This article is written in partnership with Hiya. They’re dedicated to the health and development of our kids, made possible by their eco and healthy-yet-yummy daily multivitamin—we’re honored to work with them. ~ ed.

“Parenthood.”

As a soon-to-be parent, I can’t think of a more exciting, draining, confusing, fulfilling, scary, and responsibility-filled word.

From the moment I had my first thought of “I think my eggo is preggo” to the moment three pregnancy tests confirmed my suspicions…I was slapped into a strange world of anxiousness and explosive love.

I was (and still am) inundated with information and questions and appointments and worries, and, and, and…I could go on forever.

How often should they eat? How do I teach them to be independent? What kinds of foods are “okay”? How often can they have junk food?…because I probably eat junk food too often…what if they hate me? How do I make sure they know I love them while setting healthy boundaries—and making them eat all the veggies on their plate?

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From conversation to conversation, web search to web search, book to book, and doc visit to doc visit, it can feel as if I know less the more I hunt for answers.

In short: trying to get a black-and-white answer for “how to be a good parent” is like trying to catch smoke with bare hands.

Luckily, one company, Hiya, knows the struggle is real and is here to make one aspect of parenting a whole lot easier: childhood nutrition. Its mission is to help reduce kids’ dependence on sugar and fill in the most common nutritional gaps among kids. And it all begins with a healthier daily multivitamin (sans the typical “chemical sh*t storm”).

The Sweet Danger of Sugar & a Whole New World…for Vitamins

As the song goes, “A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down.” This is why, before Hiya, a typical children’s vitamin would include a teaspoon of added sugar, weird dyes, and other candy junk…ugh.

But Hiya had a better idea: don’t teach kids that healthy things are “yucky” and need to be washed down with added sugar and gummy coating.

When vitamins look too much like candy and are filled with gummy junk that can contribute to cavities (hello cute li’l gummy bears—aka sugar monsters in animal shapes), we unintentionally train our kids to associate healthy eating with dessert. This habit is part of our society’s troubling addiction to sugar—an epidemic with consequences we are just now beginning to understand. This can lead to lifelong problems with childhood development, mental health, obesity, and more.(1)

Here’s another ugly truth we can’t sugarcoat (literally)—it makes my insides squirm and feel like I’ve already failed as a parent before I’ve fully begun:

“A new study shows that American children consume the equivalent of 30 gallons of added sugars a year…enough to fill a bathtub.(2)

In fact, according to the numbers, 98% of kids eat too much sugar. Yikes! And today’s parents are expected to outlive their children due to obesity.(3)

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Those are the numbers that keep me up at night, sick with worry, trying to navigate the mish-mash of information on Google (okay, and the fact that I have to pee every five minutes). I mean…even as a so-called “responsible” adult with a little one on the way, I find it hard to say no to a sweet treat—and don’t even get me started on the number of ways sugar and junk can find their way into “healthy” or non-dessert-related things I eat and drink…and now even kids vitamins that are meant to promote health.

It is those same types of numbers mentioned earlier that drove Hiya’s founders (new dads at the time) to spend three years curating a team of top pediatricians, nutritionists, scientists, and parents to formulate the actually healthy vitamin kids are freakin’ crazy about today.

Hiya-aaa! Slicing Sugar (& Stress) like a Ninja of Parenthood.

Let’s face it: the typical children’s vitamin is basically candy in disguise—filled with two teaspoons of sugar, artificial ingredients tough to pronounce, and other gummy junk additives that can cause cavities and more (just ask your dentist about the problems with children’s gummies). Despite our best intentions, we’re basically training their little bodies and brains to be addicted to sugar and other junk before they even have a choice.

I’m sure this is an addiction none of us purposefully want to pass down to our little ones, but it is happening right under our noses. Just like we pass down our traumas, our good qualities and our bad qualities, we also pass down dietary and health habits (or lack thereof).

Here’s my question: how am I supposed to confidently nourish my mini-me when sugar hides in plain sight?

To help us help our kids stay healthy (and help scared mamas like me who feel like there are almost too many health questions to even function), Hiya’s vitamins are made with 15 essential vitamins and minerals and a blend of 12 organic fruits and vegetables—with zero added sugar. Nada. Zip. Zilch.

And when I mention 15 essential vitamins, we’re talking all the ingredients in their optimal forms. That means Vitamin A, Zinc, Vitamin D3, b12—and 11 more—all in the forms kids need for optimal bioavailability.

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Stop my kid from getting hooked on today’s equivalent of cigarettes (sugar) from the start = check. This mom feels a whole lot more zen, which is a tough-to-come-by emotion, as we all know.

If your first thought was, “Okay, and how do I get my kid to eat that vitamin over the sugary imposter?” that’s something that, as a mama-to-be, I was wondering too.

I didn’t have to look too far for the answer because my coworker, Mary’s kids have been taking Hiya for the last few months and said this: “my daughter was rolling her eyes at me because she wanted more than 1x per day—this is a conversation we literally have daily.” In other words, Hiya is formulated to taste great and is designed for picky eaters. I mean, as a parent, what else could we ask for?!

Questions like these are weird to have running through my brain, but they’re kinda taking over these days: how do we know if they’re getting the specific vitamins they need? How much sugar is too much? It can be maddening and totally overwhelming. For this reason, having something like Hiya there to cover the nutritional bases with optimal ingredients feels as good as finally getting that five minutes of silence during nap time or that solo shower we’ve been desperately waiting for.

Being a parent is hard. Keeping our kids healthy doesn’t have to be.

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I get it…we can talk about numbers all day, but we all know that if we want the raw truth, we should ask a kid or watch for their response. In light of that, there’s a reason Hiya is the fastest-growing children’s vitamin around and has thousands of five-star reviews. Here are the responses from a few Ele-babies who take Hiya every day (written by mommy):

“Hiya: you had me at organic, no added cane sugar, and no artificial flavors.

As a busy working mom with a picky(ish) eater, there are sure to be gaps in my daughter’s nutrition. As I’ve learned more about holistic nutrition, I’ve become more wary of vitamins—most of the time, they’re marketing candy as a ‘vitamin.’ I try to focus on a food-first nutrition approach, but raising an independently-minded wild child can be challenging, and I want to make sure she’s covered.

I adore the reusable glass bottle and that it cuts down on plastic bottle waste. My daughter adores it because she decorated it with stickers! The subscription service makes refills a no-brainer, which is a serious plus for someone who can barely remember the day.

Bottom line, I feel good about giving my little one these, and she lights up when it’s vitamin time. She loves ‘em!” ~ Lindsey, mommy to a happy Hiya kiddo

“There’s so much to love about Hiya! Each tiny vitamin contains a multitude of purely-sourced nutrients that keep my kiddos’ growing bodies healthy. And because they are made from organic fruits and vegetables, they taste great too. She likes them so much that she needs regular reminders that she can only have one per day!” ~ Mary, mommy to a happy Hiya kiddo

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Whether we’re expecting (hi, that’s me), brand new parents, or adding tiny human number five to the fam, there will always be struggles, questions, and a steep learning curve in the world of parenthood. My opinion? Any option that limits the amount of anxiety and unsureness—and the number of tiny sugar addicts running around my house—is worth a shot.

~

1. American Academy of Pediatrics
2. American Heart Association
3. New York Times