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    Let Them Eat Dirt: Saving Your Child from an Oversanitized World
    Let Them Eat Dirt: Saving Your Child from an Oversanitized World
    Let Them Eat Dirt: Saving Your Child from an Oversanitized World
    Audiobook9 hours

    Let Them Eat Dirt: Saving Your Child from an Oversanitized World

    Written by B. Brett Finlay, OC, PhD and Marie-Claire Arrieta, PhD

    Narrated by Chris Sorensen

    4.5/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    In the two-hundred years since we discovered that microbes cause infectious diseases, we've battled to keep them at bay. But a recent explosion of scientific knowledge has led to undeniable evidence that early exposure to these organisms is beneficial to our children's well-being. Our current emphasis on hyper-cleanliness is taking a toll on our children's lifelong health.

    This engaging and important book explains how the millions of microbes that live in our bodies influence childhood development; why an imbalance in those microbes can lead to obesity, diabetes, asthma, autism, and reactions to vaccines, among other chronic conditions; and how-from conception on-parents can positively impact their own behaviors and those of their children. It describes how natural childbirth, breastfeeding, and solid foods influence children's microbiota and offers practical advice on whether to sterilize food implements for babies, the use of antibiotics, and why having pets is a good idea.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHighbridge Company
    Release dateSep 20, 2016
    ISBN9781681684307
    Let Them Eat Dirt: Saving Your Child from an Oversanitized World

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    Reviews for Let Them Eat Dirt

    4.5/5

    38 ratings11 reviews

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    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 4/5
      A fascinating overview of what we know about gut microbes and what they do for us. Learn how your children are affected by their developing microbe communities and how you can best nurture its development for lifelong health. The science is just getting started and it's nice to know that exciting discoveries are on the horizon.
    • 5/5
      Let Them Eat Dirt was an informative, and not overly scientific book (easy to read!) that helps explain that our world does not need to be totally free of microbes...that indeed, the immune system won't develop properly if it is never challenged. We don't need all the antimicrobial soaps and products that are on the market! And antibiotic overuse is causing problems, too. The book really covered a wide range of topics that discuss how our body needs microbes to function properly, especially the gut....and the ailments caused when things are out of balance, and what throws the balance off. Topics also include asthma and allergies, autism, vaccines, diabetes, and more. I especially liked how they tied in the importance of a healthy diet - rich in fruits, vegetables and meat, and low in sugars and processed foods -in keeping the balance in the microbes in our body. Overall a book with a wide variety of topics all related to microbes in our world, and that not all of them are bad! The fact that it talks so much about childbirth, infants & children's exposure to microbes and how a certain amount of that is actually healthy, makes it a great book for new parents who may tend to overprotect their young to the point of making them unhealthy!
    • 5/5
      B. Brett Finlay and Marie-Claire Arrieta, present a very cogent, scientific and clinical treatise on the role and importance of a healthy microbial world in and on us and our children to maintain and promote health. Wow.. What the heck does that mean... Let them eat dirt.!! Finlay and Arrieta tell us the why and how that microbes are important to our everyday life. They explain how these microbes in our guts and our skin interact with our immune systems, our bodily functions, our brains and behaviors and our resistance to dangerous microbes. This book is focused chiefly on childhood, a critical time for the establishment of health microbial colonization of our bodies. The lessons are, however for all of us reguardless of age. I too learned much from their work, one gift this pair of authors has is the ability to make the complex simple to understand. If my 8 year old patient understands then his parents will as well - thus patient compliance and better clinical outcomes. After reading this book I found myself wanting to read more - What are the interactions of the microflora with biochemistry of the ageing. Are there links between dementias and cardiovascular disease and microbiota? How can we eat better to maximize health gut flora? Can we slow ageing or reduce the incidence of disease of old age through modifying our microflora? The authors give us simple do and don't advice, debunk myths and "old Wives tales" with referenced scientific data. No this is not a scientific review article, but is a great read for the layman. When's the next book coming out??
    • 3/5
      Not a bad book for the casual reader, but I found it to be soft science, with not enough citations. The chapter on newborn intro to biota was most interesting.
    • 4/5
      I requested this book through Librarything's Early Reviewers program, expecting it to confirm much of what I already knew and believed, as a "crunchy" mom. I wasn't disappointed. The over-use of antibiotics in this world scares me. The microbes in our guts are linked to many aspects of our health, including obesity, allergies and autism. Antibiotics, while extremely helpful for infections, also essentially "carpetbomb" one's microbiota. Because they're over-used, many bacteria have become antibiotic-resistant. Vaginal birth and breastfeeding are ideal to cultivate and maintain a strong and healthy microbiome in children (check and check!). I particularly appreciated the chapter on vaccines. As a parent just trying to do what's best for her kids, there is so much information out there on vaccines, pro and con, with much of it terrifying. Finley and Arrieta are primarily pro-science, and make their argument for vaccines without being condescending to anti-vax parents. The biggest lesson I took from this book is that my whole family should be taking probiotics, and we really need to eat more veggies! I will recommend this to my parent friends!
    • 4/5
      Let Them Eat Dirt by B.Brett Finlay, Marie-Claire Arrieta (2016)The aim of this book is to explain the human dependency on the microbes in our digestive tract for much of our well-being and, increasingly, on our illnesses.First let me comment that the tone of the book bothered me…."mom" is what I call my mother; it is not what I would expect to see as a generic term that identifies mothers in general. But, after becoming sensitized to the concept I notice it is indeed used today as a short-hand for "mother" amongst the generations younger than me. This, and a slightly 'folksy/cutesy' writing style I found distracting. But then the book was written for a different target audience.The book was obviously not written for me, an over 60 male. This also bothered me. There is no question that this book was written for young, child-rearing females, but I was hoping for some information that I could use personally. The information is indeed "good" in describing the connection between what's in us and how it may be affecting us, but almost useless for me personally. According to the authors there's nothing a father can do to help the children that are growing up in the current environment of "death to all microbes", or himself, except, maybe, to fund the research.However, there is more in this book that bothers me. There is a plethora of stories and anecdotes and studies that show that the zoos in our guts are no longer what they used to be. Why is it that the incidences of obesity, asthma, eczema, hay fever, animal allergies, food allergies, autism, hyper-activity, Asperger's, diabetes, etc. etc. have suddenly emerged as a growing problem in the world? It used to be odd to encounter someone with asthma—now it's odd to not encounter someone who has trouble breathing.The authors go into much detail describing the studies that point to the microbes in our intestines as having been altered to the point where we're growing the bad kinds of microbes, if we're not trying to kill the good ones outright. Page after page, study after study, story after story…."here is how we used to be, here is what we've done to ourselves, here are the indications that the elimination of our internal bio-diversity is likely causing us problems, and here is what we probably should do to correct it."And there lies the real weakness of this book. After every study described is a caution: "more study is needed", "inconclusive", "not enough evidence", "too few participants", over and over. They detail the tests and the results and then tell us that, for whatever reason, they're not enough. That we still "don't know". That we still do not have enough proof to be able to say, "do this and all will be well".Sadly, this is a complicated subject. We have hundreds of different types of microbes in our guts, and we each have a different menagerie of microbes in our guts than everyone else, such that our stomach fauna could serve as fingerprints to uniquely identify our family grouping, if not each of us individually.And that's a great part of the problem. There are so many different types of microbes that we can't identify which ones do what and why and how. We certainly can identify the worst of a bad bunch when we eat E.coli and other internal enemies. We know how to kill them, but not how to save the good microbes--the ones that help us digest food and release energy, the ones that help protect us from the bad germs, the ones that help us grow, and think, and feel. Indeed, the suggestions are strong that the microbes we get from our mothers as we're born, and, as children, the ones to which we're exposed as we roll in the dirt with our dogs (but NOT cats) are so crucial that if we miss this stage in our childhood we may be hopelessly hampered for the rest of our lives. (But we don't know for sure.)My hope was that this book would tell me what to eat and drink that would "normalize" my internal landscape enough to eliminate the elements that are wreaking havoc with my immune system to produce allergies. But, alas, this book is for new or expecting mothers—with cautions and warnings and does and don'ts. So I have to guess, from all the clues, what might help me to stay healthy amongst all the antibacterial medicines that are growing the next generation of "man killers". Fortunately, the authors do give a large number of clues—I'm now drinking a lot of kefir and feeling very much better.So, my opinion is that you should read this book to be ready to voice an informed opinion when it comes time to allocate research funds for extended studies. The book does not describe what can be done, but what might be done, when we have enough knowledge. Read this book, in spite of the irritating frustration of its ignorance. Read this book and get others to read it. If not for you, then for you children. If it's too late for them, then for your grandchildren. Just imagine a world where everybody has some form of life-threatening allergy or mental condition. It would be so sad for us to work so hard to save the world from global-warming only to have us succumb to the super-germs that we're breeding. It would be catastrophic that we're mistakenly eating those foods (however good they taste) that dispose us to a life (however long-lived) of increasingly debilitating illnesses.For all its weaknesses as a nutritional reference work this book is necessary for at least pointing the direction in which we MUST go; and, indeed, that we must GO. It has strengthened my resolve to minimize sugar and processed foods—even if I can't eliminate them completely from my diet.
    • 5/5
      You might be surprised, as I was, at the important role microscopic bugs have in human development. “Let Them Eat Dirt” provides a thorough foundation to the new interest in the role microbes’ play in our health. Beginning with a basic explanation of microbes the authors then explore the process of conception through the first years of life viewed with a microbial perspective. Lifestyle issues such as pets, and “What do I do with a dropped pacifier?” are addressed. Other interesting chapters feature information on the link between the growing prominence of certain diseases and microbes, the gut-brain connection to mental disorders and the importance of microbes on our children’s lives. Valuable suggestions, derived from current scientific evidence, are given at the end of each chapter for things to do and not to do. Truly a must read for every parent, ideally before conception!
    • 4/5
      This is an excellent book with worthwhile information, most valuable to young adults that are preparing for parenting. I strongly recommend this book to anyone who thinks that a clean world is a safer world for their children. I am encouraged by the c. Diff results with fecal translation. The various effects of microbiota on our health are covered in understandable text for the general public.
    • 5/5
      Every parent should read this! It's filled with such important information not only for children but for adults as well. I was lucky to experience a fantastic childhood, playing outdoors and getting dirty. I think your immune system gets adjusted better to outside barrages of germs. (Only bad thing is that in the 50's no one seemed to be aware of the damages of being in the sun too long, thus I had some skin cancer removed from my nose several years ago. So, stay safe, but enjoy the great outdoors!
    • 5/5
      I've got three kids ages 6-22 and I've never been a fan of antibacterial, antibiotic or antimicrobial anything. But unfortunately one of my kids suffered ear infections early and ended up with antibiotics at 2 mos of age. He is the one with asthma, nut allergies and a host of other issues that this book claims can be caused by affecting the gut biome of microbes at a young age with the use of antibiotics.I'm not saying my child is proof this argument is correct, but my child DOES support the theory since his sisters are fine and little else was different in their early days.This book is technical enough that it will be over the heads of many readers which is sad since the message is so important. Question what mass media is telling you. Question what the drug companies tell you. Think before you slather on that antibacterial stuff. Let your kids try getting dirty....I loved this book and wished I had been more forceful to avoid antibiotic use in my son since it probably wasn't necessary. Perhaps all the inhalers, nebulizer equipment and daily meds would not have been necessary.If you are concerned about the future of the human race, this is a book you should read. And then you should start doing something to fix the future.
    • 5/5
      As a girl raised in the country this book re-enforced personal beliefs. It was an interesting and easy read for a topic that could have been difficult and/or boring for many. It would be a good book for parents and expectant parents to read. I like how it makes the comparisons of the route to a healthy child, Identifying that resiliency stars from the ground up.Susan