Pediatric Acupuncture: Solving Baby’s Colic, Constipation, and Feeding Struggles

Pediatric acupuncturist Kenna Bouvet, founder of Earth and Sky Massage and Acupuncture, joins us to explore what acupuncture and bodywork can look like for babies and kids, far beyond the stereotype of “needles in little bodies.” She shares how her own childhood digestive issues and dance injuries led her to acupuncture, and how that journey now informs her work with families navigating colic, feeding difficulties, constipation, respiratory issues, and chronic stress. Kenna also reflects on her time in the pediatric oncology and bone marrow transplant units at Columbia Medical Center, where she treated children and supported entire families through high‑stress hospital stays.

We dive into pediatric Tui Na (Chinese medical massage for kids) and Shonishin, a Japanese non‑needling technique that uses gentle stroking and tapping tools to support infants with feeding challenges, tension from birth, colic, latch issues, and digestive or respiratory concerns. Kenna explains why she rarely needles at a first visit, how she lets kids lead the session, and how she teaches parents simple, realistic touch‑based tools they can actually use at home. The conversation also highlights cultural traditions of baby massage and the shared language of Qi and prana, emphasizing touch, agency, and connection as central to healing in the perinatal and pediatric period.

Connect with Kenna: earthskylic.com

Teachers she mentioned:

Program manager of the Integrative Therapies Program at Columbia medical - Michelle Bombacie 

For NYC pediatric acupuncture training - JingShen Pediatrics with Moshe Heller and Stephen Cowan

UK pediatric acupuncture teacher - Rebecca Avern 

Shonishin - Thomas Wernicke 

Click here and use your exclusive 20% listener discount (Code: Fit20) to enroll in Master Your Pelvic Floor, our signature self-paced course that will change the way you understand and care for your body.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

I can needle babies. They're very receptive. Once you get to toddler age, you know, there's so much movement that I'm doing more body work and shone shin, which I'll explain in a second. And then I kind of get back to the needling later on. So with that said, the lead up is that you can't just, you know, do acupuncture with kids. You have to, you know, know pediatric tuena or know types of pediatric massage, shiatsu, cranial sacral. Hello everyone.

SPEAKER_00 0:29

I'm your host, Dr. Sneha Ghazi, a physical therapist, course creator, and mom. I own Sneha Physical Therapy, a private practice in New York City, and created the course Master Your Pelvic Floor to help you transform the way you think about and move your body. Use discount code FIT20 for special 20% discount exclusively for my listeners at the link in all show notes. Each episode brings phenomenal guests in the health and wellness space who share inspiring tips and tangible advice. All things health and wellness starts right here. Hello, everybody, and welcome to this week's episode on Fit as a Fiddle. Our guest today is Kenan Bouvet. She owns Earth and Sky Massage and Aupuncture in LIC Long Island City in New York. She is a licensed acupuncturist and she's a diplomat of acupuncture in New York State. And also she has a really interesting take that we've never talked about on the show, and it relates to pediatric acupuncture. I think this is a really interesting field, and she has a quite a bit of experience in it, especially because she worked as a clinician in the pediatric oncology department at Columbia Medical Center. And then she also very recently went and did a workshop in Oxford studying with pediatric specialists from Germany and the UK. So we have a lot of fun stuff to talk about. Kenna is a wonderful clinician, a friend of mine, a colleague of mine, and I love her energy and light, and I'm excited for all of you listeners to learn about her work and her. So welcome to the show today, Kenna.

SPEAKER_01 2:08

Thank you so much, and thank you so much for having me. It's such an honor to be here.

SPEAKER_00 2:12

Absolutely. So for the audience who may not know who you are and may not know about acupuncture, especially as it reads relates to pediatrics, could you tell us a little bit about yourself?

SPEAKER_01 2:24

Of course. So my name is Kenna Bouvet. I live in Long Island City and I also own Earth and Sky Massage and Acupuncture, which is in Long Island City. We're a team of about 15 massage and acupuncturists. Collectively, we specialize in body work for fertility, perinatal, pediatrics, which we'll get to. Many of us work with athletes, performers, creatives, and of course, we all work heavily with people in chronic pain and high stress. No real answers from conventional medicine. My wonderful mother sought out alternative things that could help me. And that's how we found acupuncture. And it sort of shaped my health journey from a really young age. And then through my dance career, kept kind of going back to acupuncture regularly, got me through injuries. It sort of was always this pillar in my life as something that got me back on track in health. And that's sort of what one day kind of opened up a door and something clicked, and I decided to shift careers and I haven't regretted a day. I absolutely love what I do and feel so grateful to get to go to work each day.

SPEAKER_00 3:58

That's awesome. I think the some of the most wonderful specialists in the world come from having some level of empathy and personal experience, even if it's not directly themselves or maybe a loved one or somebody in their life, you know, overcoming challenges. And I think that that just gives a great perspective and really helps you put yourself in the patient's shoes and helps you like under explain things honestly in a different way. Absolutely. That's amazing. Could you tell us a little bit about your role at Columbia Medical Center and what you did there in the oncology unit? Because that's really interesting and cool that you had that experience working there.

SPEAKER_01 4:40

Different. Yeah, I was lucky enough just to, you know, one of my teachers was the program manager of the Integrative Therapies department and sort of she was one of my favorite teachers. We stayed in touch. I was graduating and she was like, You like kids, like, you know, come come check this out. And um, it's it's a wonderful experience. It's a wonderful program. Um, so we're hired through um the Integrative Therapies program, which is run through philanthropy. So we go in and we work with any and anyone, doesn't matter what insurance they have, which really allowed the work to just focus on the work and nothing more. Um, I got to treat every age. Um, we specialized in the oncology hematology and bone marrow transplant division, but we often got called out to GI or cardiology, neurology. Um, a lot of the work was um, you know, a lot of body work, a lot of acupuncture, especially with the teenagers, and also a lot of work with the family. So we really saw it as not just treating the the child or the patient, but um always being there for the whole family. You know, sometimes uh the days every day looked very different. Um, sometimes we got sort of your quintessential nice 30-minute relaxing treatment with the children. Sometimes we were called for an emergency anxiety attack or nausea episode, and we kind of came in quickly, not knowing much, just knowing one symptom. And um, you know, maybe the treatment was five, 10 minutes of some acupressure, uh pediatric twaina, and some essential oil. What was that? Pediatric twaina, which we can talk about. Uh pediatric twaina is so twaina means um Chinese medical massage. Okay. And there is a specific line of twaina for kids called pediatric twaina, which really focuses on um the child age, because when children are born, right, they're they're born very not formed. Um, and so their acupuncture meridians are not formed, right? So their treatment and and ways we can affect their systems on the body is very different than adults. Um, you know, their meridians, I was taught their meridians aren't really formed till they're upright, standing and walking. And so before then, we're really looking at areas of the body that we can affect through massage. And tactile um, you know, body work on children is just so effective. They they change so quickly. Um uh there's so much qi just sort of running around. And um, it's also just such a great technique because it's just the hand. So in a hospital setting, you don't really need anything except clean hands. Um, and it's just very it can be very calming to the children. And it's also a modality that is very um, it's easy to be receptive to, right? So sometimes in hospitals there's a lot going on. There's a lot of this and proding and probing, and the kids are kind of just done. And so we provide this therapeutic touch to them that is gentle. They are the leaders of it. They can say no, they can say yes, and then we can also teach the caregivers, the parents. Um, pediatric traina is very um, what's the word? It's very easy to teach and it's very easy to grasp, and you don't have to be so specific, which really allows parents to be involved and and have them sort of feel like they have this modality to kind of provide some agency in their children's health. And then it also kind of provides that connection uh with the parent and the child. So pediatric is pediatric twain is fantastic. I use it all the time in my private practice, but I really got good at it in the hospital because it was a very easy modality to just utilize all the time. Um and yeah, so my work in the hospital was, you know, very uh it shaped a lot of how I work with kids because you never know what to expect. You have to have a toolbox of modalities, because some modalities won't work with one child, but it'll work great with another. Um, you you really learn how to be flexible, humble, um, and and sort of hold a grounding presence, um, but also allow craziness to happen around you and you're sort of, you know, there for the ride. Um, but yeah, it really, it really taught me how to work with kids and and to just not know what to expect, but be okay with that and just do the best you can.

SPEAKER_00 9:30

I love this show and doing these podcasts because I just like learn something new all the time. Pediatric Twain. I'm gonna look it up, reset it to you, and I'll send you some books. That's amazing. That's so cool. And I think I resonate a lot with the idea of bringing agency into the parents and the families to be able to do, you know, self-care and self-um, um just understanding the body and helping them connect with each other. Um, I do this with the parents as well. If the mom is um giving birth and then the father can help with perennial massage or just, you know, birth support. And then the same thing if they have the kid and you know, there's some torticalis and some neck uh soft tissue work, and I'll teach them like just one thing that they can do. And they just feel so good often about being able to make a change and see the change almost immediately and help to calm the child down because I mean, we can dive into just the importance of touch, but just that touch connection is more than just the physiology of mechanoreceptors or meridians, it's very emotional. And who has a better connection than a parent to a child in that situation? Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 10:43

So yeah, it's so empowering. And I think, you know, I always say to parents, like, I want to teach you because I actually I truly believe you're gonna be more effective than my touch. You know, I essentially am a stranger right now. Um, and so giving parents that power is is really that's like such a gift, if I could just do that. Um and yeah, and it's little things. It's like, you know, it can be things from soothing a child with anxiety in the moment, calming their nervous system to, you know, a child with chronic constipation and just giving some some massages they can do daily to, you know, work towards, you know, having a bowel movement every day or a child that has a lot of respiratory issues, you know, working on um areas of the body that we can kind of decongest with with body work and um yeah.

SPEAKER_00 11:32

That's amazing. Um, can we dive into a little bit about what you did recently um in at the workshop in Oxford? It's really cool. I think you you said it was very recent, is that right?

SPEAKER_01 11:44

Yeah, yeah. I went in March. Uh it was wonderful. Um, there is, you know, fantastic pediatric uh teachers in the US, not many. I think it's definitely like a specialized uh field. Um, and there's uh some amazing international um pediatric teachers. So I sort of had my eye on uh these people, and some of them are my mentors, so I got to to meet them finally in person. Um, but yeah, I mean a little bit about pediatric acupuncture generally, because I think the biggest question people are like, so what is it like with like, you know, needles in a in a little kid? And I'm like, well, pediatric acupuncture looks very different. And like I was saying, with kids and treating kids, you have to have a toolbox of modalities. So really needles like acupuncture needles aren't probably like big in the conversation, especially at first, especially when I'm first meeting uh children. Um, you know, they come into play when kids are a little older. You know, I often say I I I can needle babies, they're very receptive. Once you get to toddler age, you know, there's so much movement that I'm doing more body work and shone shin, which I'll which I'll explain in a second. Um uh and then I kind of get back to the needling later on. So with that said, uh the lead up is that you you can't just, you know, do acupuncture with kids. You have to, you know, know pediatric tuena or know types of pediatric massage, shiatsu, cranial sacral, um, which I also have studied. Um, and then what I was doing in Oxford was taking a shoneshin class. So shonishin is a very specialized uh bodywork for children, it's a Japanese non-needling technique. So it is with um different types of uh tools that are of metal, so silver, copper, and um you're holding the tool, there's different tools. You're holding the tool in a way so that it gently touches the skin. Um, and there's different techniques, like in any uh modality, that you can do to stimulate the skin and the body in different ways. Um, so it's a lot of what we call stroking and tapping of the skin with these very fine specialized tools. Um and there's I mean, maybe someone listening would disagree, but I don't think there's a lot of education around Shoneshin. You have to really seek it out. Um, so that's what I mean when I said like I've been eyeing these classes because I think Shonishin is very effective. It's very um direct with what we're treating in a child. And, you know, similarly to pediatric tuna, it's but in a different kind of way. It's very um uh relaxing of the nervous system and can really uh affect the different levels of the nervous system in the skin. And um it really targets um things that I'm working with in terms of uh babies. It's very it's very effective for babies with um any type of feeding issue, tension from birth, alcoholic, latch issues, and then digestive issues, respiratory issues, you know, as they get older. But to me, it's been a very effective modality to use, um, especially with the infants I'm getting in the clinic.

SPEAKER_00 15:25

I would love to see that.

SPEAKER_01 15:27

I want to see that I take a video. I need to make a video.

SPEAKER_00 15:31

So cool. Okay, yeah. So the thing that comes to mind now for me, because so I obviously my parents are from India and we I'm from a Hindu culture. Um, and I don't know about anything about anything, so I'm kind of like speaking out of thin air right now. But there's you know a ton. There's something that my parents have said, my grandparents have said, and people in my culture about like certain babies wearing certain um, or even just people in general, like it doesn't matter, like across a lifespan, but getting them uh very specific metals or stones for jewelry to support their specific horoscope astrology sign thingies, um, and help them with whatever problems they have. Like if there's somebody who's coming in with heart condition, digestive condition, or like a per certain temperament, like very shy or very angry or very something, and then helping them to like balance. It's like we call it prana in um yeah, in the Indian culture, and I guess that's not the right term anymore, but that's how I call it the Indian culture and the Hindu culture. We call it prana, but um, it's like qi in the in Chinese medicine. It's the same concept of like life force or energy force, and then it's to like create the harmony that's required for that specific person. So you use very specific things, but it's not for massage or tapping, it's you wear it and you just wear it, yeah. Put it on your body and you like keep it on your body to like regulate your system. Isn't that really cool that we have like some Yeah?

SPEAKER_01 17:00

This is what I love about culturally talking because I I do think like, yeah, like I'll have um parents come in and be like, oh yeah, my mom comes over and like takes the baby and just massages her for 30 minutes. And it's like they're like culturally, that's just what we do. And I was like, I'm always like, great, like keep doing that. Like, I think that there's these great traditions that have a real purpose, like they do, they are effective. And then especially if it's within their culture, it's just so ingrained in in them and the intention is so clear. I think uh I just love hearing about all of them. And I think, like you said, they all have like a through line. Like that they'll be like, Oh yeah, the grandma always massages this area. And I'm like, Yeah, like that makes sense because she's like having trouble pooping or like, you know, something. And yeah, um, maybe without knowing it though, these like wise aunties and grandmas are are doing it.

SPEAKER_00 17:51

Um you know what's interesting is like somebody who's listening, which is totally fair and fine, might think, like, oh wow, this is all just like fake science, and like what is happening here? Um, and like maybe it is like who really knows like what's true and what's not true. And someone listening is like, well, it's true if there's a systematic review with a bunch of randomized control trials, and it's like, okay, you can't like, for example, like get the horoscope of like a thousand people and then from birth fit them with a particular stone and measure outcomes of digestion or whatever. Like, you can't that might be hard. Yeah, and also like the people who came up with these things were not monetizing on it in that way, like you know what I mean? It was like just these wise old sages that were just like do this. They weren't like, oh, you have to pay me like a million dollars to do this. It wasn't like monetized like that, it was just part of the system and the culture, right? Um, so I'm just always curious to like think about this and um just open mind to concept.

SPEAKER_01 18:48

I mean, it's hard and like research is hard in this area, especially with kids. I think there are some good research studies out there um showing, you know, oxytocin levels when you do, you know, baby massage. Um, there's some great German studies with hand massage and oral stimulation, right? Because we know neurologically there's a lot of similarity with um hand and mouth development. Um and then yeah, I think you just gotta search for it, but there is some good, some some good research uh out there.

SPEAKER_00 19:22

I love that. Okay, so can we? I know you said that we we don't really like necessarily put needles into small toddlers, but what is your process of getting families and parents and even like the children that maybe are a little bit older into this work and helping them like stick with it? What is what is your patient education around this?

SPEAKER_01 19:44

Yeah, that's huge. And I think patient education sometimes is my biggest focus because you never know what you can do in a in a treatment room. You know, I treat a fair amount of um children coming in with ADHD or autism, and um, you know, they're sometimes just kind of running around the treatment room and I'm chatting with parents. And maybe I get my hands on the child at some point and we do a little where I am at can show the parent, but you know, for the most part, it's education. And this kind of goes back to Chinese medicine as a whole and really looking at different pillars of our health, right? So we're looking at bodywork, um, acupuncture and body work, but we're also looking at supplements or herbs, we're looking at diet, lifestyle, um, not so much exercise, I would say, for kids as we look at for adults. But so chatting with the parents about, you know, taking their health concern and their goal and really looking at sort of every, you know, I want to see everything the parent can tell me and show me, blood work, tests. Um, anytime they've seen other doctors and had diagnoses, we take that all into account. And then, you know, I can kind of give suggestions on these other pillars that I mentioned. Um, and I think that that's so important because children can shift quickly, but um therefore the rhythm of every day has to support that shift. So um if I can get the parents on board maybe with a bit of a different diet or maybe a supplementation treatment protocol at some point, or you know, shifting a routine with sleep or something like this, you know, I can see the shift um happen quicker than if they were just coming to me, you know, once a week or bi-weekly, um, but really doing nothing at home. Right. So I try to kind of tell, educate, share with the parents that um the the goal is going to be reached uh better if we can all get on board and and make changes in the different areas. It's not gonna just be the treatment in the treatment room. And most parents get that. I think it's hard hard. Different ways. And I think this is where being a mother has really helped me. I worked with kids before I was a mother, and I feel like I gave a long homework list of things they should do at home. And then I became a mom and I was like, oh my gosh, like I didn't do any of that. That is so hard. So I think that's really actually educated me on really seeing the family and the parents and what's what they're capable of. And um I think the greatest thing I've learned in the last couple of years is really seeing what they can manage and just giving them the one or two things so that they can also feel successful in that. Instead of giving them this long list of things they should do, which sure would be great. But like let's be real, no one's gonna, no one's gonna attain that. So and that's just sets sets up for disappointment. Um yeah. Oh wow. And then in terms of like getting kids on board with acupuncture, um I think that that too has has ebbed and flowed throughout the years. I think when I first started, I was like, oh, like every kid needs acupuncture. It's so powerful. And you know, I've really let that go. And I really like the I say from the beginning, the kids run the show. They have agency. And I really try to chat uh with you know, initial clients. I really try to chat with parents through email or phone ahead of time. I like to really keep the treatment room focused on the child, especially when they're older. I don't want to be talking about um them in front of them. I want to be talking to them. And um, I usually never needle first treatment. Maybe I talk about it, I offer to show them, but I never make it a must because it doesn't have to be. I've seen over the years that these other modalities are, you know, as effective in different ways. And then, you know, some kids really take to it and it's like awesome. We use pediatric needle, you know, smaller needles. The needling time is much shorter for kids. I'm with them the whole time. I would say like some kids, 10, 11, 12, 13, like absolutely love it. They're like little pros. And some will just never be into it, and that is totally okay.

SPEAKER_00 24:14

We glossed over a term you used before and said we're gonna come back to it. I don't remember what it was. Please. Oh, did I? It was in relation to like the shiatsu and like the instrument. Or what did we already talk about? Well, shoneshin. Was it Shon? I don't know, I don't know. Yeah, I think so.

SPEAKER_01 24:33

I think so. I touched a little on cranial sacral, but I feel like most people Yeah, people know Davis is my head.

SPEAKER_00 24:42

I'll I'll think. We both have mom brain right now. So anybody who's listening who's like, look happening. Both of our kids had tragedies and we've both been in the ER this week. So yeah, we are a lot, a lot of people can relate, a lot of moms can relate. Yes, exactly. Okay, let's um I want to talk specifically about the feeding issues, the colic, um, the constipation for like smaller, smaller babies. Um could we just touch on for because I feel like that's a big point for yeah, new parents, especially um because they're trying to navigate like the like firstly this whole birth process and everything's going on, and they're just trying to feed the baby, and the mom's trying to recover, the birthing parent is trying to recover. There's so much going on, and then we have like a crying baby who's not feeding and is colicky and is like not pooping, and it's like that trifecta. Um my personal experience, I have seen that it creates the higher highest amount of tension and worry and chaos in a family. Um, what are some things that you would give um as you know, pieces of advice or things that within your scope of practice that you offer very specifically? And what are some tangible things that people can take away who are stuck in that little zone?

SPEAKER_01 25:58

Well, I'll start by saying, you know, I think the reasons for this list that you listed, right? So colic, feeding issues, constipation, there can be many different reasons. And I feel like oftentimes I get referred babies um that like other things have been sort of um, you know, diagnosed out, right? So we know like maybe there's not a tongue tie or they've gotten it looked at or released or whatever, or you know, there's no like diagnosis something wrong with the intestines or something like that. They've gotten tests or um, and oftentimes I get referred babies that are just tense with feeding, and there's no real clear answer to, you know, pediatricians or lactation consultants. Um, and so they get sent to me to kind of look at, and that's where I kind of really feel like I sit in that area, right? Like we can do a lot of work pre-post um uh tongue tie release. Um, but oftentimes too, we're just getting babies that have this like colic, kind of cranky, crying, tension, maybe um digestive upset, gassy, that kind of realm. And I think um, you know, the treatment that I really focus on is this idea that during, you know, in utero or during birth, there was some sort of compression in the subocipital area, right? So we're thinking back of the neck, you know, occiput, the first two, you know, cervical vertebrae, right? And yeah, in this area, you know, these subocipitals have a lot of nerve uh stuff going on. And also in this area, we had a lot of the cranial nerves coming out that, you know, go to the tongue, the vagus nerve that innervates, you know, the organs. Um, so a lot of these things that tie into uh feeding or the movement of the tongue, the ability to latch, um, the ability to digest properly, um, and then just all these like proprioceptive things that are going on, right? So the the baby's ability to feel its body and what it's doing. Um, and so sometimes in birth, this congestion or stagnation, pressure, compression, you know, there's lots of terms we can we can think of, but to kind of give visuals to different people, this this area is denser, compressed for a certain in a certain way due to birth. Um, and it creates like this inability of flow of these these nerves and and whatnot, ability for the baby to turn the head properly, right? And so what we do is we really work to ease and release that area through different um uh targeted, you know, stroking, tapping techniques and shownation. There's some twain moves we can do, and then craniosacral is very effective for this as well. Um, that's what I do sort of in clinic, and there's a lot more to it, but that's you know, Sparknote version. And then in terms of like education with parents, again, that's huge. I mean, my teachers in Germany are like in every hospital, there is like hours of like baby handling before you leave the hospital, right? Like there's just so much education around how to handle and carry your baby. And I think here we don't have as much of that unless you seek it out. And so in my, you know, I I know a little little bit, I I want to know more, but I do try to give some ways of holding and caring and helping to maneuver the baby that um my goal is always to provide the best kind of situation for the baby to help themselves release the tension, right? It it's sort of this idea that if we give babies the proper environment, they can work out a lot of their tension. But if we're constantly putting them in, you know, contractions or swings or car seats, which I know we have to to travel and do things, but if we're constantly doing that, then they don't have that ability to work out the kinks, you can say, right? Um, so a lot of my education is just around like, yeah, movement and or or you know, laying them on a floor with the quilts and playing with them on either side if we're seeing a neck preference or different ways we can hold them and try to gently stretch their necks if we're seeing, you know, the the neck preference, you know, lasting beyond when it should sort of be finishing up, right? Um and then, you know, I I work closely with referrals with lactation consultants who I just absolutely love and I feel like they handle a lot of the feeding positions and that kind of stuff. And I feel like I can just, you know, make sure they they know that information and and encourage them to keep doing, you know, whatever they were taught in that realm. Um and then again, it goes back to just teaching them some massages they can do at home that help, you know, if it's gas that's you know, showing up uh for their baby. That was a bit of a ramble, but hopefully I answered.

SPEAKER_00 31:16

I think that answered a like a lot. And it's just so parallel with what we do in pediatric physical therapy too. Yeah, I'm sure. Yeah, I like want to know. Well, one thing that I always tell parents that are the especially the moms that are coming in for just birth prep, like say there's like absolutely nothing wrong with them, and they're just or or they're maybe there's like something unrelated to like postpartum, they're just coming in for like a little leaking or like some little back pain that's like not very alarming. I will always tell them postpartum baby handling, no matter what. I'm like, we need a session to talk about baby tasks and postpartum recovery. Like, I don't care that that's not what you're coming in for, but if you don't learn that, I would be doing such a disservice to you. Yeah. And I'm like telling them specifically, like if I assess a scoliosis, like if I assess them and I find that there's um, you know, there's some certain things going on with their neck, their thoracic spine, their lumbar spine, or their pelvis or their sacrum, I would I will teach them specific ways to hold the baby so that it doesn't perpetuate the negative compensations that are happening and actually help make them practice. I'm like, if you don't practice before the baby comes, everybody slip into the ways like I am literally a living example. Like I remember when you said it was so hard to do like the 15 things that you taught everyone, and then you became a mom and you're like, what the heck? I can't do all of those things. I think the biggest lesson I learned is like you have to practice it beforehand. And if you don't practice it beforehand, you will keep wanting to just do things on automatic. Um, and then the one other thing that I also learned, which I'll I'll tell everyone, is um I used to tell parents all the time, you know, one hour-ish of like over time, you have to build about an hour of cumulative tummy time. Here are all the modifications, but it doesn't have to be totally flat. I'll like give them all these ways to do it and I'll explain to them in all of my wisdom that I didn't have, even if the baby has a little discomfort, you have to keep going. Yeah, there's a there's like a red light, green light, yellow light situation. Like if they're just approaching yellow, it doesn't mean alarms firing. And I used to say all these things, right? And then Gia was born, and I told my husband, like, I explained everything to him about the tummy ahead of time. So then she starts going, and I'm like, no, we're done, we're done, we're done, we're off. Yeah. And my husband kissed me. He's like, What are you doing? You told me that you're supposed to leave her if she's like not actually crying and she's just like making sounds. And I'm like, no, she's no, she's in really bad shape. We have to stop now. She's my baby.

SPEAKER_01 33:53

Yeah. Tummy time, though, I mean, and we didn't even touch on that, but that is a huge thing. And that's probably one of my biggest things. I am pretty, pretty like highlight, highlight. I usually tell parents I'm gonna be a broken record with talking to you about tummy time, but like the benefits of tummy time are so beyond what many people think. Um, but especially with babies that have, you know, you know, digestive issues, we're we're getting pressure on that digestive system, respiratory issues, we're getting growth and length out of that lung. You know, those babies where you see have no neck, it's like really cute in the beginning, but then at a certain point you're like, there's still no neck, you know, that diaphragm like hasn't shifted, the shoulders haven't come down. And usually it's like either they haven't been doing proper tummy time-ish or the baby hasn't gotten it or just not enough. Or um, but with that said, I mean, you were saying it, like you give so many options of tummy time. I think that's also key is like you don't just plop the baby there and like hope for the best. Like, there's a lot of ways you can teach like how to get into tummy time, alternatives to start with, you know, how to how to kind of help them get into proper positioning without forcing. And um, yeah, I I definitely try to spend a portion of treatments like either teaching, talking about tummy time, or just having the baby get in there and kind of help and show and treat, you know, that's how I treat their backs. And um yeah, I am a broken record with tummy time, but definitely struggled with my kids too, you know.

SPEAKER_00 35:26

How it is. It's hard. And I I just like acknowledge that it's difficult, but like you have to keep doing it. And that's the part that I told them. I was like, it's hard, I know, and then keep going.

SPEAKER_01 35:36

And well, it's helpful that you told them, like, I I struggle, you know, I think it's helpful that you can say, like, yeah, it wasn't like a piece of cake with our our children as well.

SPEAKER_00 35:46

At all. And like I have a lot more empathy for just like it's okay if you really, truly, truly feel like at day four or five postpartum, you still are not up for certain things to do. Or day one or two. There's like literally no timeline. Like, I give you a recommendation of what it could look like with certain situations. And if it's a couple of days, or I would hopefully not, it's a couple of weeks and months out off. But if it's a couple of days here and there off, like you are okay. Like absolutely nothing will happen if day two postpartum you're not like doing diaphragmatic breathing. Yeah, like actually nothing is going to happen to you. Yeah, yeah. Just relax. Yeah, doesn't have to be a whole thing. Just go to sleep. Yeah, it doesn't have to be a thing. Um, yeah, but yeah, no, it's just it's uh, I'm sure you feel this way too, but like everything you said is still true, and then everything you feel is just with so much more love and caring and knowing how important it is, right? It's like yeah, it is like nothing goes away, it's all so true and it's so hard. So that can't like take that away from from the parents' journey. Exactly. Oh, Kenna, this is so amazing. Do you have anything else to add to us? Any other cool terms in Chinese medicine? No, I'm just kidding. But like really any vocab.

SPEAKER_01 37:10

Yeah, anything. No, I think you know, it I I maybe it's come across, but I I really I feel so like excited talking about this topic. And um, it's just a huge passion of mine. And I think it like like kind of coming back to what you were just saying, like everyone gets to the gets to the point at some point, but it's different for everyone. So the postpartum journey looks so different for everyone, and that really ringed a bell with treating children. I think that why I love working with kids, but then also working with kids in this uh career, right? Like doing acupuncture and body work with them is I can really look at who they are as people and I can really like what I work on the most as a practitioner and clinician is really just seeing the heart of the kid and and meeting them where they're at. And you know, that's why every treatment looks so different, even if I'm treating constipation five times in a row. It's like five different beings and souls, and yeah, um, without getting too woo-woo, it it really is true though, because they're they they come in so different presenting so differently. And I think that when you're working with kids, you do have this um, you do have this sort of job to really just make them the best little people they can be. And um some of my teachers here in America are just so brilliant at talking about like bringing out their superhero power and really looking at, you know, what element these kids are, what type of people and personalities they are, and you know, really accentuating the good and kind of evening out the things that get a little off. And this really, really goes into like emotions and you know, when we see kids with a lot of anxieties or or, you know, um system, you know, digestive or respiratory eczema, these things that happen because of a emotional tie, emotional reason. Um, but yeah, just really, just really looking at the kids and helping them just be the best little people. And I think that that's truly at the heart of why I love working with kids, because I feel like you you you kind of give them this gift of like being one with themselves for the rest of their lives. Like that's what I feel like I was given having this work as a kid. Like it's not that my health is always perfect, but I feel like I can um seek out what I need and trust my body and listen to it and know like that doesn't feel right. Like I need this or that, and um just like teaching kids to understand themselves and their bodies a little bit more. I don't know if that makes sense, but no, it absolutely does.

SPEAKER_00 39:48

I I resonate with that a lot. I think it's something that we really are kind of, I feel like moving towards as millennial parents who are parenting small children, is being in touch with yourself and your thoughts and your emotions and coming forward in this world with better energy. And that comes from better health overall, like not just yeah, like the health of your tissues physiologically, but the whole being. And I think that this holistic approach that you're talking about, which is all like Chinese medicine, eastern medicine, acupuncture, it's all really thinking about the person as a whole. It's not like targeted tissue. That's it, and we're done with it. It's much deeper than that. And yeah, um, and it comes from philosophies that are ancient and that have been around for like thousands of years. And I think that speaks volumes to the number of souls that it's actually touched. And so I don't think we really need any systematic review to vouch for that piece. And I don't think we ever can possibly figure that out and share it with the world in that capacity. So um, I think that's the importance of speaking about it in this way also and explaining it to people because it is very ethereal and woo-woo, if you will. And but it's not at the same time, you know. Yeah, you see the change, you do it every day, you know that, you know, certain things work for certain people, certain things don't work for other people. Like that go, that's also true. But the work in and of itself is comes from, I think, a practitioner fully understanding, and then how like the energetics of how you convey that to the human that you're working with as well. And yeah, that's really important. And that piece is research now in the way of just uh patient-client interaction and though in that language, they talk about it like that, but essentially it's energy as what flowing between two human beings.

SPEAKER_01 41:45

I mean, I I think that like I can't hide like with adults, you can kind of hide if you're having a bad day. With kids, like they just like can sense your energies off. And I, you know, you it's made me have to really leave my my stuff at the door when I treat kids because they'll feel it and it'll just go downward. Um, so they're smart, smart little humans.

SPEAKER_00 42:07

Amazing. Kenna, where can people find you and your practice if they're interested in working with you guys?

SPEAKER_01 42:12

Yeah, so we're in Long Island City, it's about five minutes from Grand Central Manhattan. Um, and uh I work at Earth and Sky Massage and Acupuncture. And we have our website, earthskylic.com. Our booking site is on there. Um, my email is also on there. I I love to, you know, if you have questions ahead of time, especially with, you know, if it's your child, I think it's good to check in and make sure that um, you know, you're bringing your kid in for these reasons and make sure that what I can do is is gonna be a good relationship. So definitely check in. Don't don't be afraid to email.

SPEAKER_00 42:51

And I'll drop all of that in the show notes for everyone so they can check it out as well.

SPEAKER_01 42:55

Thank you again for having me and letting me talk about this topic.

SPEAKER_00 43:00

Thank you for all your wisdom and sharing this with our audience. Thank you all for tuning in and investing in yourself and your well-being. If you listened to the show today and gained anything out of it, share it far and wide. It means a world when you rate and review the show. Don't forget to use your exclusive 20% discount code FIT20 when you sign up for our signature course Master Your Public Floor, linked in the show notes. See you again next week with an exciting new guest and topic.