Episode 54: A Crohn’s disease diagnosis leads to huge life shifts, with Kayla Mangione of the Family Food Project
Episode Description
This week’s guest Kayla Mangione has walked quite a road to arrive where she is today as a LMFT and Art therapist as well as the founder of the Family Food Project on Instagram. She admits that she was forced to learn to cook and to cook healthfully, after a Crohn’s Disease diagnosis 13 years ago, which resulted in major surgery. Because Kayla admits she is stubborn and didn’t want to accept being on pharmaceuticals for the rest of her life, she decided to completely change her diet, which included removing gluten completely. Now she has kept this autoimmune disease at bay, through diet and health alone and has become quite passionate about family health and wellness and empowering other mamas to be versed in it as well.
With two daughters of her own, under five years old, believes the most important thing we can teach our kids about nutrition is listening to whispers from our bodies and how food actually affects us. Now she and her oldest share a dialogue about food that is so special to her.
Her Instagram food journal is where she shares plant-focused meal ideas, parenting tips for selective eaters, and how to create healthy food relationships for kids. Her account is real and authentic and you can feel her passion for it radiating through her images and beautifully written posts.
If you check her out you’ll see her cooking with her kids, letting them cut their own food, and not hiding any foods from them or creating shame around food. I love her idea of putting an alternative plate on the side of the table for eaters that are questioning certain kinds of foods! I also love how she includes fruits and veggies together as snacks. She even gets her daughters to eat radishes and roasted cabbage!
Kayla’s mission is to empower others to cook at home and take control of their family’s health and wellness and she has certainly brought that to fruition! She believes being a Soul Mamma means allowing us to hone in on what truly matters most in our lives and she has some amazing tips to share with us today!
Take-Aways:
(10:55)
Why reframing her mindset to practice non-resistance when her body and life changed postpartum helped her two fold.
(12:48)If you are passionate about something, it is worth the sacrifices you have to make to get there.
(19:19)
Maria is fired up about taking risks especially because it helps one realize what is and isn’t serving them in their life.
(21:56)
We had to really think about what kind of lifestyle do we want and what are we willing to sacrifice in order to make this happen.
(23:19)
Discussing the role intuition plays in finding our purpose as moms. After having her second baby, Maria realized she had to listen to that inner voice that was telling her to SLOW DOWN.
(24:50)
How sometimes we expect ourselves to be the “same” as we used to be pre-baby, when really we are forever changed (for the better!)
(31:09)
The importance of joining mom groups and reaching out to connect with other mamas.
(40:00)
Why sometimes we have to just learn to “put on the brakes” and stop before we burn out.
Memorable Quotes:
“I guess I’m just really aware of the fact that like everyone was kind of wanting to put me in a box and I just don’t want to be in a box.”
“Don’t worry about having all the boxes checked before you do the thing that you want to do. Just start doing it and it might turn into something else.”
“Just take a small step to try to get to know your body a little bit better because I think that so many people ignore symptoms for so long and that’s how people end up with such severe outcomes.”
“That’s the case with almost everything in parenting. . . letting kids be involved, giving them some responsibility, they love that and it becomes more of like a team effort rather than like being on opposing teams.”
“I think it’s really important for kids to find what they’re passionate about and try on many different hats throughout their life. And I hope they learn from me that it’s okay to try new things and fail and pick themselves up and keep going and reinvent themselves if they need to.”