Darya Rose, Ph.D. | Nutrition: How to Develop Healthy Habits for Yourself and Your Family
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Like many people, Darya Rose started doing restrictive diets from a very young age with no results. Are you in the same place right now? Dial in and find out how to lose weight in a way that supports your well-being, and get tips on developing healthy eating habits in your children.
Key Takeaways From This Episode
The keys to having a healthy diet
Does ''intuitive eating'' actually work?
How to approach cravings in a healthy way
How long it takes to develop a habit
Strategies to getting your kids interested in healthy food
Tips to navigate the struggles of being a working mom
Disclaimer: All of the information and views shared on the Live Greatly podcast are purely the opinions of the authors, and they are not medical advice or treatment recommendations. The contents of this podcast are intended for informational and educational purposes only. Always seek the guidance of your physician or qualified health professional for any recommendations specific to you or for any questions regarding your specific health, your sleep patterns, changes to diet and exercise, or any medical conditions.
Resources Mentioned In This Episode
About Darya Rose, Ph.D.
Darya Rose, Ph.D., is the author of Foodist: Using Real Food and Real Science to Lose Weight Without Dieting, creator of the award-winning blog Summer Tomato, and host of The Darya Rose Show.
She received her doctorate in neuroscience from UCSF, and has a bachelor's degree in Molecular and Cell Biology from UC Berkeley. Darya’s unique, brain-based approach to food, health and weight loss teaches not just what healthy eating looks like, but how to actually change your behaviors so you can stop wishing for and actually make meaningful progress toward healthier living.
Connect with Darya
Website: www.daryaroseshow.com
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Episode Transcript
Darya (Teaser)
You can't just make a decision and all of a sudden you eat all these vegetables and your body doesn't want sugar anymore, that takes time and a lot of people don't know how to cook. So you have to slowly figure out how to make foods that are healthy taste good so that you actually want to eat them. And you don't think it's a chore.
Kristel (Guest Introduction)
Does the word diet make you cringe? I'm so excited to be chatting with Darya Rose today. Who's the author of Foodist using real food and real science to lose weight without dieting. Darya received her doctorate in neuroscience. She's also the host of the Darya Rose show. We're going to be talking about how to create healthy habits, also how to deal with cravings and how to not diet and really have a healthy relationship with food.
I'm so excited to share this with you. So let's go ahead, jump right into it and welcome Darya Rose to the show.
Darya:
It's wonderful to be here. Thank you so much.
Kristel:
My pleasure. So I'm hoping we can start by you just sharing a little bit about yourself, what you're excited about, anything that you're currently working on.
Darya:
Oh yeah. So myself, big question. Yeah. I mean, I've been, I'm old. So, uh, well, my background is Neuroscience. Let's say I have a PhD from UC San Francisco in neuroscience. I did my thesis on adult neural stem cell developments. And, but the sort of side story is that while I was becoming a scientist and learning about protein kinase is and all the big words from science, I was also, so I had grown up in Southern California in the eighties and nineties and had been dieting since I was 11 years old, which is absolutely absurd.
And that's, I was not overweight. There was nothing wrong with me. The problem was the culture and because my mom was doing it and, but it created this like lifetime of struggle with food and my body and exercise, like it was just, I mean, anybody who's been through this and I was like, what a disaster that is and how much stress and pain it can cause.
And eventually like 15 year after 15 years of dieting, I just got so fed up with it. I decided to spend my nights and weekends researching how to fix this problem.
And actually with the actual primary research, you know, cause before that had just been following trendy diets, like I didn't really know the difference between. What was healthy or what wasn't, who I didn't care. I just wanted something that would work and solve this problem. And I discovered in that process that I was doing everything exactly wrong.
That dieting makes you more likely to gain weight over the long run than lose weight. And that the people who don't struggle with this, they never diet, what they do is they just have a bunch of habits that make them slightly healthier than other people. So they tend to cook more. For instance, like ate a lot of vegetables.
They tend to be naturally active throughout their day, instead of like doing crazy workout programs and I mean, obviously there are fit people who do crazy workout programs, but like, but like, I, you know, I wasn't like, I'm not a professional athlete. I was just trying to like, not be struggling all the time.
And so I just took this, I just like put down the protein bars and I was like, okay, I'm going to eat oatmeal. And, uh, and it, unlike I felt like I just had nothing else to lose at that point. And to my Astounding shock. I didn't start massively gaining weight because I started eating carbs and three meals a day.
I actually stayed the same for a while and then slowly started to lose weight very slowly, super slowly. Uh, it took several years, but eventually I got almost seven pounds or something below my goal weight, without even trying eating more than I'd ever eaten. And most importantly eating foods that were actually good, like delicious that I loved.
And I became obsessed with the farmer's market. I started cooking for myself. I got really into food. I started following celebrity chefs and going to fancy restaurants. You know, as a grad student, I had zero money, but like, I would like save all month to go to one restaurant a month. I had one friend that would go with me and, and that turned out that turned into, uh, a whole philosophy that I felt like I had to tell people.
And so I launched a blog called Summer tomato and started telling this story and it really resonated with people really quickly and quickly became a really popular blog. And so when I ended up finishing my PhD. I, instead of going straight into a postdoc, I decided to write a book and then I read a book and did that for a while and kept blogging.
And then a few years ago, my husband and I decided to start a family. And so I took a little break and then six months after having my first kid, I got pregnant again. And that was a lot. So I just, I want not one of those people who loves being pregnant, it's hard on me and not like hard, hard.
But like hard enough that I didn't want to look, be blogging a lot. I did a little bit, I did a little bit with me. I had a podcast too called Foodist and I did a little bit with that at the time, but then I had another baby and then I had two babies and then it was a pandemic. So, uh, I was just sort of re-emerging now.
And I actually relaunched a new show called the Darya Rose show, which I've branched out a little bit. So it's not just personal health anymore. I talk more about it because that was one of the things I really got into with Summer tomato is helping people change their habits. Because one of the things that I learned is guess bad information is a big problem with people getting healthy, but any of their even bigger problem is that once people know the information, they have a lot of trouble implementing it.
So I was really getting into helping people change behaviors, and it's something I got really good at. And so that was sort of my focus for a while, but now I'm sort of using that whole framework to tackle sort of bigger problems, like, you know, misinformation in the news and vaccine hesitancy and things like that.
So that's really fun. It's, I've had like an amazing response from my audience. Who's been really cool about sticking with me and following what I'm doing and it's been fun, but it's also challenging doing it with two toddlers.
Kristel:
Yeah. Wow. Well, you've had an incredible journey and I'm so excited to like dig into all those little details that you just shared.
And one of the things that stood out that you said early on was that you started dieting at 11, right? Was it 11? And I have a memory of this was a high school, so it was probably a freshman or sophomore. And I have a memory of going out to lunch with a friend that I just met. And we were at like a local country club and I didn't really go to country clubs before that.
And she ordered a salad and was like, no croutons. It's just like I'm on, I'm on the Atkins diet. And I remember at that point, like, what's the Atkins diet? Why do you care about carbs? That I was so clueless. And then I look as, as I went about my life and there were so many differing views and opinions.
So much information out there about what to do, what not to do. And for me, I was in functional medicine for quite a while. And there were certain opinions about what you should do, what you shouldn't do. And then integrative medicine. It was more my style as far as more plant-based eating. And I love what you just said that now, you’re exploring, you're eating foods that taste really good.
And I'm curious, do you consider this like intuitive eating or how are, how do you describe what you're doing right now? Because that you just described sounds kind of like what I'm trying to encompass, like listening to my body. I'm not eliminating anything specifically, but eating more what feels good? What I respond well to, so I'd love to hear a little bit more about that.
Darya:
Yeah. So I don't use the term intuitive eating. Part of the reason. I mean, I don't, I don't know a ton about it, but part of the reason I don't is because I think a lot of people's intuitions are really wrong early on.
And in the reason is because it takes months, maybe year or more to. For your body to really understand what it means to eat nourishing food. And it's hard to just kind of like, you know, like a lot of people aren't naturally inclined to have a salad, so yeah. So, so I would say what I do is I make an effort to find things that I really, really truly love eating.
And whether that is, uh, something that is considered healthy vegetables, seasonal foods, um, I mean, it doesn't have to be vegetables. It can be delicious grains, like delicious high quality meat or desserts, you know, if I'm going to bother eating something that's got sugar in it and well, I'm so I'm at a point now where, I mean sugar, like, like has a massive impact on me.
Like I'm like, I get, you know, I have to be careful because of my body's not used to it anymore. So if I'm going to have something that's indulgent, heavier, richer, sweeter, I'm very picky about what it is. Cause I don't, I'm at the point where I loved the healthy food so much, I'm not going to bother with a crappy dessert.
Like, if I'm going to eat a dessert, it's going to be amazing and, you know, I'll pay more, more money for it. I'll do it on a special occasion. Like I do it less often than I would like, you know, when I was dieting, I would like always have the Ben and Jerry's in the freezer, like just in case, you know? And, and I would just sort of eat that whenever.
And it was, I mean, yes, it was enjoyable in the sense that it was a relief from the willpower I'd been using for several days to not eat it. Yeah. I mean, it wasn't like the best thing in the world or like something I felt that was really special. And I actually, I was like standing in the kitchen by the freeway.
Like, yeah, that's not that's I would never do anything like that anymore. And so, but if it doesn't come that all doesn't come at one, you can't just make a decision. And all of a sudden you eat all these vegetables and your body doesn't want sugar anymore, that takes time and lot of people don't know how to cook.
So you have to slowly figure out how to make foods that are healthy, tastes good, so that you actually want to eat them. And you don't think it's a chore. And that whole process is, is takes time and self-reflection and effort. And it's a process. And I think this is the biggest message is that. You kind of just have to start one habit at a time and not pretend that you can overhaul everything in one day and then just eat whatever you want. Cause that's just not how it is.
Kristel:
Right. And I, what you're saying really resonates too, because I'm thinking about like the gut microbiome, if people have cravings and that takes time to change. So it does make sense that if you're trying to intuitively eat, but your gut microbiome and your cravings are saying, you really want those cookies.
That's maybe not the right best for your overall well being, versus if you're in a place where you're starting to gradually incorporate more, you know, healthier foods, then you might be in a better place to listen to your body to know what you know, you really need.
I’m curious what your thoughts are on cravings and how can people approach them in a way to actually support well-being and optimal health.
Darya:
Yeah, it's interesting. So I was going to back up for one second, about what you were saying, like, I think about it, like, I always think in terms of the behavior, like, I don't think in terms of what you want necessarily, or like a goal in terms of like losing weight or like, if you want to make change in your life, you have to start to start one behavior at a time.
And where your feelings come in is just sort of asking yourself what you actually enjoy eating and starting open-minded and saying to yourself, like, I need to eat healthy foods, I need that's like, I need to figure that out.
So the question then becomes, well, what do I have to do to make vegetables appealing enough to me to get me to the place where I'm that person who eats vegetables all the time.
So maybe that means being really picky about. I know for me, I won't move to a city where I can't get good quality produce. I like, I lived in New York for a while and I was like, bye, sorry, sorry guys. I can't eat your food. Like the restaurants are great, but like the grocery stores aren't great. So that was really hard for me.
So, you know, maybe being very thoughtful about where you live. Maybe it's being, uh, spending the extra time on a weekend to go to the farmer's market. Maybe it's spending more money to go to a better restaurant or something like that. Um, in terms of cravings. So it's tricky. Cravings, I feel like they're coming from somewhere deeper.
Like your body doesn't need 10 Oreos. Yeah, something in you need ten Oreos, but it's not your body. So, so you sort of need to figure out what's going on and why that's coming up for you. And maybe you're not eating enough. Maybe you're specifically not eating enough carbs, maybe you're, you know, maybe so maybe you need to eat more rice or something.
So that cause 70 calories of rice is a much better choice than 400 calories of Oreos. And even though it's a carp and so it's really important to. So I think, figure out where those cravings are coming from and then address the real problem. I'm working out too hard, too much can be a big source of cravings for people.
And then there's emotional eating. You know, a lot of people have triggers around certain foods or have a habit of sort of self soothing with sugar or rich foods. And that, you know, you need a therapist and it's, you know, it's like, there's, it's tricky, but there's also things there is data on cravings and they are temporary.
Um, so, you know, there is something to be said about. Sort of sitting with that discomfort and being okay with it. So there's some work you can do. There's something called surfing the urge for anybody who's read about the craving scientific literature that, you know, it starts with like smokers and stuff, but, you know, people can sit with it and just sort of feel it and your instinct is to fight, right. And to make it stop, make this discomfort stop.
But there's a, it's a powerful skill kind of like Buddhist monk would have to be able to sit through discomfort and just be, and just deal with it. And you don't have to like it and then realizing that like, that's okay, you don't have to like every second of your life, but it'll end you know, and that's something that you can work on.
But I think probably also there's something deeper going on. Also, also will need to be addressed eventually if cravings are coming up often.
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Kristel:
So segueing a little bit into habits. I know you are, I'm sure you have a lot of information on this topic. Now, I've read different data on habits and there is different opinions and different studies that show it takes X number of days to form a habit. And then there's a large range. Well, it could be this month.
It could be 66 days. It couldn't be more, it could be less. What are your thoughts on it? What have you seen as far as research and your own personal views about creating a habit. How long does it take and where should people start healthy habits?
Darya:
Yeah, it really depends on the habit. I think that's why the data is all over the place.
Some were super easy, like a super easy one for me, for example, was just starting eating oatmeal for breakfast. I used to not eat breakfast. I started eating a meal for breakfast. It literally takes two minutes to cook seven minutes to eat. It wasn't a huge difficulty. And then I realized I really enjoyed it.
I realized that it made me less hungry. I will way like massively cut down my sugar cravings, just like one little thing of oatmeal in the morning. It's crazy because I was starving myself of carbs and I'm, I'm really physically active. So my body was like, you know, by the end of the day it was like ice cream.
Or, or I would like eat like half a bag of trail mix or something ridiculous. But once I started eating breakfast and then it, then I had this, like not only was it like nice to have breakfast and like have something tasty in the morning. But I had like really obvious results that turned out well. So that habit was a no brainer.
Learning to cook is a habit that's composed or like cooking regularly is a habit that's composed of, I don't know, like 12 different skills. Right. And if you didn't learn that growing up from someone, you know, they don't teach you in school or anything, if no one ever taught you that can feel super daunting.
And then I've talked to so many people about this. There's so many problems that come up, so people will buy food and they don't really know what to do with it. So, they don't cook and froze in their fridge, and then they feel bad for like wasting food or they'll find some complicated recipe that sounds good.
But they're stuck with eight more carrots in their fridge and a half onion. And maybe the food didn't even turn out that well, because they're actually not really a good cook. And even though they followed the recipe, maybe it didn't, wasn't seasoned quite properly. And so they have bad experiences and then they stop.
So. But, you know, if you're not systematic about going through and learning that maybe taking a class or something of that nature at that habit's going to take a lot longer because it’s more complicated.
Kristel:
Right. And I would love to talk a little bit too about kids. I know both of us are moms and I don't know if you're there yet with your kids, but I sometimes struggle with getting my kids to eat things that are considered healthy.
I mean, they're overall pretty good. Cause we eat really healthy. So what I make, like they have to try it, but I know a lot of people out there. Really struggled with this, you know, their kids only want to eat chicken nuggets and pizza and French fries, and I would love any thoughts or insights you have into helping your kids create these healthy habits and make eating these things fun.
For me, I'm always like, let's make a fun smoothie and little flax and they're like, what is that? I'm like, don't worry about it.
Darya:
Um, yeah, it's interesting. So I used to not have kids. And I used to just cite research and the research says that, yeah, it takes like 20 bites for a kid to integrate 10 to 20 bites for kids to sort of integrate a new flavor.
That's still true. But now that I have kids, my experience is a little bit more nuanced. And then again, like I don't have older kids that were available. They don't really have the option of challenging me. I mean, they'll say something that is not their favorite, but for the most, what I've had to do, and this is almost embarrassing.
I realized that like, so we with Steph and kids, I are so close together. I have a nanny that was helping and I just realized that my nanny is like, not a chef and she couldn't make food taste as good as I can because I know what tastes good. And I like, I know that you need to heat the pan up before you put oil in it.
You can't just put cold food in a cold pan and expect it to turn out good. And you know, the salty, like there needs to be more seasoning than just salt and garlic on every single thing you make. And so I have basically taken over. So my main job, besides podcasting as I'm the personal chef with my kids, because we don't eat, they're still too young to eat with us.
Like they eat at five o'clock and it's just not, my husband's not done with work yet. So I cook for them and I just, like, I talked to them a lot and I just make things, first of all, we don't have any, we don't have chicken nuggets or French fries or. And like they don't my kids, like I've only seen those things in books, so they know that's not an option that they can eat.
And when they, both of them, when they turn two had got more picky. So I had a whole year where my oldest Zelda would, she didn't like carrot. She didn't, she didn't like to eat anything orange. She would eat broccoli and kale, but that’s it. She loved cauliflower. So I could always get her to eat cauliflower, but yeah, she, we had a rough, you know, that picky two-year-old thing that happens in my, my younger is just now starting to do that where she was, they were both amazing eaters until they turned two, but I'm just writing it out.
You know, I keep, you know, maybe I'll take a break from something they don't like for a couple months and then I'll cook it in a new way and give it to them again. And now she's eating the oldest Zelda. She's eating everything again. Pretty much she loves carrots. I had to learn to cook them a slightly different way, but here's the tip.
Cook your carrots roasted them whole at 500 degrees, little oil, a little salt, little cumin. And they like to add, like, I was shocked cause usually we cut everything up, but they like to eat them really long, but they're so if you cook them at 500, they get like candy. They like, they're really soft and caramelized and they love them.
They'll eat a whole bunch in one sitting like literally they'll eat 10 carrots. So, you know, I just keep playing around with making things taste more yummy, but anything in a tortilla, if I call it. Okay.
Kristel:
So a lot of it is like how you spin it.
Darya:
Yeah. I mean, I just assume, I always remember like probably this, I always assume they're going to like it.
I'm like, I think it's delicious and they'll eat calamari. They'll eat, put weird things on my, one of them thinks that kale and lentils are her favorite food. The other one, her favorite food is onions.
Kristel:
Okay. So that's incredible. Yeah. You know, my kids will eat things like we love kohlrabi, so that's like a tree we'll slice kohlrabi, put a little salt on it.
Yeah, get them interested in things in a lot of that, what I found is when we go shopping together for it. So if I take them with, to the farmer's market, especially, and we're like, Ooh, let's pick it out. And I'll specifically be like, can you pick that out for me? Because then they feel like they're involved and then they get a little bit more excited about it.
But it, it definitely has like gone. There've been times where it's been harder and then it gets a little easier. And I definitely understand the struggle with getting your kids to eat healthy things. You know, it's, it's kind of just, I think the persistence, like don't give up, if you're listening, don't give up, keep trying.
Darya:
And, you know when I didn't have a kid and people would always give you advice of like, get the kids involved.
But when you have two year olds, like getting them involved is like a 45 minute situation. So I get that parents don't necessarily have the time to like sit and watch the kid cut strawberries for 45 minutes, but there's definitely other weird things they can do like I've, you know, help them like just, can you fill up the water cup? So we measure it for this? Or can you put this amount of salt in the thing? And yeah, they love stuff like that.
And having a garden is really nice too. I mean, we have, I'm not agreeing with them. I'm trying to learn. I'm like taking a gardening class, but so I have my first garden that I've done completely myself, but like just having them have the experience of pulling a carrot out of the ground. You know, I don't really make, grow enough to eat. We have a tiny little thing, but they get so excited and then now we have to go cook it and they are excited about that carrot. So yeah, anything like that is always makes it more fun for them.
Kristel:
For sure. So I would love to just chat a little bit about being a working mom, because you took some time off. Um, I took actually six years off when I had my kids and then I went back and it was a big, a big adjustment for me when I went back and really in the beginning, struggled with wanting to still do everything that I was doing as a mom with my career.
Like, I didn't want to give up the grocery list and the shopping and I did, I had problems delegating. I've gotten much better. And now I work for myself, work from home, but wondering how you're navigating and any insights or tips that you have, um, to help other women out there as they're going through their own personal struggles.
Darya:
Yeah, totally. I totally sympathize with that. You said like I'm not, I don't let anybody else do the grocery shopping and never gets done. Right. So, but what I will do is for the basic stuff, I'll like order like from whole foods on the Amazon app or whatever, to just, you know, at least that stuff's in the house and I can go to the specialty market myself, and that's only one trip instead of two.
I have on my calendar, like a window of time. That is when I go grocery shopping and nobody's allowed to book me anything during that time. I don't schedule podcasts or meetings. Like that's when I go grocery shopping, otherwise this whole house is going to starve and similarly I blocked off an entire day, just like one whole day that I don't do anything but work except work.
I do work out, but I just get work done. So, and that has for me has been completely game-changing like I kept thinking I was going to like launch my show, launch my show. And I just couldn't pull it together because it's not like every single day was packed with mom's stuff, but enough of every day was packed that there wasn't ever a chunk of time where I felt like I could like get in the zone and get my thoughts together and get stuff done.
So I never made any progress. And so I think just being really militant about protecting your schedule and putting the things that you absolutely need to do on the calendar and saying, this is sacred, make sure that somebody is in charge of making sure these other things are handled at this time so that I can do these things.
And obviously, sometimes it still explodes, but at this point, like 95% of the time I'm on track and it has been such a game changer. I just, I honestly can't believe it. Cause it's, like I said, I didn't. No more time came out of the blue. I just manage it better.
Kristel:
That's awesome. Right. It's like time-blocking and really making that time to get your workout.
And it sounds like that's important to you and then to have the time for creativity, which I totally agree for me if I don't have a chunk of time, I can't get into that flow state. I get distracted with like there's too much going on.
Darya:
So I think it's done. Like if I only have an hour, it's like, I sit down and I do emails and they have 30 minutes left and maybe I'll like do research one article and then it's over.
It's like, nothing happens.
Kristel:
Where did the time go?
Darya:
But if I have four hours, then I can really like sketch out a whole episode that I'm going to do and send a bunch of emails, asking people if they can be guests and it's, it's a lot more, a lot more.
Kristel:
Yeah. Awesome. So at this point, we're coming towards the end. I would love for you to share any more insights you'd like to about your show.
I'm going to put an episode. I'm going to put a link in the episode details, and then we're going to do a few closing questions for the wellness lightning round. So anything else you want to share before we jump into those questions?
Darya:
I think one of the things that we've been struggling with a lot is the pandemic.
Obviously I don't take my kids to the grocery store because I'm still scared to take them to the grocery store. They're not vaccinated. And also there's been super isolated and you know, they're just starting to do camp with masks on and they won't talk to other kids. Like it's just really hard. So I just, parents give yourself some grace and some slack in this time because it's like harder than ever.
And similarly, so if one of your issues is that other people in your life won't get vaccinated. I actually have two really great episodes on vaccines that I've recently published. One is specifically about COVID vaccines. And I, I like, I took questions from my audience for weeks about what their concerns were about the COVID vaccines and got an expert on and we, I asked everything.
And so that's a really good episode. And I also have one that just came out about just regular childhood vaccinations and adult vaccinations. And I know a lot of people have a lot of concerns about those. Those are two really great resources. If you're concerned about vaccination or if anybody in your life you're trying to encourage them.
I think I try to be really, really open-minded and ask the questions that I was hearing from nervous parents, about how to handle vaccines and immunization.
Kristel:
Well, those are incredibly important topics. So definitely resources that are incredibly valuable and there will be a link in episode details. If you guys want to check that out and then are you ready for the wellness lightning round questions?
All right. So first thing that comes to your mind, first question is, what’s a book that you've read recently or listened to recently that you would recommend.
Darya:
Oh my gosh. So I just read, I've read so many books. Gosh, I just, sorry. I just read Dume and it's so good. And there's a movie coming out. I'm a big scifi fan.
I also just read the entire like eight book expanse series.
Kristel:
Awesome. Perfect. That's fantastic. Okay. Second question. What is something that you do for your self-care that is a non-negotiable that you have to get in every day or every week, if it's not an everyday.
Darya:
It's my fitness. It's my workouts. You know, actually it's something really specific and weird is I'm obsessed, obsessed with the supernatural workout on the Oculus.
Kristel:
Whew. Interesting.
Darya:
You guys, this is the best thing that's ever happened to me because I normally don't like hit workouts. Like they're hard and miserable and I don't want to just pedal it until I'm miserable. It's so hard and so fun. And the music is fantastic and the scenery is beautiful and you should follow me and I'll follow you back. I'm Darya Rose on supernatural.
It's awesome. I worked out on the moon this morning. I'm like, how cool is that. It’s so fun.
Kristel:
And the music makes all the difference too. There's good music.
Darya:
That's what makes it fun.
Kristel:
Yeah, exactly. For sure. Okay. Last question. So knowing what you know now, what advice would you give to yourself from 10 years ago?
Darya:
I would say absolutely if your husband wants to have kids earlier, stick to your guns and say no, until you're ready, which is what I did, but it was a hard decision. Like in retrospect, I'm so glad that I made us spend time together as a couple. So we got married, but met 10 years ago exactly. We got married three years later and he wanted to have kids right away.
And I was like, I was in school till I was 30. Like I need to travel, I need to do something fun. And we did that. And I'm so, cause now. Well, we didn't know there was going to be a pandemic. And now we have these kids in this really hard to travel with them. It's like not as fun to travel with toddlers.
It's a different experience but it can be fun, but it's not the same. So yeah. Do your life, if you want kids like do it when you're ready to be a mom intensely.
Kristel:
Yeah. For sure. This has been amazing. I was so excited to chat. I learned a ton myself and definitely going to implement some of these things as I go forward.
So thank you so much for taking the time to share all of this incredible wisdom today. It was a blast.
Darya:
My absolute pleasure. Thank you so much.