Birth, Breastfeeding, and the Truth About Baby Food | Dr Federica Amati

About this episode

This is part two of my conversation with Dr Federica Amati, Head Nutritionist at ZOE and author of the Sunday Times bestseller Every Body Should Know This. In part one we covered preconception, fertility, and pregnancy nutrition. Here we follow the first 1,000 days through to the end: birth, breastfeeding, weaning, and the environmental exposures behind all of it. Much of this territory has become a source of guilt rather than clarity. Federica's framing is the one I keep returning to: this window is critical, but it is not fragile. Biology adapts, most of what shapes these years is structural, and where parents do have agency the evidence is more reassuring than the headlines suggest. What we cover: Why a critical window is not a fragile one, and what the first 1,000 days actually set Choline, iodine, and omega-3 in pregnancy, and the "four eggs a day" myth C-sections and the infant microbiome, and why the differences largely converge by age two Breast milk as a living system, and an honest comparison with formula Weaning without the marketing: the smoosh test, iron at six months, and early allergen introduction Microplastics and endocrine disruptors, and the