Episode 36: Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN on Navigating Healthy Eating with Kids
Show Summary:
Resources recommended by Holly:
Kids Cook Real Food: https://kidscookrealfood.com
Kids Eat in Color: https://kidseatincolor.com
Ellyn Satter’s Division of Responsibility: https://www.ellynsatterinstitute.org/how-to-feed/the-division-of-responsibility-in-feeding/
Sunny Side Up Nutrition: https://sunnysideupnutrition.com
-----
Whether it is getting kids to eat a vegetable at the dinner table or dealing with cake, candy, and cupcakes at birthday parties, it can be very difficult to navigate healthy eating with kids.
What can we do to model healthy relationships with food? That’s the topic we are diving into with today’s guest, Holly Zink.
Holly is one of our own functional nutritionists who works with her patients by prioritizing a healthy relationship with food while also using nutrition as a therapeutic tool.
She works with adult patients on gut, cardiometabolic, and hormone health but also enjoys working with the family to build a healthy relationship with food for the whole family.
If you are struggling to help your children enjoy healthy eating, don’t miss this conversation.
Timestamps:
0:00 - Intro
1:35 - Why Holly became a nutritionist
4:23 - How nutrition affected Holly’s migraines
4:55 - How Holly found integrative nutrition
5:56 - Food and connection with family
7:00 - How to get kids more excited about healthy eating
9:06 - Teaching kids how to cook
11:08 - Moral values around food
12:38 - Making mealtimes easier for parents
17:38 - Working with picky eaters
20:32 - Kids vs adult foods
22:37 - Mixing fruits and vegetables into foods
23:42 - Working with gut health for kids
26:20 - Eating out with kids
27:28 - Holly’s morning routine
28:42 - Holly’s podcast recommendation
29:25 - What Holly does everyday to cultivate joy
30:34 - How to learn more and work with Holly
Listen to the full conversation:
Subscribe:
Full Episode Transcript:
SPEAKERS: Dr. Andrew Wong, Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
Taking the moral value away from food right where it's not like good versus bad food. Like you said, still food. Macaroni and cheese in a package is still food. It's going to have different value for us compared to whole foods which will have a lot more nutrient density so we're getting a lot more in terms of supporting our bodies that way. But the macaroni and cheese might be easy and it fills you up or it's something that you share with your friends that you just both really like and you connect over it. So coming back to that idea that food has so much more to it than just the nutritional value. It's really important to set kids up with those skills to be able to kind of decipher that and make that choice for themselves.
Dr. Andrew Wong
Whether it is getting kids to eat a vegetable at the dinner table or dealing with cake, candy and cupcakes at birthday parties, it can be very difficult to navigate healthy eating with kids. What can we do to model healthy relationships with food? That's the topic we're diving into with today's guest, Holly Zink. Holly is one of our amazing functional nutritionists here at Capitol Integrative Health who works with her patients by prioritizing a healthy relationship with food while also using nutrition as a therapeutic tool. She works with adult patients on gut, cardio metabolic and hormone health, but also enjoys working with the family to build a healthy relationship with food. If you're struggling to help your children enjoy healthy eating, don't miss this conversation. Welcome Holly to the podcast. Thank you so much for being on today.
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
Thanks for having me. Glad to be here.
Dr. Andrew Wong
Yeah. So let's talk first about what motivated you to become a nutritionist.
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
Yeah, it's actually a very long, winding story. So I'll just kind of try to try to be concise. I really have always been fascinated by science and our bodies. I remember very clearly like in third grade, we swapped our cheeks and looked at the cells under the microscope and was just fascinated. So for a long time I wanted to be a doctor. And in college I actually fell in love with research in my senior year. So I kind of went that route instead. And during that time, I actually started struggling with my own health issues, this kind of chronic cycle of migraines versus vomit and another one would start and it was really debilitating and very well meaning doctors would give me you know medication on top of medication on top of medications, which stopped the cycle of migraines, so I'm very grateful for that. But it also gave me all of these other side effects that were kind of scary like, one made it so they couldn't find words like people I had known forever. Couldn't find their name to say it. So you know, I just became a scientist and my research started kind of digging into what was at the root of what was going on. And not a single person had mentioned to me like stress, lifestyle, the foods that you're eating, and so I kind of did my own kind of experiment on myself and figure it out that conscious of the pills plus certain foods, the stress and kind of burning the candle at both ends, working very long hours and just supporting myself with caffeine to get through that was really at the core of it. So making those changes. It was a really difficult time but it was very eye opening. My body started shouting at me, you know, you can't keep living like this. And so from that, at that time, I also became a mom and decided to stay home with my kids for a little while and it gave me some time. To reflect and keep kind of digging into things like nutrition and lifestyle and health and wellness. And it you know, it kind of helped me shift into a different perspective of science and health from a more conventional perspective to a more holistic view. So I decided to go back to school for nutrition. It really is such a powerful piece of health that I really was excited to share that with other people and help empower them to take their health into their own hands.
Dr. Andrew Wong
Thanks for sharing, Holly! I think it's such a powerful story about, you know, failing the migraines, like you said, kind of getting to the root causes. You've realized that lifestyle , stress and nutrition were at some of the roots of that. And when you start to shift, how did your migraines change?
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
Actually, you know, it was good. It went from a point where I was having them just almost constantly couldn't eat. I lost a ton of weight to you know, getting back to really maybe once every couple of years I'll have a migraine now. And it's gone within a couple of days. I feel much better.
Dr. Andrew Wong
It's amazing! Yeah, your body's kind of found a way to heal itself. Felt like a lot of people in Integrative Health, their stories of personal experiences often drive and motivation to go into a career and good health. How did you find Integrative Nutrition? Like CIH? (Capital Integrative Health)
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
It’s really just through my own research, you know, just I think getting interested in nutrition is starting to make some changes. I think the first real dive into the idea of eating more whole foods versus processed foods came from Michael Pollan, one of Michael Pollan's books, In Defense of Food, and so from there I just kept kind of digging and then just started researching different programs. And he always had a great reputation and it was in Maryland, which was nice because I live in Maryland, so it was close by. So you know, just through my research, I kind of ended up there.
Dr. Andrew Wong
I love how nutrition ties in mind, body and spirit all together. And we know that food is not only about the macronutrients and micronutrients but it's also about nourishment and community and connection. How do you find food in terms of when you're eating with your kids? How do you find that food plays a role in that connection with the family?
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
Oh, food is such an important, has so many important or so important values beyond you know, the nutrients like you said, and it is really a time to connect with people that you care about. It's a time it's a way to show that you care about them by preparing for that nourishes their bodies, and it gives you a moment honestly, for me, I use it as a moment to kind of pause in my day and put aside everything else and just really check in with each other, connect with each other. So it's really great for building that relationship with my kids.
Dr. Andrew Wong
And we know that with kids, you know how we approach food and how we approach mealtime will often impact in the future even even now with kids, right? If it's well, their relationship with eating.
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
Absolutely!
Dr. Andrew Wong
So what can we do to get our kids or children interested in healthy eating? You know, we know there's a lot of probably junk food commercials on TV. There's a lot of pride their peers are getting, you know, some maybe maybe they're saying hey, do you want to go to McDonald's get a happy meal or something like that. So how do we get our children excited about healthy eating?
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
Yeah, I will say there. It's really a long game at first. The first point to keep in mind is that there's never going to be like, consistently perfect season in terms of your kids eating. So have a little flexibility there because pressure will turn them to resist whatever you're trying to feed them. So as much as possible, just remembering that you know, as long as they're coming back to you know, you're helping family meals regularly or you're providing them with options that are healthy and nourishing. It's okay for them to kind of, you know, let the outside influences and a little bit without putting any judgment on that. And then to kind of help kind of build their skills in terms of feeding themselves healthy nourishing food. really involve them I think is one of the most powerful things you can do. And that can look different depending on your family. what you know, your kids' developmental stage. So even kids who are toddlers can be involved in the process. It could be putting out silverware on the table or it could be tearing up a piece of lettuce for salad or washing things off. And then as kids get older with some supervision, you can teach them knife skills. You can teach them to cook different things. And then once they're teenagers, you could even ask them once in a while to be the one who's responsible for the food. And when kids have that autonomy and they feel like they're contributing to the family. It's really powerful in terms of how they start to take it on and put together meals and so it's a skill that you're building over the course of the lifetime of your children. It's not something that's going to be overnight like, “Oh, this is healthy food, you should eat it” and they'll say, “Okay, great”. It's really a matter of there's a lot of psychology involved there really. So it's a matter of just playing that long game and continuing to just build those skills wherever possible.
Dr. Andrew Wong
So we teach our kids in school reading and writing and arithmetic and we teach them at home and asleep and how to exercise. Should we teach your kids how to cook?
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
I think so. I think it's a really important skill. I had basic knowledge when I came out of my home but it was I mean in my very early 20s It was a lot of like frozen fish sticks and like, you know that counted as my fish for the day and it was you know, battered and fried and probably not completely fish I don't even know what was in the fish sticks, but I didn't have the skills or the tools to do that. And I really do think I didn't even I didn't even typically like shops in the produce section. You know, I would go straight to the center aisles where everything was prepared already. So I definitely didn't have the tools that I needed to give my body what it needed, which ended up backfiring on me long term. So you know, looking forward to kids growing up now you know, whatever we can do to give them those skills. And I think it will really kind of set them up for success in the future in terms of making healthy choices. And when kids go out to college and things like that they're probably gonna, you know, make some choices that we don't necessarily want for them in terms of = life in general but when it comes to food, right. So that's their chance to kind of get out there to experiment and make their own mistakes. So that doesn't mean necessarily that you've failed in terms of teaching your kids those skills, but at some point, they'll be able to fall back on that information that they have and that knowledge and it'll definitely serve them in the end.
Dr. Andrew Wong
It's a good foundation. It sounds like to really show kids and have them experience themselves how to prepare real food.
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
Right!
Dr. Andrew Wong
And also kind of sounds like we're also changing the consciousness for our kids in terms of what food actually is, right? Instead of it saying okay, well food is from a package, food is Kraft, mac and cheese or something that's like oh, it's actually fruits and vegetables and things are not always necessarily packaged. They could be but it doesn't. It doesn't always have to be.
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
Yeah. And I think that's a good point too, in terms of what you're making in terms of changing the consciousness and like taking the moral value away from food, right? Where it's not like good versus bad food. Like you said, food macaroni and cheese in a package is still food. It's gonna have different value for us compared to whole foods which will have a lot more nutrient density. So we're getting a lot more in terms of supporting our bodies that way but the macaroni and cheese it might be easy and it fills you up or it's something that you share with your friends it just was really like and to connect over. So coming back to the idea that food has so much more to it than just a nutritional value. It's really important to set kids up with those skills to be able to kind of decipher that and make that choice for themselves in the future. Yeah.
Dr. Andrew Wong
And also, it sounds like you can combine things like to someone to eat a little salad or some veggies on the side with the. mac and cheese.
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
Exactly!
Dr. Andrew Wong
Great! Okay. And so I think we kind of are talking here about how to strike a balance between eating healthy food and junk food. And you know, I think part of what happens with a lot of junk food, let's say or processed food is that, you know, us as parents, you know, we get busy. We're kind of rushing around too many, too many, too many plates, we're juggling and things like that. So we know that mealtimes can be part of that busyness part of that stress, you know for parents. So what tips or tools do you recommend to make mealtimes easier for us parents?
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
Yeah, well, again, part of that can be including your kids. Sometimes that is more stressful than helping. It kind of makes you have to kind of figure out timing, I guess, around food if it's a busy weeknight, maybe it's a little trickier to get your kids involved. But once they have those skills that can help out a lot. You can say here, I need you to make this side dish, right, like take care of the salad for me today. And they'll know what to do and you don't that will take a lot of stress off of you. And again, that's part of the long game. But in the moment one of the things that can be really helpful in terms of trying to help your kids get all of the nourishment that they need, is serving things family style. This comes down to you know, or this can help with kids who are maybe a little bit hesitant or afraid of trying new foods or who kind of get into a rut. So serving things family style and letting kids see you eating certain things, see it on the table. That's all exposure to foods so it's a great way to bring new foods in and help expand the variety of the food that kids are eating by letting them just be exposed to it without any pressure. So that's a big piece of feeding your kids and taking the stress off of yourself to make sure your kids eat perfectly is remembering that it's actually their responsibility to decide exactly what they're going to put on your plate and put in their mouths. So you this actually is comes from a concept called the division of responsibility. It was developed by Ellen Sattar. It's actually very kind of basic and simple, but it has a lot of nuance in terms of putting it into practice but what it is, is divided the responsibility between parents and children. So parents have the responsibility of deciding what's on the menu, what time it's being served. And actually preparing it and serving it. And then kids have the responsibility of deciding from what's been prepared. What do I choose, what am I gonna take, and how much. But when you take that responsibility of what your kids are choosing to put on their plate and what they're putting in their mouth, it takes a lot of the pressure off of the parents to be perfect in terms of feeding their kids, right because there's a lot of pressure on parents. So it takes the pressure off of you but it takes the pressure off the kids too. And when the kids don't feel any pressure, they're much more likely to accept your food more quickly. They might not try it right away. It might just be a matter of it's on the table a couple of times before they even put it on their plate. It might be that they'll play with it a little. It might be the next time they'll taste it and then they don't like it. And then down the road, they might taste it again and they might enjoy it right. So by just having it on the table letting them take what they want. You have some control over what they have to choose from. You can make sure there's something there that you know that they like so they'll fill up on it and so they won't leave the table hungry but at the same time they're being exposed to all of these different foods and will expand the variety of foods that they're eating over time. And I think that's one of the.. Again, there's a lot of nuance to it in terms of like if a child has, you know, a functional issue in terms of like eating and they're really refusing a lot of foods, this might not be the best way to approach it. But in general, this is a great way to take some pressure off of yourself. To not be so perfect at mealtimes.
Dr. Andrew Wong
Yeah, and as we always say here, don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good. Right?
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
Exactly!
Dr. Andrew Wong
For the division of responsibility, it sounds like it's really a simple but revolutionary concept. It's taking that idea of us as adults being the CEO of our own health and also transferring that to kids right and letting them learn from an early age. Maybe they can kind of decide they can be the CEO of their own home too. They can be guided and you know, menu planning and everything from parents, but ultimately, it's up to them. And I love that idea of taking the pressure off of the kids and the parents too.
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
Yeah, yeah. And even beyond taking the pressure off the kids. It gives them some autonomy and a sense of control versus somebody plopping a bunch of food on your plate using here. This is dinner. You have to eat all this before you can have dessert or something like that, and it really takes a lot of the power away from the food too. It takes a lot of that tension out of the situation.
Dr. Andrew Wong
Remember, I was in grade school and you know, “eat some peas”. It’s like taste everything and then you get in trouble and ended up vomiting. And then it's taken like, you know, 40 plus years to try to get back into eating peas but as it's kind of an interesting thing. So yes, sometimes it can cause some, you know, many traumas.
Now, for kids that you said that this can work for kids that don't have, you know, issues with trying new foods but have you recommend working with kids who may have some difficulty either some or some major difficulties and try new foods. You might have a limited diet and things like that.
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
Yeah. Well, one of the things is to kind of figure out whether it's, it's whether your child is really restricted and through to a point where they have like less than 10 foods that they're willing to eat. Or if they're not gaining weight or losing weight. That's the time to maybe take them to be evaluated for something that they may need some sort of occupational therapy or something like that, to help them get past that sometimes functional issues with the muscles in their mouth, makes it harder to chew or swallow and some occupational therapy can can help a lot with that and really expand the variety of what they're eating. So that's the time to kind of get some outside help. In general, for kids, who were really, you know, refusing to try new things. The idea of taking the pressure off with that division of responsibility, like kind of coming back to that same idea. If kids are, their feelings of privacy, you get outside help. If they're doing okay, in terms of like they're on their growth charts, they're growing as expected. And, you know, there's not a major concern about health. Really trying to dive into, you know, getting them involved in the kitchen and again, taking the pressure off that like sometimes pressure looks and looks in a way or it shows up in a way that doesn't, we don't think of as pressure, but just encouraging a kid or cheering for a kid who tries broccoli for the first time. That is telling them this is good when you try broccoli really shines. I'm not cheering for you. That's not That's not good. That's not what I want. That's pressure, right? So it's internalized pressure, even if we don't consciously recognize it that way. So I think that's a big piece of it is kind of letting kids just see you moving in a certain way. Modeling it for them, providing the option, not pressuring and it's really a tricky thing to kind of navigate in the moment and we're all gonna kind of stumble as we're doing it. So again, I don't mean for that to sound like you have to be perfect in terms of no pressure because we're all going to end up pressuring at some point but as much as you are able just kind of letting the child experiment a little and get involved I think is the best way really to help kids be less picky. As long as there's nothing else going on outside of, you know, kind of sticking their heels in and refusing because they want to have autonomy. I think that's a big piece of it.
Dr. Andrew Wong
So we don't want to say we must not put pressure on our kids but put pressure on that statement, right?
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
Yeah.
Dr. Andrew Wong
And many parents struggle with eating healthy themselves when they're kids have foods in the home that they're trying to avoid. So in other words, the foods that maybe we don't want to give our kids maybe we're eating ourselves. So what do you recommend for parents in this scenario?
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
Well, there are a couple of thoughts that came to my mind on that one. One is having less of those foods in the house and remembering that there's not like not labeling food as parent food and Kid food. You know, you ultimately are trying to teach your kids to make more choices that are kind of Whole Foods type of choices. So maybe having less of those types of foods in the house. More of the like, I guess cliche like fruit and nut butter or hummus and carrot sticks, right? Having those as options for the kids so that when you know the bag of potato chips, for example, runs out for the week, there are other options there too. For snacks and everybody can have.
Dr. Andrew Wong
That's not healthy food!
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
Well, it's delicious, right? That value? But it's definitely not serving you health wise, but yeah, and then. Let's see. So when it comes to also, I think a lot of times when parents are struggling with healthy eating themselves, the kids see that you know, even if we're trying not to like let them see us dieting or things like that, they see that so remembering that you're, you're modeling the behavior for them can be really helpful. Working in your own relationship with her is the best way to do that. So, I mean, I think probably all of us have some, some issues with our relationship with food. You know, we have so many external cues coming in and telling us we should be a certain way, you should go keto, you should., you know, you should not eat meat. You have so many conflicting pieces of information coming in from outside and we kind of lose touch with what's going on inside and what our bodies are telling us.
Dr. Andrew Wong
What it should to which it sounds like very judgmental from outside and then we internalize that like you said, that's that's a great point.
What do you think about mixing fruits and vegetables into other types of foods to, you know, kind of bring incorporate that into the diet for children.
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
So I don't really, it can be really tempting to like mix things and blend it in so they don't see it. And I'm not completely opposed to that because sometimes it is a matter of how you present the food to them. So a kid might not accept like a whole raw spinach leaf but they might love the smoothie that has finished planted into it right? But I think it shouldn't be hidden but that's because, again, it's about the exposure to it. If you're hiding it from them, and they find out in the future. They're not going to trust you. Yeah. I think trust is a huge piece of the whole building a relationship with food for your kids, you know.
Dr. Andrew Wong
“This is a spinach leaf, this is what it is.”
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
Yeah.
Dr. Andrew Wong
Great. Okay, so not a big fan of stealth mode. It sounds like, yeah?
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
Not so much, no.
Dr. Andrew Wong
And then we know that, you know, that functional nutrition it's very important to support gut health and overall, what do you recommend to help support the gut health of children using both nutrition and supplements at times..
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
When it comes to supplements with kids, it's for gut health specifically, there are some probiotic strains that are there, lower, lower CFU so they are more appropriate for kids. You don't want to overdo it because you can certainly cause issues by giving them too much. But in general, unless there's really a clear reason to give them a supplementing things sticking with food so like if they've been on antibiotics and they want to do low-dose supplement probiotic for them for a short term, but I think really sticking with the foods so things that will help feed their their gut bacteria, help keep things moving. Help them you know, a lot of times kids will struggle with constipation because they don't eat enough fiber. So you know, trying to make sure you've got enough fiber in their diet and I think we can go overboard with the fiber to like people hear that they make like throw tons of chia seeds into their kids diet, which, you know, will kind of it can be very filling when you add a lot of fiber so then they're not eating other things that they need. So not to say like, be overly zealous with the fiber, but I'm trying to get some fruits and vegetables in there will help to feed the gut bacteria help to keep things moving. Try to keep them drinking water throughout the day that will help as well. And then fermented foods are a great way to help you know their gut bacteria and keep things healthy. From that standpoint, they have a lot of variety even more than what you'll find in a probiotic supplements. So I always I prefer to use fermented foods anyway if we're going to choose one or the other. And so things like yogurt or sauerkraut or lots of fermented vegetable brands out there right now. Some pickles are fermented, not all, but that can be a good option. And miso is a great option as well so you can make like a broth out of it or you could use it for dressing or different things.
Dr. Andrew Wong
A really delicious options! I always say this on this podcast, but I always like this HEX Ferments company from Baltimore. Do you like that one for prebiotics, sauerkraut?
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
They're great!
Dr. Andrew Wong
I guess the other thing I was wondering is do you ever go out with your kids to eat and you know, there's always this kid's menu, which has basically three items: pizza, chicken fingers and mac and cheese. That's usually no matter what kind of restaurant you're going to. Would you think about kids menus and how would you approach that if someone's dining out?
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
Yeah, well, when we do not I try to just take off as much pressure as I can. I prefer not for for them to choose not from the kids menu because like we talked about, you know, the idea of trying to introduce them to Whole Foods and like not having this idea that there's kids food versus adult food, but there are always going to be instances where you get there and the kids really want that grilled cheese that's on the kids menu, right? And so again, it kind of comes down to the idea of taking off the pressure. Maybe when you go out to eat and you're giving your kids options. You let them pick whatever they want. And then the next meal you come back to kind of the habits that you're trying to build in terms of bringing in more nutrient dense Whole Foods.
Dr. Andrew Wong
Okay, great. That's great advice. Thank you so much, Holly!
Well, I think this is so important to really cultivate these healthy relationships with food both for ourselves and our children. So we can kind of, you know, educate the next generation on what real food is. But like you said, not have too much pressure put on ourselves either. It's really great advice. Thank you so much!
And we have some closing questions for all of our guests. So if you don't mind what I'm to ask you, do you have any morning routine?
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
Well, well, since Daylight Savings has kind of fallen away a little bit. It's a little bit of a struggle in the morning to get up and do it but it's nothing fancy. It's, I wish I could say as opposed to who like gets up and does yoga or something. But really my cat wakes me up generally and like leads me to the kitchen to feed her. And then I make some coffee and I just sit on the couch and I kind of enjoy the silence for a little bit before the kids get up. I tried to get up like 20 minutes early just so I can just sit and peace. And that, I guess it's kind of my own form of meditation in a way. It's not because it's structured as some meditation practices are but it just really, that silence before we get started and just a little bit of breathing is really really helpful to get me on the right foot.
Dr. Andrew Wong
The best thing in the morning is some silence. Kind of gets you started on the right foot. That's great!
What book or podcasts are you enjoying the most right now and why do you enjoy that?
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
Oh, so books. I don't. I generally am reading books with my kids at bedtime. I don't have my own books right now. But I do listen to podcasts. I like there's one called ologies. I'm not sure if you've heard of it before. But it's a woman- she's a scientist and she, I think her tagline is like she interviews different ologists. So all of these different studies of all of these different things. I think the most recent one I listened to was about bats. And it's actually kind of fascinating to just kind of dig into, like listening to these experts, talk about all the different components of the all the different sciences really in like how it kind of comes together to as like a small piece of what's going on in the whole world. I think it's really interesting.
Dr. Andrew Wong
Yeah, that’s so interesting! I'd love to hear an interview on meteorologists because the world has been pretty crazy recently. It has kind of figured that out.
What do you do every day to cultivate joy? Joy is so important in terms of health and wellness.
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
It is really important. Yeah, I think really, it's different every day. What brings joy? A lot of times is connecting with my kids like taking 10 minutes just go outside and play, which I think we forget to play a lot of the time. That's really huge. It's been a lesson that they've taught me actually. But I think just anything that where I'm consciously trying to be present in the moment is huge in terms of bringing joy because it kind of makes everything else fall away. And I really, you know, I may be making art, it might be just connecting with a friend. But really just becoming present is huge. A huge piece of it.
Dr. Andrew Wong
Yeah, joys infusing that present moment. And I think it is as important if not more than work, you know, I think we're going to use the place of work as well but taking the time with your kids just to, you know, play with them. It's really great. Well I'm doing that as well. That’s great.
Well, Holly, you're amazing nutritionists here at CIH. You do have a special interest in family nutrition working with kids 12 and up, right? How can listeners know more about you and work with you?
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
Well, they can find me on the website. I have a bio at the Capital Integrative Health website. Use capital integrative health.org.
Dr. Andrew Wong
Yeah, cihealth.org
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
Yeah, yes. I should know that
Dr. Andrew Wong
But it's on Google, you can all google it and make sure it’s that website.
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
Yeah, and if you're a patient here you can, you know, request an appointment with nutritionist, any one of our amazing nutritionists here, but you can specifically request me if you have questions related to, you know, the family nutrition as well.
Dr. Andrew Wong
Yes. Thanks so much, Holly, for being on today.
Holly Zink, MS, CNS, LDN
Absolutely. Thanks for having me.
Dr. Andrew Wong
Thank you! Thank you for all the listeners too, and we'll talk to you soon.
Thank you for taking the time to listen to us today. If you enjoyed this conversation, please take a moment to leave a review. It helps our podcasts reach more listeners. Don't forget to subscribe so you don't miss our next episodes and conversations and thank you so much again for being with us.