132 | Safeguarding YOUR KIDS from School Sickness!

Welcome back to another episode of the Real Health Podcast. For the next couple weeks, we're gonna spend some time and talk through how to bulletproof your immune system. Really, today's gonna be your child's immune system for the season ahead. We can look to today for the future here in just a matter of few weeks. Bugs are gonna be everywhere, and kids are now kinda getting back into the herd, and so it's gonna be spreading like wildfire.

So what are you doing about it? Right? Are you waiting til your child's sick to do something bad, or are you bulletproofing their immune system today? We can create a nice, healthy, robust, adaptive immune system today to help them really reduce those significant illnesses, right? Because for the most part, children are going to adapt pretty well.

They're going to get exposed to a viral load or something. They're going to adapt well and overcome it pretty quickly. But some kids, I mean, it just hits the lungs hard, and they're in respiratory distress, and they're needing breathing treatments, how do we avoid that potentially? How do we avoid the chronic usage of antibiotics that alone can hinder the immune system long term and create autoimmunity the more we use? And so what do we do today, right?

So, as always, the goal, the aim, the vision of the Real Health Care podcast is to provide as much value as condensed period of time to help you in your health journey, not just for you, but for your entire family. So without further ado, let's dive in. Let's talk through it. How do we bulletproof your child's immune system for the season ahead? The first thing we're gonna talk about is very important, and that is as simple as it can be, start under chiropractic care.

If you haven't had your child checked, their nervous system checked, the nervous system is the master regulator of the entire body, and there's plenty of clinical data that shows that a child who's being adjusted has a stronger immune system. They're more resilient. They're better adaptive. And so when a child is regularly being adjusted, it's not for putting bones back into alignment and helping with their pain. Kids are young.

They usually don't have pain. It's all about helping their nervous systems adapt to stress better, and so that if they do get sick, they're gonna overcome it quicker. And then there's some really cool studies that show that as children are being adjusted, even in that illness. So, and if your kids are sick, we don't want you to stay away from the office. We want you to bring them into the office, but as they're getting adjusted, it actually helps open their drainage pathways, can help with ear swelling or tympanic membrane swelling, ear infection prevention.

So, making sure you're getting your children adjusted, checked on a regular basis in these next few months is so, so important for their overall health. That's number one. Number two, reduce sugar intake. Sugar is an immediate immune suppressor, and so, you know, when kids are coming back together and there's snacks and treat time and, you know, all of this, hey, if you get a certain score, you get a candy or something. It's crazy.

Mean, candy's like at church, it's like, you answered the right Bible question. Here's a piece of candy. Avoid it. Avoid this unnecessary sugar. One, it's not great for their brain.

It creates an excitable brain. Too much excitement to the brain or too much stimulation can result in symptoms like ADHD. But two, it actually, sugar directly hinders immune function. It actually suppresses the immune system for about twenty four hours when you consume sugar. So we wanna avoid sugar, and if we're gonna avoid sugar, then what do we replace it with?

Well, you know, natural sweeteners are great like honey. Honey is a fantastic natural sweetener. Actually helps build immune system health. It's great for sore throats. It's great for sweeteners to add to food that makes it feel sweeter, taste sweeter, but obviously isn't going to create the detrimental effects to their immune system.

So, we use a lot of honey in the family. We use coconut sugar when we cook, and we just try to avoid sugar at all costs. Especially, just think about it, when kids are sick, when they're presenting with an illness and their body immune system's fighting it, that's the worst time to give sugar. So don't give them a bunch of sugary popsicles that's good for the throat. Try to give them nourishing foods like broths.

Those are gonna help build their immune system the best. What about vitamin C? You know, C is one of those that is so simple, but yet so effective at helping strengthen an immune system. Typically, five hundred milligrams of vitamin C every day is just great for kids. Usually, they make chewable tablets that are easy to absorb, easy to obviously, for kids, it's very palatable, but I would say daily vitamin C is an absolute thumbs up.

Another vitamin that's great for kids is vitamin D. You're gonna accomplish this one of two ways. One, when you think about kids going into a classroom setting, well, they're not gonna be exposed to sunlight. Their vitamin D levels are gonna drop. So we wanna make sure we're giving them adequate vitamin D support.

So whether that's like as soon as they get home, they're going outside, they're getting to the sun, and they're getting absorption of sun for vitamin D level increases, or we supplement with vitamin D. Depending on the age, you can supplement anywhere between five hundred IUs to a couple thousand IUs, but make sure you work with your provider to look at their vitamin D levels and supplement accordingly. Nutritionally, you can obviously make sure that you're supporting vitamin D levels with healthy cholesterol. If your kids aren't eating grass fed beef and eggs, they don't have the cholesterol backbone to even build vitamin D, you gotta make sure, you have to make sure that they're eating healthy fats. Again, not just for neurological health, brain health, but also for vitamin D production.

Sunlight and healthy fats, specifically cholesterol, will usually accomplish that. Make sure that your kids, so this would be point number four, make sure your kids are eating protein. Protein to start their day. Protein and healthy fats to start their day. Amino acids are fantastic and so vital for antibody production.

So, you know, the robustness to the immune system is contingent upon the protein they're consuming. Make sure your kids every morning are getting, you know, maybe it's turkey bacon or turkey sausage or a couple eggs, some nuts like macadamia nuts or almonds or cashews. We're giving them quality protein and quality fats to start their day. One of the other things that we really like to use in our house are, you know, proteins and fats that are like fermented. So, like fermented dairy, kefir for instance.

It's like a yogurt, but it's a kind of a living dairy product that's full of probiotics and prebiotics. And what's great about a quality dairy product like kefir, specifically grass fed A2 kefir, is that it will help the gut, the digestive system, is most of the immune system. So, make sure we're consuming with kids fermented foods. So, whether it's fermented dairy, or even like a little sauerkraut, or kimchi, or whatever, or even a little kombucha, making sure that they're consuming fermented foods is also going to help build up their immune system. You know, there's a study done by Harvard School of Public Health, they showed that kids, through the Journal of Clinical Nutrition, that kids that consume the highest amount of vegetables and fruits reduce infection rates by twenty five to thirty percent.

Fruits and veggies are packed full of polyphenols and antioxidants and nutrients that kids need to build a healthy immune system. So, just not even supplementing, but incorporating a kind of a whole food style plan into their diet is so important for reducing infectious loads in kids. Physical activity, let's talk through that. Kind of point number four here. That at least sixty minutes of physical movement a day is the goal here.

Okay, so how much do the kids move? Make sure they're running, playing with a ball, outside, at least sixty minutes a day. Moderate exercise in kids, is about sixty minutes a day, significantly enhances immune function, and so specifically what it does is it improves immune surveillance. So your immune system's ability to survey, hey, what's right, what's not right, viral is loads? Okay, if there is, if they're gonna get on it pretty quick.

So let's try to aim for sixty minutes of physical exercise, quote unquote, or just being outside playing, sixty minutes every single day. Hey, let's reduce screen time. Usually, the kids are gonna be under fluorescent lights in school, right, which severely oppressive to their nervous system, and then, you know, maybe they get out of school. Maybe during school, they're on iPads and screen time and learning. I know my kids, and that's just kinda how life is now at school.

Right? Like, my son got a a MacBook in in high school. That's what he uses for a lot of his education. So what do we do? We use blue light glasses at night when he's studying.

We gotta make sure that he's getting time off of that iPad or MacBook, and because the more screen time, the more stressed their nervous system, the more stressed their nervous system, the weaker their immune system. So let's make sure that we're monitoring screen time in this season where it can just get so quickly away from us, and we yeah, all of a sudden, on their screens three hours a day. It's crazy. So make sure they're getting outside again. They're getting off their screens, and when it's appropriate, so during nighttime, you don't wanna use blue light blocking glasses all day.

Blue light's not bad. It's bad at night. It dysregulates their circadian rhythm. So make sure we're actually putting some filters on their screens to limit blue light exposure at night. Okay.

Next point in reference now, sleep. You gotta have a healthy sleep cycle. Making sure that kids go to sleep at the same time and wake up at the same time is so crucial to helping build a healthy circadian rhythm. This is so important. So what I would suggest is if the kids are like 10 years and under, that they're getting about ten hours of sleep.

If they're 11 to like 18, they're getting at least nine hours of sleep. That's minimum. That's minimum. Okay? And so what this ensures is that they're getting into deep, restful sleep to allow their immune system, nervous system to function at its finest.

Okay? So sleep rhythms are so important, and going to bed at the same time and waking up at the same time establishes what we call just healthy sleep architecture, making sure they're getting adequate deep sleep and REM sleep for their body to function and heal and thrive for the next day. Let's talk about the studies here. So when you look at kids who get at least nine to twelve hours of sleep, okay, they have more T cell function or better T cell function or activation and less inflammation, we call it cytokines, but less cytokine inflammation production. Some bedtime sleep habits.

Make sure they're off screens an hour before bed. Sleep in a colder room environment to enhance deep sleep, and make sure that even if your kids are having a hard time to, you know, going to sleep, they're kind of stirred up, that, you know, even kids, keep an eye, are they consuming any caffeine? So does that 12, 13, 14, 15 year old, if they're consuming caffeine past 2PM, it could be disrupting their sleep cycle. You know, caffeine has a half life about eight hours, so we need to be cutting out all caffeine at least 2:00 is the kind of the cutoff time.

If they're consuming caffeine past 2, it's absolutely disrupting their sleep cycle. Supplementation. I'm a leave you with this last piece. Some of the things that we do every single day with our kids is we give them this product that contains elderberry, it contains beta glucans, which are mushroom extracts, and astragalus, okay? We call it Immuno Berry in the office.

It's a product that we carry, but it's a great daily herbal tonic that they can consume, even my kindergarten consumes it, to help their immune system stay strong. So we're getting them adjusted. They're taking vitamin C. They're taking Immuno Berry. They're getting good sleep.

They're removing sugar. They're increasing healthy fats, and they're getting outside and reducing screen time. When we incorporate those strategies, they're really gonna function and thrive at its finest. You know, the next episode we're gonna talk about, hey, if your kid is sick, what do we do about it? Today, it's all about prevention.

So, when looking ahead, if you're thinking about helping your child's immune system thrive now, or in the future, we gotta do something about it today. Today's the day that we start building a robust immune system. Get your child adjusted. Sugar off their diet. Increase healthy fats and protein.

When we talk about screen time, limit screen time. Get them outside. Add in some healthy supplementation like vitamin C and immunoberry that contain healthy beta glucans, and it's a boost to their immune system. Get them vitamin D exposure. Get them into the sun.

Wear them out, get them some physical exercise, and their immune system's gonna thrive because of it. Next time we talk, it'll be how do we now handle a child that is sick? What do we do from nebulizing to using silver to garlic to ole of oregano? We're gonna talk all about herbs. Which ones do we use?

Which ones are okay? What do we do if we just use the antibiotic? How do we repair their immune system? We're going to talk about that all on the next episode of the Real Health Podcast. Thanks for tuning in today to today's episode.

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