comes.

It is a lack of messaging within our nervous system. Depends on your genes is, do you make enough? Do you break it down? Is the message going through? Is the message coming back?

When we look into the genetics, we're able to pinpoint into, oh, yes, you don't produce enough dopamine, for example. Well, do we need a medication? Well, let's try it first. An amino acid that's a precursor of the medication.

If that doesn't work, then let's look at the people that are taking the message. Is the message going through, Is the message coming back? Yes. No. What is happening at every single level? Is there inflammation?

The message is going through, but if there's inflammation, it's not going to happen. And there's, for example, chronic inflammation that we're used to, whereas there's acute inflammation. You hit yourself, you know, it hurts.

But there's this other inflammation, which is like, we kind of get used to it and we ignore it. You know, like the little headache one once once in a while or the tantrums. That's inflammation. So let's decrease inflammation.

Oh, what is causing the inflammation? Oh, it's the toxins. You know, it's probably, you know, the mold in your house. I'm not telling you to throw out your house. I'm just saying.

Well, it could be environmental. We change the environment, we change the color our genes are expressed. So medications are good for somebody, but not for others. And it's not just.

See, the problem with medications, they only focus on dopamine. They don't focus on the other thing. Diet, stress, sleep, movement, inflammation, detoxification, repair.

They're just focusing on one thing and one thing only. We're holistic people. We are not. I cannot separate at all my skin from my gut. I cannot separate my toe from my brain. I can't. I'm one. Right.

So this is the whole thing about having something holistic to be able to understand and express. Hey, medications are there for a reason. Yes, I believe they are there.

Like, they use them as candy because that's the only way they know how to use them. But when you understand your child at this genetic level, the story completely changes.

Kristina: 00:37:25

One thing I want to also share around that is because as a teacher, you know, I would be talking with parents and like, oh, my child started medication. And then like, three weeks later, because nothing changed. Oh, now we're trying a different medication. Right.

Because again, they weren't making those connections of how it was really helping the child. Right. So by connecting all of this information, you can get the right medication if you need medication, right?

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:37:50

Yes.

Herb: 00:37:51

That's actually how I found out I had brain damage, is I wanted. I was really depressed. I wanted to go find some anti. Find some help, and I didn't want this, oh, try this one. Oh, do you feel more suicidal now?

I was like, oh, try this one. Oh, try this one. Or try this one.

Kristina: 00:38:07

So better finally.

Herb: 00:38:08

So I went and had my brain scanned so that they could pinpoint exactly kind of what was going on. And that scan came back like, wow, you're doing remarkably well for as much brain Damage as you have was what the doctor told me.

Kristina: 00:38:20

So that we're also able to pinpoint this medication has the highest possibility of working because we know what part is kind of messed up.

Herb: 00:38:29

But again, if I also had done the genetic testing to find out, which I had done, but not at this level. So I learned that when I get stressed, I go through magnesium like crazy. So I take a lot, a lot of magnesium supplements. I don't eat.

I'm not supposed to eat potatoes anymore. I still do once in a while, so I learned some things and how I digest a lot of foods, but not to the level that you're talking about.

So that's really interesting and intriguing to me.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:38:56

And you just said something key trial and error medications are done by that trial and error. And they can be. I've met moms three years later, it's like they cannot still find a medication for my child.

We've tried all of these medications, all of these dosages, and still it's not working. It's a trial and error. Our genetic map tells you the way the map, the way you are metabolizing those.

And so if your liver is not detoxifying, then you have a lot of side effects from these medications. And as you said, once they saw my brain, they were like, yeah, this is where the problem is. Not everybody can pinpoint.

You're so lucky to know exactly where in the brain. What happens in the brain of a lot of kids with ADHD is they have a lot of information in the prefrontal cortex.

Kristina: 00:39:47

Frontal. Yeah.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:39:48

So instead of receiving the world from here, they're receiving the world from here. Same thing. Kids with autism. You bring a child with extreme autism to a. To a mall, and they go crazy because there's too much.

Too much information, too many lights, too many noises and stuff like that, because they're perceiving the world from here, not from here.

Herb: 00:40:06

It's actually really funny you say that, because my brain damage, I've. I've messed up my left prefrontal cortex and the front of my brain. And so I have a lot of ad. ADHD symptoms now that I didn't have as much previously.

So it did change my behaviors, even though it wasn't necessarily adhd.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:40:29

Yeah, it's not necessarily adhd, but it's just. We like putting labels. You know, is it a disorder? Is it. Is it. You know, is it really, truly a deficit? Are you missing something? No, you're not.

It's a difference.

Kristina: 00:40:44

Yeah.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:40:46

We look at ADHD as a difference, and the Difference is who you are. And when, when we understand how to work with this genetics and, and people go like, why do you choose those genes?

Because those are the trigger genes. Why? You know, if you have a child who was having tantrums every single day, okay, that is your, that is like a forest fire. Okay.

You don't want to get there. You don't want even to get to, to the, to your campfire.

You want to turn them off down here, you want to remove the match, you want to remove the little twigs. You turn it off here and everything else is turned on. Calms down.

Kristina: 00:41:25

Yeah.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:41:26

So the genes we work are like the trigger genes. They're down here.

Kristina: 00:41:30

Yeah, yeah, Absolutely. Love it.

And, you know, tying it into homeschooling and really working with families whenever you can, really take that time to stop and explore and find out what's best for your child, like in learning styles and things like that. Think about how much better your, not only your child will feel, but your family will feel.

And then that ripples out into the community, into the world, because we have more people who are calm and settled and can handle things when things do go crazy. Right. Instead of just exploding at the little triggers that happen.

So what a beautiful thing, having this map, having this idea, and being able to really help your child at a base level instead of putting things on top and trying to hopefully douse those flames.

Herb: 00:42:18

Another saying is, is if you don't eat your food like it's medicine, you'll be eating your medicine like it's food.

And so the reverse of that is if you consider food your medicine and you work with that and you use it as medicine, the foods that you eat every day, then you can actually start fixing a lot of these problems at that level before they get up here.

And you need to have medicine to put those fires out, you can use the food as the medicine to again grow and make your children healthier from the bottom up, instead of trying to use medications to put it out from the top down.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:42:56

That is absolutely right. We have people getting off their medications, changing their lifestyle.

Kristina: 00:43:02

Yeah. And that's huge. Yeah.

Being able to, you know, go through the process, get the right diet, sleep, etc, work with your practitioner, because that's the safe way to do it. Right. To get off or reduce or whatever. Amazing things can really, really happen.

Herb: 00:43:18

So instead of eating food for enjoyment, eat food for life, Eat food for the life you want.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:43:24

Absolutely. Because the person that knows you best is you.

Kristina: 00:43:28

Yep. And then right now, as parents have to really help their child Figure it all out. But, yep, that's the base. Exactly.

Oh, my gosh, Alicia, this has been so amazing. Is there something that we didn't touch on that you really wanted to touch on today as we spoke about the. All these things?

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:43:45

Well, I encourage people to, of course, get the book. Start there. Start with the book. The book actually comes with a free kids activity book, which is.

It's fun because for me, having the kids playing their part is important.

Kristina: 00:43:59

Yes.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:44:00

For kids being able to understand the biology, the genetics, you know, at their level, it's really cool.

Kristina: 00:44:07

Yeah.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:44:08

And so, you know, I, I actually, I'm actually the author 95 of that book because I really went crazy about it. It has so many things you can. Can implement. Just move one step at a time. Truly, it's not about perfection. It's about progress.

Even if you do one or two little steps every week that can make a difference and embrace yourself as a mom or dad of an ADHD kid. You're doing your best. Sometimes we get lost in the, the amount of information out there, you know, but you're doing amazing.

So congratulations, because, you know, you're doing amazing. And if you're doing homeschooling with an ADHD child, this can definitely make a huge difference, get the kids involved. It's like, it's like this.

Somebody told me they should teach this at schools, and I'm like, yeah, we should teach this at schools.

Herb: 00:45:05

Yeah. And if you think it's like, oh, my kid's adhd, I don't have time. I have to do all this. I have to do all of this. Well, you know what?

If you're putting this food nutrition in and you can help calm that down, then that will give you that time. That will give you that.

And also then you have your children in the kitchen with you learning nutrition, learning health, and they're learning so many other things in the kitchen, watching you, helping you. So, you know, this isn't just about food.

It's about the whole family dynamics and moving together and building relationships and using food in that learning process. So, you know, it's not, it's not just, oh, this isn't. This isn't just one more thing I have to take on.

This is something that you can grow into and actually maybe resolve some issues at the root cause level and then be able to just like, remove that and move forward in a much more positive way with your family.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:45:58

Yeah, absolutely.

Kristina: 00:46:01

Awesome. And Alicia, go ahead and give us information that you need for the.

That audience to be able to either get your book or contact you so they can find out more about this.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:46:11

Well, the best way is get our book. It's on Amazon. It's Epigenetic Roadmap to Parenting Children with adhd.

The title in Spanish, in case you need it, is MAPA Epigenetico Paraguiera Padres de Ninos Conte de. I really a lot into the Spanish community because I'm originally from Mexico.

But I believe that there's not enough support for the Spanish speaking community as there is from the English one. I also have a lot of bilingual families. Like, you know, the kids might speak English, but the parents still don't feel that good in English.

So you have it in both languages. Just get our book.

If you go into our book, you will find, you know, like, ways of contacting us within the book and you will find ways of finding out more if you want to. If you. How do I. Does it do the genetic testing? Is it really necessary at the beginning? No, it's not.

You can actually put a lot of things into perspective if you want to go into the genetics, then within the book you'll find a link that will take you to a page that will explain you the step by step and how to contact us and how to chat with us. We're open to chatting with people. I do a lot of one on ones just to chat with people to see if this is a fit for you and your. And your family.

Kristina: 00:47:28

Right, Excellent. Thank you so much. And of course, everything will be down in the show notes as well, so you will be able to find out all of that information there.

This has been a wonderful conversation. Thank you for breaking it down.

So parents can really understand the interconnection, the relationship, because that's what a lot of people I think are missing, is that, oh, just change your diet, just change your food, da, da, da, da. But they miss that whole message of the interconnection and how things really impact each other. So thank you so much for joining us today.

Herb: 00:47:57

Yeah, it was super informative. Really, really apprec. Thank you for. For going down this rabbit hole and finding it out and then bringing it out to the world and sharing it with us.

It's. It's so important that more people do that. So thank you for being here today. Thank you for sharing yourself with us.

Alicia Mazari-Andersen: 00:48:13

Thank you, guys. It's been an honor to be with you. As always.

Kristina: 00:48:17

Thank you so much. All right, audience, it is that time to make sure that you have liked, subscribed, left some reviews and shared this with people you care about.

Because guess what?

If you're here finding out about these parenting things, if you're here finding about out about Nutri and parenting and all the different sciences that we are bringing to you, there's a reason. And I bet there's somebody else in your life who might have just as much impact or gets some more benefit out of sharing.

So please do that for us so that bringing education home can be a benefit for our whole community. Thank you so much for joining us today and we'll see you next time.

Herb: 00:48:53

Bye for now.