Today we’re talking about one of my favorite topics: poop. And we’re finding out that the most important time to pay attention to our poop and what it can tell us about the microbiome is in the earliest months of life. I recently did a really interesting webinar on this topic. It's such a critical aspect of creating lifelong health that I wanted to share it on the podcast, to make sure anyone who missed it had a chance to listen. With the huge rise in inflammatory diseases from obesity and diabetes to autoimmunity and so many more, it’s imperative we look at the gut to optimize whole body health – this is a fundamental piece of Functional Medicine that I’ve been using with my patients for decades.

To dig into the specifics of how we can start kids off with the best health possible, I sat down with Dr. Tracy Shafizadeh. She is leading the work in understanding the infant microbiome, as a nutritional scientist who helps new and expectant moms learn about creating healthy gut bugs in their babies. Dr. Tracy translates her extensive scientific knowledge of breastmilk and the gut microbiome into practical terms to help parents understand how a balanced gut from infancy leads to a healthy immune system and metabolism for life. Dr. Shafizadeh received her PhD in nutritional biology from the University of California, Davis, and spends her free time "loving the guts" out of her two boys.

This episode is brought to you by BiOptimizers, Primal Kitchen, and Beekeeper’s Naturals.