Jan 29

Jan 29 The UCSF Guide to Healthy & Happy Eating

Not a lot of people know this, but in addition to the work I do here at The Fortified Family, I’ve also taught college and university nutrition for nearly 15 years now!

Where I used to be able to do more teaching in person, with 7 small kids and running a full-time baby-feeding business, I have had to move all of my nutrition courses online. While I do miss teaching students in the face-to-face environment, thankfully nutrition is one subject matter that transfers really nicely to the online space.

Currently I teach nutrition online at 6 different colleges and universities throughout California, including my position as an Associate Clinical Professor of Nutrition at the University of California San Francisco School of Nursing.

I love teaching my future Nurse Practitioner as well as medical and dental students about nutrition, but at UCSF I also get an opportunity to publish research, write textbooks and communicate the nutrition work we are doing at the school to the larger public through collaborations with the University of California public affairs and media relations team.

Recently some of the journalists I work with published “The UCSF Guide to Healthy and Happy Eating” and I was delighted when they included my baby-led weaning work and ideas in the piece!

The UCSF Guide to Healthy & Happy Eating

The authors of this article were really forthright in their intentions, “We talked to dozens of experts, and they agree: No fad diets. No superfoods. No shame.”

As a faculty member specializing in infant feeding and baby-led weaning, I was honored to help write the part of the article all about how to “Get Kids to Love Healthy Eating”.

I’ll link to the full article and also share the beautiful infographic that designer Stephanie Koch (also a mom of a BLW grad :) did for the article below. If you click on the article link and scroll to section 10 - you can see Stephanie’s interactive graphic, but I’ll also post the static version below for you too.

Thank you to UCSF for featuring this important info and for sharing about how valuable baby and child eating behaviors are in shaping our later relationships with food as adults!

The 12 Tenets of Healthy, Happy Eating

In the UCSF Guide to Healthy & Happy Eating, the authors lay out 12 areas to educate yourself if you want a healthier relationship with food. They include: