00:00:00    Alyssa

You're listening to Voices of Your Village, and today we get to dive into a topic that is just always on my mind, I feel like. We get to chat about navigating school lunch with Feeding Littles co -founder Megan McNamee. She is a registered dietitian and nutritionist and co -founder of Feeding Littles, one of my favorite Instagram accounts. She specializes in pediatric nutrition and eating disorder prevention. Megan and her business partner Judy help parents feel confident feeding their babies, toddlers, and big kids through online courses and social media support. What I'm so stoked about is that they just launched their second book, Feeding Littles Lunches. It's a ...

00:00:00    Alyssa

You're listening to Voices of Your Village, and today we get to dive into all of those big feelings that are coming up in this back -to -school time. We get to chat about something called restraint collapse, where kids restrain everything and kind of hold it in throughout the day, and then they collapse and let it all out with us. This is a doozy when they're navigating something new and hard, like back -to -school. It's like it's starting a new job or moving to a new house or any big life change where your brain is trying to figure out all the newness and what it means and it's exhausting. And so then we have these big meltdowns and feelings about things that typic...

00:00:00    Alyssa

You're listening to Voices of Your Village. And today, I got to hang out with Maria Davis-Pierre to chat about Black families who are navigating autism diagnoses and what that Black side of autism looks like, both within the Black community and outside of the Black community. Maria graduated from Florida State University with a Bachelor's of Science in Sociology and went on to obtain a Master's of Science in Mental Health Counseling from Nova Southeastern University. As a licensed mental health therapist, Maria primarily works with Black parents to provide support through education and advocacy training. Her passion for working in the field stems from her personal j...

00:00:00    Alyssa

You're listening to Voices of Your Village, and in this episode, I got to hang out with our very own Rachel Lounder to chat about transitioning from one to two kids. We chatted about our own personal journeys and different things we hear from the outside world about, oh, what second kids are supposed to be like and all that jazz. We talked about triggers, things that worked for us, things that didn't, and we had very different experiences. My second born has similar sensory systems to her first born, and then vice versa for her second born has similar sensory systems to my first born. And so we got to chat about what that looked like and how it showed up and how it ...

00:00:00    Alyssa

You're listening to Voices of Your Village, and today I get to hang out with Victoria Facelli, the author of Feed the Baby. And I want to let you know that we recorded this episode back when I was still pregnant. And so you'll hear some of that in this of like, what does it look like for me in this season? It's a pretty personal episode. Victoria took me on a ride and we got to chat about how to balance infant feeding with parental mental health. This is such a huge topic. I personally have been through this and just feel like every time friends of mine are having kids, those first few weeks and months are so wrapped up in feeding and there's such a focus on it a...

00:00:00    Alyssa

You're listening to Voices of Your Village, and I get to dive in with occupational therapist Kelly Mahler, all about really the key to, I would say, navigating life from a well -being standpoint. We get to chat about interoception. This is one of the sensory systems that I think is so often overlooked, and I think it's the cornerstone for mental wellness. It definitely is the cornerstone for accessing self -control. So often we want kids to control their words, control their actions, like, ask for things kindly, all that jazz, and the reality is they can't do that if they don't first have interoceptive awareness, if they aren't aware of what's happening inside their bo...

00:00:00    Alyssa

You're listening to Voices of Your Village, and we heard you loud and clear after our last digital media podcast interview that you wanted more. We are diving in with Ash Brandin. They do work around screen time. You might know them as The Gamer Educator over on Instagram. And today we get to chat about how to use screen time as a tool for regulation. I am stoked to share this and also know that for a lot of us, there's a lot of messaging around screen time as a dysregulating tool and that this is something that's only dysregulating for folks. We get to look at what's happening hormonally. How do we use screen time with intention? And Ash is someone that I have had ...

00:00:00    Alyssa

You're listening to Voices of Your Village. And today we get to dive into something that really hits home for me. We get to chat with Larissa Geleris about when your nervous system is overwhelmed by your child's sensory needs. Larissa is an occupational therapist and y 'all know how much I love an OT. It was really helpful because really right when Sage was pretty young, it became clear that he and I are a sensory mismatch. That what fuels me and is recharging for me is the opposite of what fuels him and is recharging for him and then vice versa. What fuels him and is recharging for him is the opposite for me. I, for instance, am a sound sensitive human. So like tappin...

00:00:00    Alyssa 

You're listening to Voices of Your Village, and today we get to chat about how to break these intergenerational cycles. I got to hang out with Dr. Mariel Buqué. She is a Columbia University trained psychologist and an intergenerational trauma expert and the author of her new book, Break the Cycle. It's out right now. And y 'all, we were chatting about this so so much in this interview, but I can't stress enough how key building awareness of our intergenerational patterns and triggers and trends is for us doing this work with tiny humans and knowing that this impact of us doing this work goes far beyond us. I chat with her too in this interview about the messiness of d...

00:00:00    Alyssa

You're listening to Voices of Your Village. This is episode 225. I got to hang out with one of my dear friends, Lori Goodrich. She is an occupational therapist and truly transformed how I live my life, how I show up as a parent, how I show up as a teacher. She was so influential in my journey and continues to be. We're going to dive in to the sensory systems, what they are. We hear that word sensory a lot, but what does that even mean? And spoiler alert, it's how we function in the world. It is the foundation for how we show up, for how we feel, for how we process emotions, for everything. This episode is pure gold, and I'm so excited to share it with you. Before we...