Nutrition & Kids – A parent’s perspective with Kelly LeVeque

There’s perhaps nothing more important a parent can do for their children than provide nutritious foods and set healthy boundaries around sugar and treats. This is the focus for Kelly LeVeque, a nutritionist, author, podcaster, and an investor in Levels. Her goal is to ignore the allure of convenient items and provide food that will help her own children – and her clients – grow and thrive. She joined us on the podcast to chat about:

• Controlling what you can
• Setting healthy boundaries
• Delayed gratification
• Focusing on experiences over sweets

Start by controlling what you can

Be thoughtful and strategic when mapping out how your family will eat and what foods are and aren’t part of your routine.

What I’ve been trying to do is control the controllable. What’s controllable in our house is, what is he eating for breakfast? How is he going into his day? Is he starting his day with protein and veggies? Is he having a smoothie with veggies? Is he having an egg scramble? Okay, great. Now, how am I packing his lunch so that it’s blood-sugar balancing, so that it’s nutrient dense? How am I serving him dinner? And so, these are the things that are happening in our home. And then, when I can, I am making swaps. One of the things that I put in actually in the school nurses form was that we don’t do any liquid sugar in our family. There won’t be any juice. There won’t be any milk. There won’t be any Gatorade. Whole fruit forms are fine. He’s two, almost three, but I’ve had the conversation with him. Our family doesn’t do juice. If you want something that has flavored water, you tell momma and I we have an electrolyte drink element that I’m happy to give him. There are hint waters that are waters, little flavor. We’ve made spa water here at home, but having those boundaries. Then being able to say yes when it’s a birthday party and he can enjoy that celebration, then I don’t feel bad saying yes, because I’m not giving him sugar on the regular.

Set boundaries for your children’s diet

Just like TV time shouldn’t be accessible anytime, so too should parents set clear guardrails around sugar and dessert.

What I have really focused on is making the associations when, for example, Bash does go to a birthday party and eats a lot of sugar, and has a meltdown in the car ride home, or gets home and is upset and frustrated. We’ll have the conversation. I’ll say, “Why do you think that you feel frustrated? Why do you think you’re really upset? Are you feeling tired? Do you feel like maybe you need a little protein or you need a little rest?” I offer up solutions to what I perceive as a major blood sugar spike and crash. We’ll talk it through. Because what I’m seeing on Instagram and what I’m seeing with even – It’s hard for me, because even with some really respected dieticians that I follow in the kids’ space are saying, “You should offer dessert at the exact same time as dinner every single night so it’s not taboo. I think what we’re doing is we’re over-correcting. We wouldn’t say, “Well, screen times, kids are addicted to screens. So we’re just going to say, ‘You can use the screen whenever you want, because we want you to be able to create those boundaries for yourself and not make it taboo.’” The reality is there needs to be an adult in the room, and we need to have boundaries with things that are unhealthy in our life as adults and for our children.

Don’t hold back from adult conversations

Even though her son can’t understand everything yet, Kelly doesn’t hesitate to explain how things work, like hormones.

I think we have the conversation around, what is this food? We can have big, hard conversations with our kids. They know more than we think they do. So saying like, “Hey, that chicken, you saw the chickens at the ecology center farm clucking around, and they laid the eggs. That makes your blueberry muffins that we make, or your scrambled eggs. And that chicken is protein for your body. It makes your body strong.” I will sometimes say things that are way over his head like, “That protein makes your work hormones. And when you’re older, you’ll get to know what those are.” He’ll say words back at me like, “Hormones,” no idea what they mean. But I know it’s laying the foundation that he’ll eventually understand that. And so, I’m not saying cookies are bad for him, sugar is bad for him. What I’m saying is desserts are for celebration.

Practice delayed gratification

Kids shouldn’t get everything they want. They need to learn that boundaries are there for a reason and remain healthy so they can learn and grow.

The reality is kids, they have an affinity for very sweet things. They like the sweetest lemonade. We look at research offering lemonade to children between the ages of toddlers and adolescents and teenagers, the teenagers will start to prefer the less sweet lemonade, but the toddler will always pick the sweetest lemonade. And so, we have to be the one pulling back the sugar and making the swaps without making them feel left out or creating taboo, creating rules. And so, I think boundaries are healthy. Delayed gratification is healthy for kids. It allows them to know what it’s like to not get everything that they want. Allows them to be resilient and to work for things later in life. I mean, this may be an unpopular opinion, but I much rather protect my child’s blood sugar balance. I’d much rather protect their brain, and their mood, and their energy, especially in the days when he’s going to school and learning, because we know in research that retention goes down when blood sugar is higher with kids. If he’s not taking anything home with him after school in his brain, that’s a problem for me.

Aim for a well-rounded food day

Audit what your children are eating over the course of the day, and ensure there is a good balance of protein and fiber overall.

You have to look at the whole day. You have to look at what they’ve eaten prior to a sugar bomb, if it’s happening alone, if it’s happening in tandem with protein, fat, and fiber. And so, that’s the whole goal of the Fab Four, is just to bring light to marketing terms like, Hey, just because it’s gluten-free, dairy-free, grain-free, sometimes it doesn’t matter. We have to look at the balance and quantity. Really just teaching parents to look at a lunch box or a plate and say, “Where’s the protein? Where’s the fat? Where’s the fiber?” Okay. Now count the carbohydrates. If there’s two slices of bread, 20 crackers, and a bunch of grapes in that lunch box, I’m going to go ahead and bet you that that’s what your kid is probably going to eat majority of the time. The other stuff, the protein in there, and like the vet and the veggies are probably coming home. What you’ve just provided them is this massive glucose spike. Then it’s going to create a crash.

You can still be a fun mom without sugar

It can be hard to picture a birthday party without cupcakes, but the truth is that kids are looking for an experience, not just sweets.

The hard part as a mom is this moment of, well, everyone got cupcakes at Theo’s birthday, and now everyone’s coming to my house for Bash’s birthday. I, the not fun mom, who’s doing strawberries skewers, and how can I make this a little more fun? What I would say is the kids just want a special moment. They want to be recognized. They want to be seen. They want to be celebrated. Getting them involved in choosing a healthy choice, giving them the opportunity to have power is really important. Not having power over them, like, “We’re doing strawberry skewers for your birthday. But how about this? Look at this picture of a watermelon cake. Look at these strawberries skewers with this coconut cream, and everyone can dip their own, or they can dip it in.” Maybe you’re using evolved chocolate chips, which don’t have as much sugar. Something like that where you’re saying, “Do you want this or do you want that?” You’re giving them two options, they’re making the choice.

Rethink sandwiches as a staple

Kelly never packs sandwiches for her son, and when he has a burger she always removes on half of the bun.

I haven’t sent him to school with a sandwich. Whenever we go to a restaurant, if he wants the burger on the menu, we take the top bun off. Bash has never had a burger with two sides of the bun. I know we’ll get to an age where… Because Chris and I will order it lettuce wrapped. He sometimes will get it lettuce wrapped to be like us. I know he’s going to get to an age where he’s going to understand there are two buns on a burger and then I’ll be able to have that conversation with him. But parents know, you put two buns on a burger, or two pieces of bread on a sandwich, they take two bites because that bread is so filling. They’re not even getting to the protein in that sandwich. I don’t even care if it’s a PB and J. They’re barely getting through it because that bread is filling them up and taking up all the space in their stomach. They’re going to eat the carbohydrates first and they’re going to fill up on the carbohydrates the fastest.

Don’t fall for marketing tactics

Older generations were easily marketed to – and still are today.

I feel bad that I think our parents’ generation was duped by marketing, and that they were never given the opportunity to learn the science of blood sugar balance, or how to take care of themselves. Because what I see in that generation now, especially when I have clients who are maybe your grandparents’ age, somewhere in their fifties to their seventies, is that they’re the ones who are easily sold to. They don’t know to pull out the processed foods, the carbohydrates, the sugars. They did a lot of celebrating with food, and now they’re the ones who when a commercial for Bradbury Ketones or some kind of quick fix pill that’s being marketed to them, because their email’s on the internet. Now they’re getting emails from a big supplement company that this is the cure to all of their issues. Then you go to your parents’ house and they have supplements you don’t know where they got them. They were sold by a friend, or they sold by the internet and they’re not sticking to the foundations of, how do we eat to balance blood sugar balance?

Teach kids what healthy looks and feel like

You know you’ve done a good job as a parent when kids know how to take care of themselves thanks to the example you set and the advice you gave.

When I think about what my job is as a parent, my job is to help them to feel seen, and supported, and comforted, and listened to, and to teach them the things that they need to be their own person out in the world. That means teaching them how to do their own laundry, teaching them how to make scrambled eggs, how to saute and roast veggies, how to get in the kitchen and take care of themselves. If they know how to pay their bills, if they know how to do their laundry, and they know how to make food for themselves, and we set this foundation, if they go off to college and eat the fast food and the laundry piles up in their room, they’re out at parties late night and not protecting their sleep, they’ll eventually come back to, “Oh, that feels really good in my body to eat healthy and to sleep well. And I like to have clean clothes.” They’ll learn those lessons on their own in college when they’re adult. But to have laid the foundation for them, what feels good, what feels relaxing, what it feels like to feel comforted and listened to and to take care of yourself, that’s Sunday self-care for me right there. Learn how to do your own laundry and make some food for yourself and you will win in life.

Kelly LeVeque:

The hardest part is that there are so many moms and dads that are just trying their best and they don’t know the metabolic science. They don’t know the science of blood sugar. They don’t understand it. And so, I am just trying to simplify the heck out of it. They just need to know that carbohydrates, whether it’s starch, a sugar, a fruit, liquid sugar, it’s breaking down the blood sugar, spiking their blood sugar. Insulin is being released. Their blood sugar is crashing. What’s happening? That sugar is being put away in their liver and their muscles.

Kelly LeVeque:

Unfortunately, if they’re getting too much all the time, it’s going to be converted to triglycerides or fat in their liver and create this non-alcoholic fatty liver disease. But worse, it’s like you think your child has ADHD. You think your child has mood issue. You think your child is uninterested in movement. We know that balancing blood sugar and bringing blood sugar down to a healthier level creates spontaneous movement. Your kids want to run. They want to play. They want to be outside.

Kelly LeVeque:

They don’t want to be watching screens. They don’t want to be lethargic. Their food choices and what you’re offering them are creating this environment and this reality for you. And so, let me help you look at a plate and say, “All right, I’m offering four carbohydrates and one little bit of protein. How can I balance this out?”

Ben Grynol:

I’m Ben Grynol, part of the early startup team here at Levels. We’re building tech that helps people to understand their metabolic health. This is your front row seat to everything we do. This is A Whole New Level. As parents, it can be immensely challenging to feed kids. Feels like it’s an ongoing struggle, this tension, this debate between what kids want or what they think they want and what we should actually feed them. There’s no better person to talk to about this than Kelly LeVeque.

Ben Grynol:

Kelly is many different things. She’s a friend of Levels. She’s an investor in Levels. She is a nutritionist, a content creator, an author, a podcaster, and the list goes on. Kelly has so much insight as a mother and a parent herself to two young boys. She recently put out this course called The Fab Four Under Four. And so, it is an extension of the different courses that she’s created for adults and for a lot of the clients that she works with as a nutritionist.

Ben Grynol:

And so, Kelly and I had the chance to sit down and talk about some of the challenges around being a parent and making these choices, making these decisions for not only what we should feed kids, but how we should communicate the principles of food to them without feeling like we’re being overly prescriptive. How do we steer kids the right direction so that they have the knowledge, they have the foundation with their little minds as they’re growing and being the sponges that they are. How do we give them the tools and the guidance that they can start to make their own decisions as they grow?

Ben Grynol:

There’s a really interesting conversation. Kelly had such depth of knowledge to share. You can find Kelly on social at Be Well By Kelly. You can check out our website, kellyleveque.com. That’s K-E-L-L-Y-L-E-V-E-Q-U-E.com. You’ll find all the different courses that she’s done, blog posts, links to her podcast, also called Be Well By Kelly. Make sure you check it out, like subscribe. But those are all good places to connect with Kelly and to learn more about everything that she’s working on. And so, here’s where we kick things off.

Ben Grynol:

The thought behind this topic of nutrition and kids, and I know it’s something that is near and dear to your heart, but from a parent’s perspective, there’s so many challenges to feeding kids. It’s this dichotomy between making sure kids are fed and not giving them everything they want, but also trying to steer them in the right direction. I think from an outsider’s perspective sometimes, like how could you possibly give your kid whatever it is? Right?

Kelly LeVeque:

Right.

Ben Grynol:

There’s a relationship with food. There’s making the right choices. And so, how do you start to think about why feeding kids is so hard?

Kelly LeVeque:

It’s interesting because as Sebastian, my oldest, grows up and starts having toddler friends and goes to birthday parties and just recently started preschool, I think as they age, it gets harder and harder. What I’ve really been thinking about lately, especially in the last couple of weeks with Bash going off to school, is how important the beginning is. We know from research that there’s this flavor window for kids, and it’s the first 18 months of life.

Kelly LeVeque:

When you start feeding your child, somewhere between four and six months, the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends six months, and exclusively breastfeeding, if you can, until the six month mark. But then you’re talking about the introduction of flavors and foods. And so, I look back and I was really interested in introducing Bash to those bitter flavors, those sour flavors, the brussel sprouts, the kale, as many flavors, exposure, exposure. Exposure to plants and to little farms in our neighborhood, the farmer’s market, taking him to the grocery store.

Kelly LeVeque:

It was the hardest, actually, during COVID when we were having groceries delivered and we weren’t immersed in that. And so, what we ended up doing was buying seedlings and planting little sweet peppers in the backyard and watering our strawberries. All of a sudden, he was a little green thumb. But I look at that exposure and that foundation, and I know, okay, as a child, he has that foundation. Now we’re going to come up against what it feels like as we’re coming up against challenges.

Kelly LeVeque:

We’re coming up against birthday parties that have pizza, and donuts, and cake. And then we’re coming up against preschool. I would say, I value education. I was lucky enough, and my parents sent me to Catholic school growing up. I had great friends and they had great food options. Feel really blessed for that opportunity. It was important for us with Sebastian to do the same.

Kelly LeVeque:

But it’s amazing because we’re paying for his education outside of public school, but even sitting down with the teachers and they’re like, “Does he have any health issues, or do you have any boundaries for him in regards to his food? Here, by the way, is the menu and the calendar. You look at the calendar of food, snacks at 9:00 AM for a two and a half year old, and it’s Cheez-Its, blueberries, and milk. Then the next day it’s crackers, cheese, and juice.

Kelly LeVeque:

I don’t want to be that mom who feels crazy and is bringing him his own snack every single day. But I also have to look at the rest of his day. What I’ve been trying to do is control the controllable. What’s controllable in our house is, what is he eating for breakfast? How is he going into his day? Is he starting his day with protein and veggies? Is he having a smoothie with veggies? Is he having an egg scramble? Okay, great.

Kelly LeVeque:

Now, how am I packing his lunch so that it’s blood-sugar balancing, so that it’s nutrient dense? How am I serving him dinner? And so, these are the things that are happening in our home. And then, when I can, I am making swaps. One of the things that I put in actually in the school nurses form was that we don’t do any liquid sugar in our family. There won’t be any juice. There won’t be any milk. There won’t be any Gatorade. Whole fruit forms are fine.

Kelly LeVeque:

He’s two, almost three, but I’ve had the conversation with him. Our family doesn’t do juice. If you want something that has flavored water, you tell momma and I will… We have an electrolyte drink element that I’m happy to give him. There are hint waters that are waters, little flavor. We’ve made spa water here at home, but having those boundaries. Then being able to say yes when it’s a birthday party and he can enjoy that celebration, then I don’t feel bad saying yes, because I’m not giving him sugar on the regular, and I’m not allowing for it.

Kelly LeVeque:

And so, when it is this celebration of life, a birthday party, a holiday, I don’t want to have the guilt that, wow, we’ve just been eating a lot of sugar all day every day. I mean, I’m telling you, I was deep in the nutrition research when it comes to blood sugar balance and how it affects mood, behavior, learning. I think understanding all the science really gives me the strength to have hard boundaries. But also, those boundaries allow me to have the flexibility to really enjoy and celebrate when we want to have sugar, when we want to have dessert, when we want to have a tradition in our family, that includes celebratory food.

Ben Grynol:

Yeah. It’s hard because there are almost these three factors. There’s environmental. It’s what you’re saying around, you can control what you can control. So it’s what you choose to bring in the house and what you choose to expose kids to. Another factor is this outside influence. That can be friends’ birthday parties. It can be media. We’ll call it out-of-home media, being cereal boxes, which is a much larger and deeper conversation. Also, media as far as anything that kids might see on devices or…

Ben Grynol:

I mean, that’s the reality of our society. Kids will come across things and they’ll say, “I want,” whatever it is, friends’ houses, grandparents. No matter how you try to position things, outside influence is very strong, and that’s hard. Then the third factor is this idea of the broken food system. Where that ties in is a conversation that came up… Actually, it was last week. We did a book club with Robert Lustig, which I know you just recorded with Robert.

Ben Grynol:

Rob, we did a book club around metabolical, and one of the questions that came up was from Scott Klein, who’s one of the engineers on our team. He just sent his kids back to school. He said it’s wild… I can’t remember exactly what it was, but I think it was bread. It was this prescriptive thing where the kids had to have bread. Either it was provided by the school or in their lunchbox. It was something wild like that. He was like, “I don’t understand why, as a parent, I can’t make this decision.”

Ben Grynol:

That’s where it gets really hard, is that… And I know Casey’s mentioned this before in the school system, “Pizza is a vegetable.” That is broken in itself. And so, you start to extrapolate all these tiers, environmental, outside influence, and then this idea of the policy or broken food system. That’s where it can get really challenging because no matter how you try to steer kids in the right direction with things like swaps and things like having early conversations, well maintaining a lens that you’re not trying to create a relationship with food that might be unhealthy, not unhealthy food-

Kelly LeVeque:

Exactly. You don’t want things to be taboo.

Ben Grynol:

Exactly. Exactly. As long as kids understand. Kids are little sponges, but their brains are also developing. It gets really challenging as a parent where you just want to make sure that kids are fed and fed well, but you can only control what you can. And then you can’t get worried about what you can’t control because it’s the reality of the world that we live in.

Kelly LeVeque:

Definitely. I think what I have really focused on is making the associations when, for example, Bash does go to a birthday party and eats a lot of sugar, and has a meltdown in the car ride home, or gets home and is upset and frustrated. We’ll have the conversation. I’ll say, “Why do you think that you feel frustrated? Why do you think you’re really upset? Are you feeling tired? Do you feel like maybe you need a little protein or you need a little rest?”

Kelly LeVeque:

I offer up solutions to what I perceive as a major blood sugar spike and crash. We’ll talk it through because what I’m seeing on Instagram and what I’m seeing with even… It’s hard for me, because even with some really respected dieticians that I follow in the kids’ space are saying, “You should offer dessert at the exact same time as dinner every single night so it’s not taboo. I think what we’re doing is we’re over-correcting.

Kelly LeVeque:

We wouldn’t say, “Well, screen times, kids are addicted to screens. So we’re just going to say, ‘You can use the screen whenever you want, because we want you to be able to create those boundaries for yourself and not make it taboo.’” The reality is there needs to be an adult in the room, and we need to have boundaries with things that are unhealthy in our life as adults and for our children.

Kelly LeVeque:

And so, when I think about sugar, we do have time in the week that we have it. Bash knows that he gets dessert on the weekends, that that is part of the plan. And that sometimes we make popsicles in the Vitamix. He doesn’t know the difference, but there’s no added sugar. It’s blended fruit and probably some spinach in there and maybe some chia seeds or something. But he loves making them. He loves being involved, and he wants that dessert.

Kelly LeVeque:

And then, sometimes it’s this place, Betters, which is a coconut milk ice cream place that does all that [inaudible 00:12:59] old type stuff. Sometimes it’s a cookie at a birthday party, and that needs to be okay. I mean, I just absolutely disagree with the fact that we should be serving dessert at every meal to make sure that it’s not taboo and that there isn’t this bad relationship. I think we have the conversation around, what is this food?

Kelly LeVeque:

We can have big, hard conversations with our kids. They know more than we think they do. So saying like, “Hey, that chicken, you saw the chickens at the ecology center farm clucking around, and they laid the eggs. That makes your blueberry muffins that we make, or your scrambled eggs. And that chicken is protein for your body. It makes your body strong.” I will sometimes say things that are way over his head like, “That protein makes your work hormones. And when you’re older, you’ll get to know what those are.”

Kelly LeVeque:

He’ll say words back at me like, “Hormones, no idea what they mean.” But I know it’s laying the foundation that he’ll eventually understand that. And so, I’m not saying cookies are bad for him, sugar is bad for him. What I’m saying is desserts are for celebration. They are fun, and they’re sweet. I’ll tell him, “Use vocabulary to explain what it is.” And then I’ll say, “Like Curious George and Blippi, we have desserts on the weekend. We celebrate not having to go to work, and we celebrate having time together as a family, or your birthday, or a holiday. Do you want to help me make the cookies this week? Do you want to help me make the popsicles?”

Kelly LeVeque:

Get him involved, get him excited about it, because the reality is kids, they have an affinity for very sweet things. They like the sweetest lemonade. We look at research offering lemonade to children between the ages of toddlers and adolescents and teenagers, the teenagers will start to prefer the less sweet lemonade, but the toddler will always pick the sweetest lemonade. And so, we have to be the one pulling back the sugar and making the swaps without making them feel left out or creating taboo, creating rules.

Kelly LeVeque:

And so, I think boundaries are healthy. Delayed gratification is healthy for kids. It allows them to know what it’s like to not get everything that they want. Allows them to be resilient and to work for things later in life. I mean, this may be an unpopular opinion, but I much rather protect my child’s blood sugar balance. I’d much rather protect their brain, and their mood, and their energy, especially in the days when he’s going to school and learning, because we know in research that retention goes down when blood sugar is higher with kids. If he’s not taking anything home with him after school in his brain, that’s a problem for me.

Ben Grynol:

Yeah. The easiest example is understanding metabolic function as an adult. As soon as a person gets insight about what the feeling… Let’s just use the example of the afternoon slump, because many people can relate to it. It’s like I’m trying to type it’s 1:30 PM, and just my face is hitting the keyboard. I can’t keep my eyes open. I have to get more sleep and I need more coffee. And then, I’m jittery because I had too much coffee.

Ben Grynol:

I think that’s probably an okay heuristic for people to use. If you’re trying to be introspective about it, it’s actually not a bad hypothesis of what is happening. But then as soon as you realize what is actually happening and you’re like, the reason your face is hitting the keyboard is because you had… Not to dunk on Subway, but you had a footlong sub from Subway with white bread, and all these things, and you just had a major glucose spike.

Ben Grynol:

And so, that made you feel sleepy and that’s what’s happening in your body. Then the reason you’re jittery is not because you need more coffee. What’s actually happening is you’re now hypoglycemic because you’ve had such a big dip. You overproduce insulin to try to bring your blood sugar down. As soon as you start to connect the dots with that as a parent, and you go, “Wait a minute. If I’m giving my kids goldfish, a sandwich, a cookie, all of these things, and that’s what they’re having for lunch, how could they possibly be learning in school?”

Ben Grynol:

Because if my head was about to hit the keyboard, what are they doing when math comes on? Nevermind retain that information. They can’t even maintain focus because they’re just in such a state of mental fog that what do you do? So I think where it’s really hard is, without having that lens as a parent on this is what happened to me, now I have to make sure that this doesn’t happen to my child, so that I can provide them with the best opportunity to learn in school…

Ben Grynol:

What do people expect is going to happen if you pack these lunches that think are healthy? That’s marketing gone bad, is everything saying like… Well, Mary’s crackers, again, not to dunk on them, but just another example of, “Well, this is the healthy option for a cracker. I’m going to give my kid 20 of these in his or her lunch.” And then you’re like, “It doesn’t matter how many seeds are in that cracker. There’s brown rice. There’s syrup. There’s like everything that you… Like brown rice syrup, there’s brown rice flour, there’s seeds. And then that is causing the same result and outcomes.

Ben Grynol:

So there’s a lot of education in that I think that’s what you’re doing even with things like the Fab Four Under Four, and trying to tie in this education and learning from adults, and how they can apply that to their kids. It’s just hugely beneficial, but it feels like it’s [inaudible 00:18:36] in all ways.

Kelly LeVeque:

Thank you. Yeah. I’m really passionate about it. I mean, I feel like my passion for the science of blood sugar has just followed me throughout my life and how my life has changed and grown from my pregnancy course, teaching people how to balance their blood sugar through pregnancy, and the outcomes that we see there, lower birth weight, easier delivery, less hypertension, obviously less gestational diabetes.

Kelly LeVeque:

On average, someone who eats highly processed foods, who’s pregnant, gains 20 more pounds than someone who eats primarily a whole food fiber rich diet. That goes back to blood sugar. And then we extrapolate that and you just start to see it in your kids. I mean, you hit the nail on the head. Mary’s crackers is a great example. And then even seeing we go to the ecology center, which is this little farm down the street, it’s a fruit stand, veggie stand.

Kelly LeVeque:

They have really awesome traditionally fermented sourdough company that brings in sourdough and things like that. But Sebastian goes down there and he hasn’t really had much of a breakfast. We jump on our bike, have a little kid’s seat. We’ll ride down the street, we’ll go to this little farm. He’ll mow through a pound of grapes before we even leave the farm. I see that same meltdown happen as if we went to a birthday party for a cupcake. You have to look at the whole day.

Kelly LeVeque:

You have to look at what they’ve eaten prior to a sugar bomb, if it’s happening alone, if it’s happening in tandem with protein, fat, and fiber. And so, that’s the whole goal of the Fab Four, is just to bring light to marketing terms like, “Hey, just because it’s gluten-free, dairy-free, grain-free, sometimes it doesn’t matter. We have to look at the balance and quantity. Really just teaching parents to look at a lunch box or a plate and say, “Where’s the protein? Where’s the fat? Where’s the fiber?”

Kelly LeVeque:

Okay. Now count the carbohydrates. If there’s two slices of bread, 20 crackers, and a bunch of grapes in that lunch box, I’m going to go ahead and bet you that that’s what your kid is probably going to eat majority of the time. The other stuff, the protein in there, and like the vet and the veggies are probably coming home. What you’ve just provided them is this massive glucose spike. Then it’s going to create a crash. What we know, like I said earlier, is we have changes in mood. We have more meltdowns and tantrums. We have less learning, less retention. And then that’s not even talking about what we’re seeing on a biological level in kids.

Kelly LeVeque:

If you had Rob Lustig on the podcast, you know non-alcoholic fatty liver disease is not just for alcoholics. We are seeing it in adults and we are seeing it in the most vulnerable children. It’s because of liquid sugar. It’s because of the soda. It’s because of the juice. It’s because of the Gatorade. Sorry to Duncan Gatorade. But it is this sugar that is… It’s so fast to be metabolized. It causes a major surge in blood sugar. Their little livers are like, “Oh my gosh. What are we going to do here? We have to metabolize this into triglyceride and then store it in our liver.”

Kelly LeVeque:

Then you have the marbling of this very important organ that is detoxifying everything from our body. So yeah, I mean, I’m passionate about it. It’s heartbreaking for me. The hardest part is that there are so many moms and dads that are just trying their best and they don’t know the metabolic science. They don’t know the science of blood sugar. They don’t understand it. And so, I am just trying to simplify the heck out of it.

Kelly LeVeque:

Sometimes someone might say, “Yeah. What do you mean by that? And explain it further.” I’m like, “They just need to know that carbohydrates, whether it’s starch, a sugar, a fruit, liquid sugar, it’s breaking down the blood sugar, spiking their blood sugar, insulin is being released, their blood sugar is crashing. What’s happening, that sugar is being put away in their liver and their muscles. Unfortunately, if they’re getting too much all the time, it’s going to be converted to triglycerides or fat in their liver and create this non-alcoholic fatty liver disease.

Kelly LeVeque:

But worse, it’s like you think your child has ADHD. You think your child has a mood issue. You think your child is uninterested in movement. We know that balancing blood sugar and bringing blood sugar down to a healthier level creates spontaneous movement. Your kids want to run. They want to play. They want to be outside. They don’t want to be watching screens. They don’t want to be lethargic. Their food choices and what you’re offering them are creating this environment and this reality for you.

Kelly LeVeque:

And so, let me help you look at a plate and say, “All right. I’m offering four carbohydrates and one little bit of protein. How can I balance this out?”

Ben Grynol:

Yeah. It’s funny because it’s really easy to jump to the conclusion, “I think my child has behavioral issues,” or like, “Did you see the kid down the street? I think he or she has behavioral issues,” and that’s not the case. It’s such an inaccurate conclusion to just jump to that and say, “That is the reason why,” especially when people aren’t coming at it from a bad place. They’re trying to reason with what is happening.

Ben Grynol:

As soon as you remove the inputs, like bad input, bad output, you remove or you evolve, because you can’t just remove it completely and say, “Hey, this is the way it is starting fresh.” It’s you do exactly what you’re saying with letting Sebastian know why certain choices are made and the way to think about food. As that changes, and those inputs change, the output changes completely.

Ben Grynol:

And so, if parents can understand that and kids can understand that as well, that you remove these bad inputs, behaviorally, kids change. There are just fewer temper tantrums or there’s maybe a kinder and more respectful way of navigating the world because kids are still emotional and they’re trying to figure things out. They’re very smart, but they’ve also got developing brains. If you give those brains poor input sources, you’re not putting them in the best position to feel regulated, if that makes sense, and to be at a state of homeostasis where it’s like they really feel grounded.

Ben Grynol:

They’re still small. They’re still developing. This is not meant to be overly philosophical. But there is a point where, as parents, as adults… We are adults, so we have to say, even if kids are not our own, we still have to make sure that… You have a bunch of Sebastian’s friends over, that’s your opportunity to make a choice. Juice boxes, Nutella, and those little breadstick dip things that you dip in cheese, or, “Hey, here’s a plate of nuts,” and whatever you prepared for the kids, nuts and fruit and whatever.

Ben Grynol:

It might be in limitations, so that they’ve got these options. And it’s like, “Well, you can decide to eat or you don’t have to eat.” Then extrapolating that one layer further, is like grapes versus blackberries, knowing that the only caveat is, and where it gets really hard is without measuring kids’ glucose levels. It’s very difficult to say how everybody’s going to metabolize things because you can’t just say that Taschen’s going to metabolize something the same as Sebastian, because we know that genetically that’s just incorrect. Everyone’s response is different. So it’s trying to figure out these cues as a parent and you’re somewhat putting together the puzzle pieces all the time.

Kelly LeVeque:

Definitely. No, I think that’s a perfect example of how we can have control and support our community, and our extended family, and our friends, and their metabolic health. The hard part as a mom is this moment of, well, everyone got cupcakes at Theo’s birthday, and now everyone’s coming to my house for Bash’s birthday. I, the not fun mom, who’s doing strawberries skewers, and how can I make this a little more fun? What I would say is the kids just want a special moment. They want to be recognized. They want to be seen. They want to be celebrated.

Kelly LeVeque:

Getting them involved in choosing a healthy choice, giving them the opportunity to have power is really important. Not having power over them, like, “We’re doing strawberry skewers for your birthday. But how about this? Look at this picture of a watermelon cake. Look at these strawberries skewers with this coconut cream, and everyone can dip their own, or they can dip it in.” Maybe you’re using evolved chocolate chips, which don’t have as much sugar. Something like that where you’re saying, “Do you want this or do you want that?”

Kelly LeVeque:

You’re giving them two options, they’re making the choice. They’re invested in the choice. How can you expose them to helping to prepare that dessert in that celebratory moment? That’s really what our kids want from us. They want to be empowered. They want to be helpers. They want to learn. They want to be exposed, and then they want to celebrate. And so, we can do that in a helpful way.

Kelly LeVeque:

I think that’s what I’m trying to empower parents to do on my platform, and through my courses, is to set those boundaries and then to know that… Your son’s name is Theo, so I’m not saying Theo’s mom would do this, but that Theo’s mom just went to the store and picked up cupcakes, pulled them out of the plastic clamshell container, and put them on the table. Maybe that’s what she did, and that’s okay too. But if you have the ability to, whether that’s financially, or the time that you have, to invest or produce, create, make these delicious nutritious options, do it.

Kelly LeVeque:

You’re getting quality time with your kids. They’re getting exposed to making food for themselves, even if it’s a sweet dessert. I think that’s really what we should be focusing on.

Ben Grynol:

Yeah. It’s funny that you say that because it was either this morning or yesterday, that Penelope said, “Hey mom, can I help make the lunch?” The snack for school. Pam was like, “Yeah, of course.” So just involving her in the process. She’s showing curiosity. She’s showing interest. She wants to understand and learn. Those are the opportunities that you have to capitalize on and say like, “Yes, let’s do this together.”

Ben Grynol:

You start to build the knowledge. You start to build the relationship with what they’re eating and why. And that becomes a lot easier. Where it gets hard though, so let’s play the other side of it for a second. It’s so easy to come at this and go, “Kelly, this is great. I’m just a busy parent and I don’t have time. It’s so much easier for… I buy the healthy options. The pre-packaged mini things, they’re healthy. I can see the labels. They’ve got seeds. They’ve got nuts. They’ve got all these things.”

Ben Grynol:

Let’s assume somebody doesn’t understand that not all pre-packaged and processed things are created equal by any means, even when it appears to be healthy. But the busy parents is going, “Kelly, I don’t have time.” And so, then your feedback is, “Change the process,” being, “Why don’t you make the lunch the night before?” If you’re trying to buy time in the morning, that’s like, “Change the process. Hack the routine.”

Ben Grynol:

Then the other side is tactical options where you say, “I understand you’re busy, but this will take you three more minutes.” What are some tactical lunches? Let’s just go that deep. Let’s go that granular of, what are some tactical lunches that parents, as they’re thinking about back to school for kids, could say, “Okay, I need a Monday through Friday plan.” What are some options where you would say, “Here are some things they can put in the lunch box to give better options for the kids?”

Kelly LeVeque:

Well, I’ll just look at the last week of Sebastian going to school and what he had for lunch, because I think people, when they think about breakfast and when they think about lunch, they think about specific food groups. For breakfast, we’re having cereals, pancakes, waffles, egg. For lunch, we’re having sandwiches. We’re having sandwiches. We’re having crackers and cheese in the sandwiches, and we’re having fruit on the side. That’s all lunch.

Kelly LeVeque:

And so, when I look at Sebastian’s lunch, for example, we use the tolerant lentil pasta when we make pasta for him. We had it with a little bit of pesto. We had like a lemon rotisserie chicken. I put, a lot of times, leftovers in his lunch. Looking at the last week, it’s like, okay, I had the pesto pasta in a little container. We use the Planet Earth stainless steel lunchbox. You put a cooler pack in it, he’ll eat that popsicled because I know he loves it.

Kelly LeVeque:

There’s a little bit of protein in that in comparison to, say, a whole wheat pasta. We’re getting some fiber and some protein in that. He’ll eat the chicken. Then I just look and say, “Okay, I know I want him to have something sweet in his lunch,” whether that’s blackberries, strawberries, blueberries. If I want to provide something that feels a little bit more fun, I do get those dehydrated strawberries, raspberries, and blueberries. They’re just dehydrated.

Kelly LeVeque:

Oh, sorry, they’re not dehydrated. No, they are dehydrated, because dried is when they add sugar. Yeah. Sorry, brain fart. When I want to have a little more fun with him, I’ll add the dehydrated fruit. That’s literally just the fruit, it’s been dehydrated. I never give him the whole bag of that stuff because then he can pound through the entire bag, and then we’re talking like 50 to 60 grams of sugar. But dehydrated blueberries or strawberries feel fun.

Kelly LeVeque:

There’s a little box in the middle of the Planet Box lunch box, the stainless steel one, that’s for sweets. So I sometimes put some of those in there, or a couple of slivers of date. If he wants, like, “Okay, this is a little sweeter. This is a little more fun.” Today we did a little container of hummus, some cucumbers, some carrots and red pepper, because I know he loves crudites. We have that a lot. I wrapped up some turkey slices with avocado. I put in some Hu crackers, which is a great almond flour cracker.

Kelly LeVeque:

That is a grain-free cracker that’s pretty low carb. I love Siete tortillas, almond flour. If you can’t do nuts at your school, cassava flour, which is a root. But it’s a lower carb flour tortilla, and I’ll do pizza pockets with that. I’ll do pasta sauce, Italian sausage, peppers, tomatoes, spinach, saute it with some pizza sauce in a pan, and then put it in one of those Siete tortillas like a burrito or like a quesadilla.

Kelly LeVeque:

If you have a nut-free school, sunflower butter is great. A little sunflower butter and some apples, if he can dip, always helps. I mean, I put chicken and rice in his lunch a few days ago because we had chicken and rice the night before. So he does have more carbohydrates and grain, and fruit. And then I’m looking at that lunch box and I’m never really doing more than two. Occasionally it’s he’s getting crackers and I’m getting a little bit of apple, or he’s getting a Siete tortilla and he’s having some blackberries.

Kelly LeVeque:

But in that lunch, I’m really packing in the protein, fat, and fiber either wrapped in that Siete tortilla or something that he can dip those apples in, or something that I know he will gravitate towards. Even if that comes down to me adding… I love Thrive Market, so we put Thrive Market olives. They have many all of packs, Mediterranean, and Zesty Italian, and plain. We’ll use the Chomps or the Thrive Market mini little grass-fed beef sticks. If he wants a crunchy chip that’s not a chip, we’ll use… There are artichoke chips now that are delicious, and it’s just sliced artichokes.

Kelly LeVeque:

We also use the seaweed snacks with salt. Those are great. When he’s home, he’ll snack on nuts all the time, pili nuts, pistachios. I know parents are really afraid of choking, but pili nuts are really soft. They’re long. He knows he can bite them in half. But even Taschen, now with only two teeth and those hard gums, I’ve given him a pili nut. It’s so soft, so softer than a cashew and softer than a macadamia nut. Really buttery. It’s like a keto nut. But not to say that it’s boring. It’s just not lunch food.

Kelly LeVeque:

I haven’t sent him to school with a sandwich. Whenever we go to a restaurant, if he wants the burger on the menu, we take the top bun off. Bash has never had a burger with two sides of the bun. I know we’ll get to an age where… Because Chris and I will order it lettuce wrapped. He sometimes will get it lettuce wrapped to be like us. I know he’s going to get to an age where he’s going to understand there are two buns on a burger and then I’ll be able to have that conversation with him.

Kelly LeVeque:

But parents know, you put two buns on a burger, or two pieces of bread on a sandwich, they take two bites because that bread is so filling. They’re not even getting to the protein in that sandwich. I don’t even care if it’s a PB and J. They’re barely getting through it because that bread is filling them up and taking up all the space in their stomach. They’re going to eat the carbohydrates first and they’re going to fill up on the carbohydrates the fastest.

Kelly LeVeque:

So how can you look at their lunchbox and say, “Count the carbs”? If there are two pieces of bread, crackers, and grapes, that’s four carbohydrates. You just had a little peanut butter or turkey in that bread, that’s the only protein they’re getting. How are we balancing this out? Can you use a grain-free tortilla instead of two pieces of bread? You’re probably saving them 40 grams of carbohydrates. And you just went from two to one, one carbohydrate.

Kelly LeVeque:

Then you look at the crackers and the grapes. How can you swap those crackers for veggies? How can you swap those grapes for blackberries? Then you’re naturally creating this balance in their lunchbox. Will they ever get grapes? Yeah, absolutely. But can you pick the day where they’re having veggie chicken curry, or a chili in a thermos, and then you’re putting grapes on the side because you know that the protein, fat, and veggies is all in that chili. They’re going to eat that, fill up, feel calm. It’s almost like grounding their body and then they can have some grapes.

Ben Grynol:

Yeah. It’s funny because you still want to make sure that kids are getting what they feel is exciting food, like, “Oh mom, this is so boring. You’re giving me kale again. I don’t want that.” Kale chips, very different than just massage kale.

Kelly LeVeque:

Totally.

Ben Grynol:

It’s salty. It’s tasty. Covered in olive oil and you do it in the oven. That alone, “Hey, there are these chips.” Artichoke chips, all these things. The pepperoni sticks, it’s funny. Pam bought those because she’s like, “Hey, I saw Kelly had these pepperoni sticks. I’m going to do that for Theo.” He thinks it’s cool, like it’s a cool thing. Now, that’s not, “I’m buying Hot Rods.” You’re still buying, you have to understand, it’s processed meat. What is going into the processing? Not all are created equal.

Ben Grynol:

But if you go to a butcher shop and you understand what is going into that, or you buy ones from Thrive or wherever, it’s very different. Where it gets pretty funny is you still can do things like the sandwiches, at least we’re finding, when done right. We buy those Joseph’s wraps, the different flatbreads and the pitas. That becomes the vehicle for the sandwich. But that doesn’t mean put lunch meat in there. Why? Because that’s again another process of education where it’s like you don’t know what you don’t know. But if you don’t know that most lunch meats, even the ones that say naturally processed, the healthy option are just filled with potato starch and-

Kelly LeVeque:

Sure.

Ben Grynol:

… some corn syrup, like actual sugar, natural flavoring. All of these things and all these fillers, it’s all for naught. It doesn’t matter what vehicle you use to deliver that. That is not the option. That’s where you take the leftover chicken that you had the night before and you chop it up and there you go. That becomes the protein source in your sandwich. Your child still feels like he or she is eating a sandwich, just like their friends.

Ben Grynol:

It’s a very different approach than two sides of a bun. It’s a very different approach where they’re still eating what they think is a very average lunch. Because kids want to be like their friends, “I eat sandwiches-

Kelly LeVeque:

They don’t want to feel left out. Yeah.

Ben Grynol:

Yeah, just like my friends. I’ve got chips just like my friends.” Well, yours are kale chips. They don’t think about it that way, but that’s because you’ve established the foundation for what they’re going to eat, and that’s all back to the input source. It’s so important to do that. And then, even with things like dinners. For pizza, we use those Joseph’s flatbreads, and that becomes the foundation. That’s your pizza. The pizza goes in the kid’s lunchbox. They had pizza for lunch and they feel great about what they’re eating. But it is not giving them the afternoon slump because it’s very different.

Ben Grynol:

And so, it’s, it’s creating that routine, I think, of knowing what you are doing and why, that makes it a lot easier to think about lunches, as opposed to scrambling. I think that’s probably the by-product of why things get packed the way they do. “I don’t know what to do. I’m going to the store. I have little time,” or, “I order my groceries.” They get these boxes of things. They’re going to put four different packages within the lunch box, and that’s it, and that’s the lunch. I know you said before, you grew up on Lunchables and Pepperidge Farms, and that was great. But that’s very different time.

Kelly LeVeque:

It is a very different time. I think what my mom trusted when she was raising us was that convenience foods were a luxury, and that these big large companies, whether it’s like General Mills or whatever, my mom trusted them to take care of us. No, she’d see the commercials. She thinks that like, “This is great for us. It’s whole grains and it’s whole wheat,” Triscuits and Wheat Thins and all that kind of stuff.

Kelly LeVeque:

I feel bad that I think our parents’ generation was duped by marketing, and that they were never given the opportunity to learn the science of blood sugar balance, or how to take care of themselves. Because what I see in that generation now, especially when I have clients who are maybe your grandparents’ age, somewhere in their fifties to their seventies, is that they’re the ones who are easily sold to. They don’t know to pull out the processed foods, the carbohydrates, the sugars.

Kelly LeVeque:

They did a lot of celebrating with food, and now they’re the ones who when a commercial for Bradbury Ketones or some kind of quick fix pill that’s being marketed to them, because their email’s on the internet. Now they’re getting emails from a big supplement company that this is the cure to all of their issues. Then you go to your parents’ house and they have supplements you don’t know where they got them. They were sold by a friend, or they sold by the internet and they’re not sticking to the foundations of, how do we eat to balance blood sugar balance?

Kelly LeVeque:

How do we eat to promote health? How do we eat to ensure that we have the nutrients that our bodies need to thrive? That is just foundational science that is missing from our education in school, in elementary school. It’s missing from high school. It’s missing from college. If I could go back and change the curriculum of kids in high school, I would absolutely pull things like calculus and put in things like health, like home-ec, like finance.

Kelly LeVeque:

Like, do you know how to balance your checkbook? Do you know what compounding interests looks like? Do you know what savings looks like if you start early, versus, hey, all these kids who are using credit cards and paying with installments for things that they don’t need. I mean, there’s a lot that needs to be changed. But health is a major part of it that home-ec at cooking. I sit down with 30 and 40 year olds who have kids who are under 10, and they know how to make scrambled eggs and ground turkey for tacos.

Kelly LeVeque:

They never had the time. They were in a big career. Their parents didn’t teach them. They used fast casual food. So they are so overwhelmed by the process of packing a lunch. If that is someone who’s tuning in and listening, and they are starting from ground zero, I would say, you’ve got to learn the basics. It’s how do you make eggs? How do you make a protein? How do you cook a rotisserie chicken? How do you roast some veggies? What does it mean to blanche veggies? It doesn’t have to be fancy. You don’t have to follow a recipe. You just have to have those basics, put those together, and know that that is really healthy for your kids.

Ben Grynol:

Yeah. And being very cognizant of not being duped by marketing, because marketing is so strong and it’s really easy to fall into the trap of assuming something is healthy. I think, actually, this is probably me being naive and overly trusting, is that a lot of these companies that are going into making these products, they truly are trying to make something that they think is healthy, but they don’t understand the implications of the ingredients that they’re using.

Ben Grynol:

Let’s just use Mary’s. Mary’s is making the assumption that they’re putting their best foot forward as a company, and making these very healthy crackers, because I think as a society, there’s such a long road ahead for people to understand, on average, the implications of X, Y, and Z, as it relates to metabolic health, knowing that analytes are molecules. It’s not just about glucose. It’s not just about insulin. It’s not just about ketones.

Ben Grynol:

We can keep going on and on and on. There are so many things that pertain to having good metabolic health, that I don’t think anybody is starting one of these, we’ll call them hipster companies, because they usually have pretty good marketing. But a company that really has this holistic approach to saying, “We’re doing what’s right for the planet, and for people, and for creating products with sustainable packaging.” It’s just like the intent is right. The execution is just a little wrong because we have more work to do as a society.

Ben Grynol:

I think that’s where it’s going to be hard. But just knowing that as a parent, as you’re making choices as an adult for yourself, learning to make things like scrambled eggs, learning to saute ground beef, whatever it is, ground turkey, whatever protein source you choose, and not just adding the taco seasoning to it because that’s what you thought was the right thing to do, saying, “Cool. Little salt, little pepper, little olive oil, you’re set.” Very, very different than just dumping in the pre-packaged seasoning because then everything you’ve done is basically lost.

Kelly LeVeque:

Right. Now I have to plug my seasoning. Williams Sonoma was a seasoning I created. I created a line of functional seasonings at Williams Sonoma. There’s a Be Savory that’s Italian, a Be Spicy that’s your Mexican or a rub for meat. And then a Be Sweet which is a turmeric, cinnamon, very warming fall type of a spice. But can be used in coffees, teas, baked goods. But the Be Spicy is my taco seasoning, which includes absolutely no sugar. But we added a little bit of dehydrated beet for those polyphenols, and to block advanced glycation end products.

Kelly LeVeque:

A lot of times when we char meat, or we use sugar with meat, we create oxidative stress in our body. We create this [inaudible 00:45:16] process of… Think about like rusting in our body. And so, I wanted to make something that was easy for parents, because that’s the key, is how… Siete has the taco seasoning that’s without sugar too. And maltodextrin and all the weird fillers. People need our help. So these hipster companies, unfortunately, when you’re making a cracker, or you’re making a cereal, or you’re making what we might say, like more of like fun food, the party style food, it’s not just healthier because it’s grain-free.

Kelly LeVeque:

That’s I think the crux, because it’s not just healthier because they’re using coconut sugar. It’s not just healthier because they’re not using canola oil and they’re using sunflower oil. We have to just realize that this is a highly processed food even if it is grain-free, and we need to have boundaries around those foods. The unfortunate part is boring sugar-free seasonings, boring whole foods aren’t as sexy as a cool grain-free cereal that has a fun character on the front of the box. It just isn’t. This is where us as parents need to be parents and not their friends and bring the boring.

Ben Grynol:

Yeah. That’s exactly it. We are parents. We are pseudo friends. We’ll call it that.

Kelly LeVeque:

Yeah. I mean, I’m getting to be friends with… He’s obviously my best little friend, and so is Taschen. But at certain point, until he has the ability to make these decisions for himself. And there’s going to be a time when my boys go off to… Are in high school, and they’re in college, and they’re at parties and they’re making choices without me, and they’re going to make those choices. I just always hope that they always come back to their foundation, which is they know how to make foods for themselves. They know how to make whole foods for themselves.

Kelly LeVeque:

When I think about what my job is as a parent, my job is to help them to feel seen, and supported, and comforted, and listened to, and to teach them the things that they need to be their own person out in the world. That means teaching them how to do their own laundry, teaching them how to make scrambled eggs, how to saute and roast veggies, how to get in the kitchen and take care of themselves.

Kelly LeVeque:

If they know how to pay their bills, if they know how to do their laundry, and they know how to make food for themselves, and we set this foundation, if they go off to college and eat the fast food and the laundry piles up in their room, they’re out at parties late night and not protecting their sleep, they’ll eventually come back to, “Oh, that feels really good in my body to eat healthy and to sleep well. And I like to have clean clothes.”

Kelly LeVeque:

They’ll learn those lessons on their own in college when they’re adult. But to have laid the foundation for them, what feels good, what feels relaxing, what it feels like to feel comforted and listened to and to take care of yourself, that’s Sunday self-care for me right there. Learn how to do your own laundry and make some food for yourself and you will win in life.

Ben Grynol:

That’s your role, it’s education, exposure, and guidance. You’re setting the foundation.

Kelly LeVeque:

Yeah.

Ben Grynol:

Well, I think it’s probably a good place to wrap. But where can people find you? There are so many things that you are involved in, content creator, thought leader, an author, podcaster. We can keep going down the rabbit hole. But where can people find you?

Kelly LeVeque:

Yeah. If you look up Be Well By Kelly, you can find me on Instagram and Facebook. My website is bewellbykelly or kellyleveque.com. My books are Body Love, Body Love Every Day. I wrote some nutrition courses for pregnancy, to balance your blood sugar, the foundations of blood sugar called Fab Four Fundamentals. Fab Four Under Four teaches you how to balance your kids plate so that they learn, grow, and thrive at their genetic potential.

Kelly LeVeque:

Yeah. I’m just really passionate about blood sugar, and I have been for about a decade. So every single one of these resources is going to teach you blood sugar balance. That’s why I’m so obsessed with Levels. That’s why I became an investor. That’s why we’re having this podcast. We had Casey Means on our podcast. You’ve connected me to some amazing people like Dr. Alison Hall. We just had her on the podcast. She’s doing research for Levels, really cool stuff.

Kelly LeVeque:

So learn how to balance your blood sugar, how to eat for that balance. And then, I tell you, your life will be changed for the good. It’s priceless education.

Ben Grynol:

You guys are renovating right now?

Kelly LeVeque:

Yeah. We bought our house and we’re renovating. My mom’s best friend from high school, her husband is a contractor. He’s 60 something. He retires at the end of the year. And so, he was like, “Kelly, whatever you want to do, you’ve got to rock and roll because I’m done. Hanging up my hammer at the end of the year.” So I was like, “Okay, let’s do it. I’m never going to have this type of red carpet contractor prize.”