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Would you forgo an ultrasound as an expectant mom? Would you eat sushi or sit in a sauna? Would you avoid fluorescent lights and synthetic fabrics in your household? Just how far would you go to buck conventional parenting choices? Mia Rofrano is a holistic mom who makes many unconventional decisions to keep her family well – from her pre-pregnancy choices to how she labored, to how she now chooses co-sleeping and elimination communication” with her toddler.
Mia, as a teenager, struggled with digestive issues. Today, she is a healthy, nourished wife and mom, who focuses on natural beauty and health for herself and her family. She reviews in this conversation why she prefers uncommon yet healthier practices in her home and life and what the results have been.
Visit Mia’s Instagram account @theoliveoilqueen and her linktr.ee account
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Watch the episode here
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Episode Transcript
Within the below transcript the bolded text is Hilda
As an expectant mom, would you avoid ultrasounds? What about eating sushi or drinking raw milk? This is episode 571, and our guest is Mia Rofrano. Mia goes in-depth on our episode about how she has bucked conventional wisdom and conventional thinking when it comes to pregnancy. Not just that. She not only had a very unique labor and delivery with her first, but now she is parenting her eighteen-month-old with elimination communication and making other unconventional choices.
In addition to co-sleeping, she was once a teenager with digestive issues, but she is now known online as the olive oil queen. She is a healthy, nourished wife and mom, focused on natural beauty and health. She really offers unique insights into what has motivated her to cast aside conventional norms in terms of parenting and health, and what the results have been.
Before we get into the conversation, I want to tell you about Nourishing Our Children. Are you a parent, a would-be parent, a grandparent, or an adult interested in children’s health? Nourishing Our Children is a project of the Weston A. Price Foundation, and it launched in 2005 with a focus on timeless principles for supporting learning, behavior, and health through optimal nutrition.
Nourishing Our Children has an active closed group on Facebook that offers support on how to nourish and not merely feed our children. When you join, you will also have complimentary access to the group that is focused on adults. For a donation of only $5 for the calendar year, the moderators ensure that no question goes unanswered. Find out more or join the Nourishing Our Children Groups.
Here is a testimonial that just might inspire you. “I am a first time mom of a soon to be nine month old and a member of the Nourishing Our Children’s private Facebook group. I began with the Nourishing Traditions book on baby and childcare, but I felt I needed encouragement and support in implementing some of the recommended food practices.
Joining the group became instrumental in helping me navigate the barriers I had to giving my baby his first nourishing foods. I have had so many questions, and I have been so grateful for the clarifications and answers. My questions are always answered in this group, and I would say rather promptly as well. Thank you, Nourishing Our Children. This is a testimonial from Catherine Jimenez.
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Welcome to the show, Mia.
Thank you for having me.
Eating Forbidden Foods During Pregnancy
I am so excited for this conversation. We are going to debunk myths and show people what is possible. Let’s start with the fact that you ate what you even have called forbidden foods during pregnancy. Talk to me about that.
I had everything. I had sushi once. I had raw milk literally every day. I had oysters all the time. Oysters tasted like candy to me. We had a little spot in our town that had an oyster happy hour, and I had to drag Stephen away from work and say, “I need to go get oysters.” They were just the best thing for me. I do not know what it is. They are super nutrient-dense. They are one of the highest sources of vitamin B12. There were a lot of things I ironically could not stomach during pregnancy. Even red meat sometimes was just a little like, did not sound that appetizing, but oysters, they were always super appetizing to me.
Why are oysters raw milk and such? Why are they considered non grata for the pregnant woman?
All three of those foods are raw foods. I think just because of legal reasons, raw foods contain a lot of bacteria, which, if it is a good quality form of that raw food, it has a lot of good bacteria. You can go get sushi at a grocery store for $5, and you probably do not want to eat that sushi when you are pregnant.
It is a little bit nuanced, but I always felt great when I ate them just because of those raw nutrients. Raw foods are living. When you are growing something that is living in life, and you want that energy, those nutrients, but yeah, I think there could just be a little bit of risk with bacteria. If you look at the CDC food outbreaks, most of them are related to lettuce and cantaloupe. Those are raw foods, too.
They do not tell women to stay away from those, or do they?
I know. They are like, “Eat fruits and vegetables. They are healthy for you.”
Were you a fan of intuitive eating during pregnancy?
Definitely. I will say that is something that I learned, which, if you read about how pregnancy works with your nutrient stores, it takes nutrients from the past three months or something. It is mostly important to eat really well up to the time that you actually conceive. That is really important because when you are pregnant, like, just the way your hormones are, your brain is, you are tired, you are nauseous.
You might not want a steak. There were some days when I was like, “All I can eat is like a croissant right now or some sourdough crackers.” I definitely had a bit of stress about that because I am like, “I am not getting protein, I am not getting all these vitamins,” but I think it is really important to just eat intuitively. Later on, I was craving a bunch of oysters, and I have a healthy, healthy, thriving child.
That is wonderful. Was it also your intuition that told you to stay away from ultrasounds, or what impacted that decision? I understand you did not do a single one during your pregnancy.
Yes. There is actually a really funny story behind that, too, because my parents-in-law went through the traditional system. When I said, “I am not going to get ultrasounds, they were a little worried.” She actually gave me a book, it is called Made For This by Mary Haseltine. Basically, it is funny that she gave me that book because the book says, “Here are all your options. You do not have to do any of it.
You can just leave it up to God if you want.” When I told her about the, I am like, “The book says this, and that is my decision. I would rather not know what goes on and trust God.” I think that was really important. Were there times, yes, in the beginning, where I was like, “I did not know if it was a boy, but does the baby have all its organs? How do I know it is real?”
The very beginning, and I was texting some friends, and they were like, “Do not do it. They were sending me studies to show all of the different effects that it could potentially have.” At the end of the day, the biggest thing was that if you give over authority in the beginning, I think that just makes you susceptible to more intervention and giving over authority as you go on. I am really glad I just stuck with my intuition and just trusted God.
What kept me really going, I had a fetoscope. I was like, “Whenever I get to the point where I can hear the baby’s heartbeat, I can listen whenever I want.” That is what I did. Anytime I was nervous, I grabbed my fetoscope. I just found a little heartbeat, and I listened, and I felt better. I have heard stories where women are like, “I just had a weird inkling to go get an ultrasound.” They found out their baby had spinal bifida, or whatever it is called, and they had to get surgery. I am like, “That is great. I pray for that intuition too,” like that is just how I prefer to do things.
Really listening to your body and understanding, maybe also that women from the beginning of time did not have all these modern interventions. When you say, “Giving over authority,” I guess what you mean is like outsourcing your autonomy and, in a way, even trusting the authorities over your own inner knowing.
I have just heard so many stories of friends who even do it with a midwife or in a birthing center. They have all this stress, they are texting me paragraphs, “They said my placenta is one centimeter to the right, too much, and I have to go to the specialty and get more ultrasounds and come back in every two weeks for a month.” It is just like, “That is not worth it to me, personally.”
Going On A Hike, Taking Warm Baths, And Going To Church
What else did you do during your pregnancy that was unconventional, but was right for you?
Let’s see. I definitely did, like, I ate as well as I could in the first trimester. I went on a lot of hikes. I saunaed a little bit. That just felt right for me, which is also kind of forbidden when you are pregnant. Taking, as they say, you can take warm baths, but not hot baths, but I took baths. That was a game-changer for me, especially when you start to get really heavy and sore. Taking a magnesium salt bath was really good for me. I went to church a lot. I prayed a lot. I tried to just surrender a lot because that is what motherhood is about.
I feel like everything in pregnancy prepares you for that. In the beginning, if I was tired, I would say, “I am going to sit down. I am not going to drink coffee. I am not going to go try to distract myself. I am going to sit down and rest.” That seems like something so simple that I feel like so many women just try to fight because they have to go to work. They have to get things done. They have to be productive. In motherhood, you really have to, you have to slow down. Everything that took you 30 minutes is now going to take you two hours. Cooking dinner or whatever.
Many women try to fight their way in life because they have to go to work and be productive. In motherhood, you have to slow down.
Preparing For A Baby Even Before Conception
That is a good point. I want to go back to something you said earlier, which is really foundational for the foundation. I say, not trying to repeat the word foundation, but the point is, what Dr. Price discovered was that around the world, people prepared for conception for having a baby way before they even conceived. They tried to eat the most nutrient-rich diet ahead of time so that their body would have the right nutritional stores to conceive and then carry that baby to term. What was your status when it comes to that? Were you preparing ahead of time, would you say?
Definitely. Steven and I got married, and we knew we wanted to have a baby right away. When we started dating, I was already eating healthy, and we had started to toy with the idea of having a family eventually. I definitely tried to eat really well. The one thing that a lot of people will try to do is lose weight for their wedding. I specifically did not want to do that because I wanted to have good nutrient stores. I wanted to have healthy fat. Obviously, I wanted to look healthy, but I feel like a lot of people have to fit into the dress and impress people and all of that. It was like, “That is not worth it to me because I want a healthy baby.”
I am so glad you mentioned that. It had not occurred to me before. You are right. Everyone’s trying to fit into their wedding dress, and they are possibly cutting out nutrients that their body needs for fertility. It’s so ironic. A lot of times, when people get married, I could be wrong, but in our culture, I will say, there is so much emphasis on the wedding day itself and not as much on the marriage. Does that make sense?
That was something really interesting about Stephen and I’s marriage because we planned our wedding in two months. People were like, “Don’t you want to do this? You want to think about this?” Which I am grateful for some of those ideas, but at the end of the day, I just wanted to be married. It turned out to be a fantastic day. We basically got pregnant the first time trying to conceive. That was also a blessing. People, a lot of times, forget what really matters.
Getting Rid Of Polyester And Perfumes
Apart from diet, let’s talk a little bit about ways in which you and Steven were choosing healthy, unconventional ways of taking care of yourselves even before you started your family.
No polyester. We have cotton, linen, silk, wool, all the natural fibers, especially our sheets and underwear. There are some dresses or things like socks. You cannot find 100% natural socks very easily, but we really tried in that sense, and we wash all of those fabrics in unscented detergent. We do not use any synthetic fragrances because they disrupt your hormones.
I did not wear perfume for a while. I did end up finding a natural one that I just started wearing recently, but I did not wear perfume for a while. We did not use any shampoo that had a lot of these endocrine disruptors. That goes along with any skincare product. It is hard because it is so normal to us. I am trying to remember, like, “What is unconventional?”
Do not realize how unconventional it is. Let me say this, I am really happy to hear you use the word we and here is why. It’s because a lot of people think fertility only has to do with a woman, but it has to do with a man as well, doesn’t it?
Yes, definitely.
Those chemicals in the shampoos, in the cleaning products, and in our clothing, as you said, are endocrine disruptors, meaning that they alter and interfere with our normal hormone function, which can affect fertility as well.
I am very thankful that Steven is actually more particular than I am for those things. If we get an Uber and there is a very strong fragrance, he will probably cancel the ride or make a big deal and roll the windows down. I am just like, “It is 30 minutes.” I am thankful to have him push me to be better always in that direction. We try to stay out of fluorescent lights, turn off the wifi at night, use a lot of red lights at night, and just for like therapy in general.
To me, even as you’re mentioning the red light and less fluorescent, I’m thinking my whole body actually relaxes more. It is just a wonderful ambiance that is not overstimulating, not getting us in that fight or flight mode. Our ancestors lived when they did not have electricity. They either had the natural sunlight or, at night, they had firelight, which is so inviting on so many levels.
Theo was born in the red light, which I think is one of the reasons why he has a very calm demeanor, and he will fall asleep to the red light. We have our red light glasses in case we have to go to New York City or the airport or whatever, we do wear those.
All About Free Birth, Home Birth, And Pain-Free Birth
Talk to us a little bit about that labor with you. Did you do it at home? Just to be clear, I do not think the foundation has a strong stance. People must do a free birth, a home birth, or a pain-free birth. We are not about that, but I am curious.
From the beginning, I told myself, because a couple of months before getting pregnant, I attended my friend’s free birth. That was just like a really unique experience that was life-changing for me. I just knew I wanted to do something similar. Again, from the beginning, I just prayed and trusted my intuition. I am going to be prepared to do it by myself unless I find someone who is the right person.
Thankfully, I found a woman whose name is Iris. She is technically a doula, but she did attend my birth, and she was by my side throughout my whole pregnancy. Our prenatal meetings were us going hiking in the woods in the early morning. It was just the best thing ever, and I would just talk about like, “This is going on, and a lot of it was spiritual.” A lot of it was rediscovering how I was not mothered as a child and what I needed to become a mother, which is really interesting because I would crave things from my childhood, crave foods.
I feel like becoming from a maiden to a mother, you just go through a big spiritual transformation. We talked a lot about that. She taught me about hypnobirthing. We did some yoga stretches. She brought over a birth sling. We had all these meetings leading up to my birth. Just as a woman, free birth is great, but we are not meant to do it alone.
We are only free birthing because we do not have that community, and we have a strong distrust of the medical system. We are scared of all these interventions. I was really thankful to find someone to just be there with me, and mentally just knowing she is going to come to my birth. She is going to help. They gave me postpartum, and she has been with me throughout my whole pregnancy, which was huge.
I love that those conversations, those hikes, even that pursuit on your part of what is playing into my feelings right now in terms of how I was mothered and how I was raised and what I am missing today.
That was really nice. Right on my due date, I went into labor and due date with quotations, because I calculated it myself, but I went into labor right on my due date. A couple of hours went by, and I think my water broke a little bit. At first, it was just very mild. It was during Lent for us, so we had a church session that evening. It was always Steven’s and my dream for me to go into labor during church, because just church at night with the lights and the candles and the singing, it was just like, “That is perfect.”
It blesses you in labor. I went home, and I was like I just have to clean one more dish. We tried to watch a show. It just was not happening. We tried to fall asleep. It was not happening. It started to pick up very quickly. I went into labor around 6:00 PM. The heiress came over, I think around 1:00 AM. I just remember I cannot look at her. I was just so inward, but I knew she was there. I felt her hand. I felt her rubbing my back, trying to offer me food and things like that.
I did have a birth pool that was given to me by a friend, and they got that prepared, and I was trying to wait as long as possible to get into the birth pool because that was probably where I was going to end up birthing. I got in the birth pool at around 2:00 AM. Three hours later, Theo came out. He came out with a nuchal hand, I think that is what they call it, but basically his hand was right here.
Stephen sat holding my hand during every single contraction, and I was in whatever position felt comfortable for me. Being in the water was great. I really liked that. He came out, and it was amazing. I waddled over to the toilet, plopped out my placenta. I was just talking, and it just came out, and then I waddled over to my bed and got in my bed and just hung out with my baby.
Now I am curious, did you keep the placenta or not?
I did keep it. We ended up consuming just a little bit of it, which is something, I guess, unconventional. People do not realize how powerful oxytocin is and how much it plays a role in your birth. You have the biggest surge of oxytocin in your entire life, more than having sex, more than breastfeeding during birth. It peaks fifteen minutes after birth when you are skin-to-skin with your baby.
That is like the ultimate natural high that a woman can, well, probably more than a man, that we can ever get. That hormone is just incredible. I mean, we have receptors in our brains, in our uterus, in our boobs, in our gut, in our heart, and it is very anti-inflammatory. That has played a huge role in my postpartum recovery, in my child’s bonding, and in my child’s nervous system.
Anything that you do, I mean, even going into a doctor’s office and having bright lights, that adrenaline competes with the oxytocin. Anything having strangers having to get out of the car, all these books talk about, or you think about the tribal women, they are birthing in a cave in the dark, and it is dim, and it is quiet, and it is at night. You are probably just around people that you are very familiar with and that you trust.
Any intervention, such as an epidural, numbs your pain receptors so your brain is not receiving that you have pain and so it is not releasing the natural oxytocin that is a natural pain reliever. It calms you down, and people are not napping with their babies. They are not baby carrying, and then so you are not getting as much of that hormone, which is, I think, really powerful, and people do not realize how little things can just interrupt that release and the bonding and the calming that you get from that.
When you are saying that you get that calming and that wonderful effect from the constant skin contact and so forth, you do not just mean for the mom, you mean for the baby too, right?
Definitely, yes. I always think about a meme where people are like, “Your baby is so well-behaved.” In my head, I am like, “Thanks, I breastfeed and co-sleep, and I am with my baby. I brought him into the world in a safe, gentle way.” All of those things really do affect the baby’s nervous system. Other babies, if their mom leaves the room, it is like the end of the world. Of course, he loves me, and he is “Mama,” but he is totally fine without me because he has that foundational bond, which is extremely important.
Some studies show that the peak oxytocin you receive after birth can epigenetically change your DNA. I forget exactly what the study said, but somehow it changes the way that you bond with your child. I feel like a lot of moms get birth and they go into postpartum depression, or they do not really know how to bond with their baby. Maybe it is because of some intervention, and it is not to say that you cannot bond, maybe if you have that intervention. That just sets you up on the right foot. It is like nature’s reward for giving birth the way God designed.
I love that nature’s reward. I cannot help but go back, Mia, to my own early motherhood days and how I would drop the kids off at the church nursery, let’s say. You might have one kid clinging to your leg, and you are hoping that the caregiver will distract them so that you can sneak off, and it’s like, “Why not just keep the kid with me? They are sending you such a signal, I want to be with you.”
This is not a place of judgment. You and I both, this is just a conversation about possibilities. What if we, not even in the initial medical interventions during labor and delivery, but afterwards, what is our relationship like? Are we touching each other enough? Does my kid need to know that I am that anchor for them so that they can go off and play and explore freely because they know you are not going? I am not saying you cannot work or whatever, but you get my drift, right?
Yes, definitely. A lot of people just do not, like I said, “I do not know how all these things that we do that are normal in society add up to affect that relationship and that bond and the hormones that you are receiving.” Obviously, some people have to work. Obviously, you want to break from your baby every once in a while, but I think just that foundation, that beginning, is so important.
Benefits Of Co-Sleeping With Your Child
It really is. Let’s talk about unconventional things that you do now beyond the postpartum time. Do you co-sleep? You said you do, right?
He is almost 18 months now, so every single day for 18 months, he has been next to me at night. For me, I get more sleep that way. Sometimes I am like, “It would be nice if I could just get a night without sleep.” Sometimes I have a little playpen for him, and after he turned one, he was able to nap independently in there.
I just lie next to him, I nurse him to sleep, and then I sneak away, and he naps. Sometimes, like, “Maybe I should just leave him in the playpen at night and see what happens.” It feels wrong to me. It feels very wrong. I feel almost naked if I am not sleeping next to him. Sometimes Steven will play with him and be like, “Do you want to take a nap?” “I cannot sleep without him. It just feels wrong.”
Speaking of something that feels wrong, some people say, without getting too graphic, because this is a clean show, how can you be intimate with your spouse if there is always a baby or 2 or 3 in the bed?
For us, I like my little playpen hack. I can put him down at first in the night in the playpen, and he will sleep maybe 1 or 2 hours there. Typically, Steve and I have an hour or two to hang out at night, just us two. I will say, “You have to take this with a grain of salt because maybe your baby is teething, maybe your baby is sick, maybe your baby is going through a developmental leap. Now he is getting older, and he knows what the playpen means. That he is going to be in there by himself.
Sometimes he will not fall asleep unless he is in bed.” Stroller naps are always great because if you have a place where you could just leave him outside, or you can just bring the stroller in, we did that a lot. Car naps are also great. If you can just bring the car seat in and plop him somewhere. You find your way, as a co-sleeping mom, or even my mother-in-law can rock him to sleep if she wants.
The point is that co-sleeping does not deprive you and your spouse of intimacy, basically.
No.
Got it.
I will just add to that, it does make the times that we are guaranteed to have time together a little different. It is not going to be guaranteed every night for us. It just depends on Theo. He is going through some developmental leap, and he would not go to sleep until like ten last night. He and I might have planned that once we get the baby down, we will hang out, and sometimes we have to be a little flexible. Unexpectedly, sometimes he will fall asleep at 7:00 PM. We are like, “We can watch a movie, we can do whatever.
Benefits Of Doing Elimination Communication With Your Child
Everything changes once you have your kiddos, right? Everything changes. Let’s talk a little bit about, as we begin to wrap up now, what it looks like for how you are raising Theo, unconventionally. I have a question about screens. Does he have a little gaming thing or a fake phone that he plays with?
No screens. I will say a lot of people have pressured me because they are like, “Just show him a little educational video, just so you can get some things done.” I do not have a problem getting things done. It just takes me longer. I am also bonding with my child. If I am making coffee, I let him help me. I try to keep him involved as much as possible.
They are incredibly smart. He understands so much. I remember there was one day when I was just like, “What if I just get him to throw something away?” I just hand it to the trash. He was just starting to walk and barely talking. I said, “Can you throw this in the trash?” He walked right over to the trash and threw it in. Now he loves throwing things in the trash if I need him to. They have all these things like toddler towers, and I am in the kitchen a lot.
I try to keep him involved as much as possible, and I feel like just explaining to him what I am doing, “Mommy, I am getting the coffee beans and grinding the coffee, or I am making tea, or I am heating up the food.” That is how he stays entertained, and sometimes he will go off and play on his own, and sometimes he wants to drag me along with him, and I have to say, “I am not going to get this done right now. I am just going to go play with him for five minutes, and then I will come back for five minutes. I will play with him for five minutes.”
I feel like that is a lot of motherhood, too, like everything is like five-minute intervals. It is like, you do not get to really do anything with endurance, unless you have someone to watch the child, but that is okay. I feel like the more you try to fight it, the harder it is. Again, back to the beginning of pregnancy. If I am tired, I am going to surrender to that. If Theo wants to play with me right now, I am going to surrender to that.
I am very blessed to be able to stay home with him. I think that makes a huge difference. I also provide all the meals. I am providing the childcare for him. I am investing a lot now. For example, we do elimination communication. He goes poop on the potty, and I do not have to change poopy diapers, and that is great. Sometimes I get to put a little underwear on him, and he is eighteen months old, and he will tell me if he has to go to the bathroom.
That is so amazing. I have heard of that.
It is really incredible how natural it is for them to eliminate elsewhere. Also, I think people think about it as, “I am going to get them out of diapers sooner.” No, it is actually just another form of, like you know, when your baby is hungry, you are going to feed them, when they are tired, you are going to help them get to sleep, when they have to use the bathroom. It is another form of communication and bonding with your child. You are showing them like, “I know you have needs, and I am helping you with these needs.” It is really incredible. Those are some of the things.
Recommended Diet For An Infant Or Toddler
That is so beautiful. Let’s start to wrap up with food. What do you feed Theo now that he is a toddler?
I will say he is entering a little bit of a picky stage, but it is what it is. He loves every form of dairy. Butter, cheese, homemade ice cream, yogurt, milk, raw milk. He has every form of dairy, and I try to make sure it is good quality. I try to feed him sheep and goat or A2 dairy. I started off with bone broths. We did a little egg yolk. He loves meat. He does not like a ton of vegetables. Although last night he ate a lot of carrots, and he likes some zucchini. Sometimes when I give him vegetables, you can just tell his digestion is a little bit messed up. I still try to give it to him slowly. What else do I have? Whipped bone marrow, butter.
These all sound like wise and friendly traditions. I love it, Mia. It sounds like you never buy the little jars of baby food at the store, girl.
Definitely not, yeah. It is crazy because I feel like all of that, like the purees and all the things, I did try stuff here and there, like purees, but it is all so messy. If you hand them a piece of meat, they might be a little greasy, but you do not have vegetable puree all over your floor.
Some of those purees also just look like throw-up.
I always only feed him foods that I would want to eat. If I were in an emergency, if I needed to give him a pouch, I would taste it because I am like, “If I do not want to eat it, I do not want to force him to eat it.”
Was there anything that he out and out rejected as an intuitive eater at thirteen months or something?
I am trying to think. There were some vegetables he definitely liked, like I would give him a little pouch just to try it out, and he would just spit it out. He has definitely rejected some things.
Why have you picked these, which I consider very nutrient-dense foods with the fat-soluble activators? Why did you pick those over, say, the rice cereal or what others would recommend for an infant or toddler?
It is really interesting because I feel like I have heard a lot of stories about man-made foods like rice cereal, formula, and whatever. I have heard a lot of these moms say, “The baby sleeps better.” It’s because they are spending so much energy to digest this food that is not meant for their body. Of course, you want your baby to sleep a healthy amount, but I feel like if they are like sleeping through the night as soon as they start solids because they are eating all this food, I feel like that is not good either. I did a lot of reading.
I read nourishing traditions books, and just intuitively, it is like, what would our ancestors feed their babies, not rice cereals. Also, just understanding what nutrients, like for example, bone marrow has, like living immune modulating nutrients that are only found, I think, in shark liver, breast milk, and bone marrow. It is like, obviously, I want to give him that. It has one of the most amazing nutrients that is super hard to find.
I feel like you just have to think about it as like what is going to actually grow their brain and grow their muscles and calm their nervous system? A lot of these rice cereals have folic acid. What if he has the MTHFR gene that cannot digest folic acid, and then he is ADHD and crazy, and then I am frustrated, and then it is a cycle because I am exhausted. It is just a lot. You do not end up in that space.
Making The Choice Not To Get Vaccinations
Speaking of thinking ahead, what unconventional choices have you made regarding vaccines?
We have not done any vaccines, actually. In fact, we have not even been to a single doctor with Theo. We have been to a chiropractor, who thankfully, is very plugged in. If we need something, if something comes up with Theo, she is able to refer us to whom we need to go. He did have his tongue tie released. We did do that, but yeah, we have not done a single vaccine. That is another thing that people are always saying all the time. He is so alert. People are so boggled that he can look you in the eyes like an actual human. It is like, “He was not given drugs from the moment he came out of the womb. Of course, he is going to be that alert.”
What influenced your decision not to vaccinate?
I feel like, just again, intuitively, with all the things in my head, less intervention is better. Just knowing, thinking about the people that I do know who do not have any vaccines. There are very few of them, but I do know them, and they are very healthy. I feel like maybe, back in the day, when there were like ten vaccines, maybe I would have considered some, but I feel like today it is just so obvious. They are just trying to shove them all in you. They are trying to combine three in one.
There is a study that showed that 60% or 70% of SIDS cases, sudden infant death syndrome, were within a week of kids getting vaccines. If he is thriving and healthy, I do not think that is necessary. Also, when you read about breastfeeding, your breast milk supplies all that the child needs for their immunity. That is why things like breastfeeding into toddlerhood are really important. It is not really for them because they are hungry and they need to get nutrients from you. It is more about the effect it has on their immune system and the benefits of that.
That is so beautiful. Is it not cool that raw milk from the mother’s breast is so nourishing and so protective?
I just want to add one more thing. I know some families that choose not to vaccinate their child, but then they are like, “We cannot go anywhere. We have to stay home, and we cannot put them in the sun.” All of those things are important. If you are not going to vaccinate your child, they have to be exposed to the world, and they have to develop the way to fight all these things in our environment. We traveled with him very early on. We went to Italy when he was four months old. We went and saw my family when he was two months old. I took him to the grocery stores when he was really little. We went out.
If you will not vaccinate your child, be sure to expose them to the world. They need to develop ways to combat all these issues in our environment.
You intentionally diversified his microbiome, basically.
Yes.
Not trying to keep him in a bubble. You are doing the opposite.
It is like, “No, he is going to get sick.” He got sick after all the trips that we went on in the beginning. Guess what? I nursed him. I cuddled with him, I listened to his needs, and I breastfed him, and within two days, he was totally fine. Now he is thriving, now he can go on a trip, and he does not get sick at all.
Back Up And Think For Yourself
I love this so much. This has been a wonderful conversation. I love hearing your stories, Mia. It has been a blessing. Now I want to ask you the question I love to pose at the end. Mia, if you could just tell the listener one thing, one thing they could do to improve their health, what would you recommend that they do?
I would just say have faith because sometimes we are overwhelmed with all this information and we do not know what to do, and sometimes you just need to back out of that and think for yourself, “What do you truly want for your health and your family?” Everyone’s telling you to have a home birth or a hospital birth. Is that what you truly want? Do you want to be in the comfort of your own home? Do you want a hospital birth, and everyone’s telling you to have a home birth? I feel like sometimes you just need to back up, have faith, and connect with your intuition.
When dealing with an overwhelming amount of information, you have to learn to back up, have faith, and connect with your intuition.
Thank you so much, Mia. On behalf of the Weston A. Price Foundation, it has been an absolute pleasure.
Thank you.
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Our guest was Mia Rofrano. You can find her on Instagram at The Olive Oil Queen and check out her Linktree at Linktree The Olive Oil Queen to learn more. For the transcript for this week’s episode, visit our website, Weston A. Price, and simply click on the podcast page. Now for a recent letter to the editor from the Wise Traditions Journal from the winter of 2025.
“Thank you for the delicious sourdough bread recipe. I found it in the Wise Traditions Journal issue, summer 2025, page five. The bread came out great. Fortunately, I had a sourdough starter on hand to make the bread. I have tried numerous other sourdough recipes with marginal success, but this hit a home run. I will be preparing this bread often.”
“I use fresh milled kamut flour, and I bake the bread in a stoneware mini loaf pan, which makes four loaves, so I can share with others. As always, the quarterly journals are so full of fantastic information.” This is a letter from Kathleen from Avondale, Colorado. Thank you for writing that letter, Kathleen. You can also write us a letter to the editor. Just write Info@WestonA.Price.org and put letter to the editor in the subject line.
If you want to get one of our Wise Traditions journals, just become a member. Go to Weston A. Price, click on the Become a Member button, and remember to use the code POD10. It is only $30 for the year. It is an incredible deal. You support our work of education, research, and activism, and you get the journals to boot. Thank you so much for tuning in, my friend. Stay well and remember to keep your feet on the ground and your face to the sun.
About Mia Rofrano
Once a gut-troubled teen, now a nourished wife and mom focused on natural beauty and health. She shares a grounded approach to healing through food, lifestyle, and motherhood at @theoliveoilqueen.
Important Links
- Mia Rofrano on Instagram
- Linktree The Olive Oil Queen
- Info@WestonA.Price.org
- Nourishing Our Children Facebook Group
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