Better Health Through Honest Dialogue
Lawrence Palevsky, MD explains how holistic doctors may identify and adjust the behaviors that may warn of imbalances in children’s lives, as an alternative to prescribing drugs.
Holistic Anarchy presents the views of Annemarie Colbin, Ph.D and Lawrence B. Palevsky, MD. (Please click on the page tabs above for more information about us and the Holistic Anarchy mission.)
Holistic Anarchy is an educational resource; it is not to be construed as giving individual medical advice. Each person must take responsibility for his or her own health, and consult with his or her own trusted health care practitioner to make health care decisions. Thanks for visiting!
Hi Dr. Palevsky! I have sent this website to every parent in my contact list! They all need to hear your blog about medicating children. So good to see and hear you again!
Hi Louise,
Good to hear from you. Thanks for watching and sending the link along to other parents. Watch for other videos on vaccine ingredients, genetically modified foods and much more. All the best to you. Keep up the good work.
Dr. Palevsky,
I work in an natural grocery store, and not only are parents medicating their children too much, but I have noticed that many parents seem to be really into “supplementing” their young children too much, just this past month three new mothers came into the store looking for natural “infant” supplements for their perfectly healthy, breast feed (mothers healthy as well) infant at the direction from their pediatrician? I was very surprised by this.
I find this a bit unsettling because when I talk to these parents, they all pretty much say the same thing that their childrend won’t eat “good food” just junk, so they want to supplement them with X-tra vitamins to stay healthy.
I will share this web with my friends as well, … thanks for your advise, love to listen to you!
denise
I hear that children, esp. babies, may be able to get all the nutrients they need from food, incl. mother’s milk, but isn’t Vitamin D an exception? Or is that just a lot of hype? If the mother is deficient in Vitamin D, the baby isn’t getting any either, and this can result in calamitous health problems, as far as I know.
A big thank you to Denise and Betty for your recent messages.
Denise,
I couldn’t agree with you more. I share your experience where perfectly healthy infants and children are loaded up with ‘natural supplements’ due to the belief that we’re not getting enough. Children have to process the natural supplements when they’re ingested. And that takes energy, which sometimes drains them or stresses their digestive systems, diverting energy away from digesting the foods that they are eating. I try to use ‘natural supplements’ for medical treatment and subscribe to the idea that “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” If children won’t eat “good food,” and only eat junk, it’s not because they’re going to the store to buy it themselves. I’d like to see parents hold the fort, set up some boundaries, and not compromise their children’s health by submitting to the children’s wants and desires. Parents are in charge, and are never not in charge. Supplements are just that: Supplements! They do not provide children with anything close to what their bodies require as is derived directly from the whole foods from nature….Thanks for writing!
Betty,
You raise a good point. The best source of vitamin D is the sun. No food comes close to it. There are several problems with our association with the sun. One, we use sunscreen to block the necessary vitamin D that we are exposed to that helps us manufacture the active vitamin D in our bodies. Two, we don’t get outside enough to get sufficient sun exposure. Three, people with darker skin who live in more northern climates tend to need more sun exposure to manufacture sufficient vitamin D. Four, the stress of our daily Western lives depletes us of our vitamin D stores. Five, unhealthy diets further deplete vitamin D stores. Breast milk was designed to offer infants all they need. If it’s deficient in vitamin D, it’s not because there’s something wrong with the milk. It’s because of some, or all of the points I mentioned above. Just supplementing with vitamin D is pretty short-sighted, being that multiple deficiencies are likely to show themselves if the above issues are present. My advice to moms…..get outside in direct and indirect sun. Let the babies receive some early morning/late afternoon direct and indirect sun during warmer months without sunscreen. Stop using conventional sunscreens as much as possible. (I like http://www.uvnaturalusa.com for its minimal toxcity - they have a baby line). Reduce stress as much as possible, and eat a well-balanced, colorful, whole foods diet. At that point, there’s no reason to believe that moms breast milks are deficient. Thanks for writing.
I thank you, doc, for your unbelievably thorough reply. I did not give my son Vitamin D supplement when he was a baby 18 years ago and I was feeling guilty. We both were in the sun a lot. He is small-boned, but I guess that’s neither her nor there. My understanding is that it is not the density of the bone that really matters, but their flexibility, i.e., a willow branch VS a (dense) hardwood tree branch. To take this a bit farther, older women who broke a limb or a hip were found to have dense bones quite a bit of the time. Turns everything on its head, doesn’t it. Hope your health column here will increase. You are knowledgable and helpful.