Speaker 1: Apogae Production. Welcome back to another episode of Am I
Speaker 1: A Bad Mum? Podcast? That's the question we constantly ask,
Speaker 1: am I A Bad Mum?
Speaker 2: We ask it in hope. I guess, don't we that
Speaker 2: other people are feeling the same way we are when
Speaker 2: it comes to day to day parenting, the inns and outs.
Speaker 1: I had a conversation the other day because I've got
Speaker 1: my dad coming over for Christmas from the UK with
Speaker 1: his wife, and I said, like, you haven't seen the
Speaker 1: girls for a while. Yeah, you're going to have days
Speaker 1: where you go, oh, they're really lovely, and you're going
Speaker 1: to have days where you go, they are complete assholes.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I think that happens to most of us. So
Speaker 2: I felt like I felt like that was possibly how
Speaker 2: I rolled this morning driving to school, just like that
Speaker 2: moment of going, sorry, why do I do this again?
Speaker 1: Do you want to tell people what you actually said
Speaker 1: to go see this morning? Because you just sort of
Speaker 1: skimmed over that without saying what you actually said. So
Speaker 1: she had been doing your head in in the car
Speaker 1: and you were dropping her off at her like introduction
Speaker 1: to high school.
Speaker 2: Yeah, transition day they call it. You know where it
Speaker 2: came from. Katie was another mom messaged me and goes,
Speaker 2: oh my gosh, I'm a mess. She was just doing
Speaker 2: drop off, same school, same thing, and she was like,
Speaker 2: I'm a mess. And I replied to her. I was like,
Speaker 2: I'm actually fine, so fine, it's gonna be a great day.
Speaker 1: Yeah, a good one because she was doing your headed.
Speaker 2: She just was such a bitch to me all the
Speaker 2: way in that when I dropped her off, I was like,
Speaker 2: see ya, I hope you get eaten alive in there.
Speaker 2: See ya having a day. It's like, you're not getting
Speaker 2: out of the car. I was like, no, no, you
Speaker 2: do that. You know, I have moments where I feel
Speaker 2: bad for saying what I just said, But at the
Speaker 2: same time, I was like, you know, in my own
Speaker 2: little self pity. Now with driving in, I've got two
Speaker 2: girls in the car, Gracie and a little friend. They
Speaker 2: say to me, Hey, when we get there, can you
Speaker 2: take a photo of us walking in? And I was like, oh, yeah, sure,
Speaker 2: Why well, because when you know, in six years time,
Speaker 2: when we're finishing, we're going to get another photo of
Speaker 2: us walking out together. And I was like, oh that's
Speaker 2: a bit cute. Yeah. Sure. Skip forward to where I'm
Speaker 2: like dropping them off, and I'm thinking, I hope you
Speaker 2: getting alive in there. It's you know, first day of
Speaker 2: high school. Good luck. And then I get out of
Speaker 2: the car to take the photo. They were like what
Speaker 2: are you doing? And I was like, you asked me
Speaker 2: to take a photo. Yeah, well you know, we don't
Speaker 2: need to take a photo. I was like, you just
Speaker 2: you just asked me to take the photo. So I'm
Speaker 2: out of the car to take the photo. And now
Speaker 2: you're telling me what are you doing? Why are you
Speaker 2: taking a photo? What the You're just gaslighting me massively.
Speaker 2: I said, stand there and take a photo. So you
Speaker 2: got the photo of them. I'm so confused where I
Speaker 2: just went wrong with that.
Speaker 1: And then that's the thing. You're always in the wrong.
Speaker 1: You're always the one in the wrong. And they will argue.
Speaker 1: My girls will argue that red is fucking blue. When
Speaker 1: I'm like, no, you're not understanding. They will argue with
Speaker 1: it's something in I don't know what it is, something
Speaker 1: in them that's like I'm just gonna keep arguing even
Speaker 1: though like I will not allow you to be right no,
Speaker 1: And you.
Speaker 2: Sit there second guessing yourself, going why are we even
Speaker 2: having this conversation, right, why, yeah, why are you fighting this?
Speaker 2: Because you can clearly see the answer and you're just
Speaker 2: still fighting it. I don't even understand why we're doing this.
Speaker 1: The most recent example of this, well, this is not
Speaker 1: even the most recent. It's just one that's popped into
Speaker 1: my head. There'll be others was the day when Holly said,
Speaker 1: I've got so much school work to do. I've got
Speaker 1: so much school work to do this weekend. I come
Speaker 1: home from a walk on Friday afternoon and starting TikTok
Speaker 1: for an hour. That was my fault. It was my fault.
Speaker 1: You don't understand it's my Friday. I'm like, mate, you
Speaker 1: had a perfectly good hour there that you were scrolling
Speaker 1: on TikTok.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and then fast forward Saturday. Didn't get it done
Speaker 2: because you don't understand it was her Saturday.
Speaker 1: She deserves a sleeping god.
Speaker 2: Sunday. You don't understand. I have a friend over it.
Speaker 2: It's really important. Monday. Don't hand in assignment. You clearly
Speaker 2: don't understand.
Speaker 1: No, it's all what I fault.
Speaker 2: You're a that person that just got no idea, never
Speaker 2: been there, never done that, no assholes. Am I a
Speaker 2: bad mom for taking it personally.
Speaker 1: Oh, no, everything I do this at the moment, I
Speaker 1: really think that as kids get older, it's really bad
Speaker 1: face self esteem.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but I was also thinking about that exact point
Speaker 2: of like when I was driving to drop Gracie off,
Speaker 2: this is still a continuation of the same thing, and
Speaker 2: I was sort of like battling with myself, battling internally
Speaker 2: with myself over the whole idea of just going like, no,
Speaker 2: I don't understand, like, maybe I'm not seeing the point,
Speaker 2: Like you start to second guess yourself, Katie, maybe I'm
Speaker 2: not seeing it the way that they're seeing it. Maybe
Speaker 2: I'm not listening properly, because she's like, maybe i'm And
Speaker 2: then you just start thinking, fuck, am I the parent
Speaker 2: or am I the child? Like I took everything that
Speaker 2: she said this morning personally as like a personal dig
Speaker 2: at me. Her friend said something about a school, and
Speaker 2: then Gracie went, oh, I'd love to go there. This
Speaker 2: is as we're driving to a transition day for her
Speaker 2: high school that she chose, but I allowed her to
Speaker 2: choose that I allowed her to audition, or she got
Speaker 2: in off her own merit. And then now she's sitting
Speaker 2: in the car on the day that we're driving there, saying, oh, yeah,
Speaker 2: I love that school. I'd love to go to that school. Bro,
Speaker 2: I'm taken that personally. That's number one.
Speaker 1: She may as well have said, you book me into
Speaker 1: the wrong school.
Speaker 2: YEP, might as well. That's exactly how I took it,
Speaker 2: because in my head I was like, this is not
Speaker 2: my school of choice, but I allowed you anyway, just
Speaker 2: moving forward. I took that one personally. Then she made
Speaker 2: a comment of like, oh, they've even got boarding school there.
Speaker 2: I'd love to go to boarding school. And then her
Speaker 2: little friend goes, oh, I wouldn't. She goes, I'd really
Speaker 2: miss my parents a lot, like I'd miss my mom especially,
Speaker 2: like so much that I couldn't do boarding school. Gracie
Speaker 2: proceeds to go, oh, no, I think I would be
Speaker 2: actually fine. I think it would actually be really good
Speaker 2: for me. But I think I would do really well
Speaker 2: in a boarding school situation.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and so let me just guess what you heard.
Speaker 1: I hate my mom. Yeah, I want to go to
Speaker 1: boarding school because I hate my p parents. This is
Speaker 1: like recently Holly said to me one of her really
Speaker 1: close friends. She said, oh, her and her mom are
Speaker 1: like best friends. They're like, like best friends, like we
Speaker 1: don't have that. And I was like, okay, well I
Speaker 1: don't want to be a best friend, but now I
Speaker 1: do because now I feel bad.
Speaker 2: How do we just not take it? In my head?
Speaker 2: I was like listening to this conversation going round and
Speaker 2: around and round in my head exactly like that situation.
Speaker 2: But then the boarding school, I really took it personally
Speaker 2: because I thought, fuck you. Your friend has just sat there
Speaker 2: and said how much she would miss her mom and
Speaker 2: she would not like boarding school at all. You've sat
Speaker 2: there with your dickhead mom driving you to school, and
Speaker 2: you're saying how much better off you would be in
Speaker 2: boarding school. So I was like, fuck you, and they're.
Speaker 1: Off to boarding school. You go because I would quite
Speaker 1: like that too.
Speaker 2: You said that, Katie. I was like, if you want
Speaker 2: to go, absolutely I'll do that. I'll absolutely take you
Speaker 2: and you can go there, and I'm not picking up
Speaker 2: for holidays. You can stay.
Speaker 1: You're only twenty minutes away from home.
Speaker 2: Don't care, you're going to stay there. But the other
Speaker 2: thing is the little friend's out there and goes. One
Speaker 2: of my brother's friends here boards and he always says, no,
Speaker 2: you definitely don't want to board because the older kids
Speaker 2: pick on you and this, this and that and made
Speaker 2: up all these things and graces to Oh yeah, I
Speaker 2: think i'd be great.
Speaker 1: There because that's how much I hate my mum. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I we just don't suck it up.
Speaker 2: Look at her. She just drives me because she wants to.
Speaker 2: She's got nothing better to do. She just wants to
Speaker 2: sit in the traffic for an hour just to drive
Speaker 2: me to school. And oh here I am.
Speaker 1: It's almost like taking the bully from school, sitting her
Speaker 1: in your passenger seat and just driving her around everywhere
Speaker 1: she wants to go and paying for everything.
Speaker 2: Honestly, Katie, I was like, even if the therapist was
Speaker 2: listening to us right now, I genuinely was in that
Speaker 2: headspace of like battling going, don't listen to it, don't
Speaker 2: take it on board, not mine, that's yours. Then like
Speaker 2: she just keeps on going, she keeps rolling with the punches,
Speaker 2: and I'm like, I even turned up the music so
Speaker 2: I could try and drown her out. I'll put on
Speaker 2: music that I know she doesn't like, because I was like,
Speaker 2: and then the last thing, Katie was the conversation around
Speaker 2: a phone and now you and I know exactly with
Speaker 2: this how it rolls in our house. And now Gracie
Speaker 2: is eleven, yes, and she keeps on pushing the boundary
Speaker 2: with the phone. I need a phone. I want to
Speaker 2: phone either. Then her friend says in the back of
Speaker 2: the car after the boarding school conversation, so I'm already
Speaker 2: on edge, and she goes, oh, Gracie, are you getting
Speaker 2: a phone? And Gracie goes, oh, I don't know, Like
Speaker 2: maybe when I'm like thirteen or probably thirty two. I
Speaker 2: was like, well, at this stage, it's going to be
Speaker 2: fucking thirty two when you're still finishing boarding school and
Speaker 2: paying for it yourself, like you say, yourself, And then
Speaker 2: afterwards you're like, Rachel, they was.
Speaker 1: So childish, but they drive you to it. It was
Speaker 1: her fault.
Speaker 2: Do you want to know something really deep down and
Speaker 2: personal about me, about the way that my brain works.
Speaker 2: I see other people driving their high school kids to
Speaker 2: high school and they're sitting in the same car, but
Speaker 2: the kid has a big set of fucking headphones on
Speaker 2: or like AirPods in, and I look at that and go,
Speaker 2: I don't ever want to be like that.
Speaker 1: Mm yeah, until you do want to be like that.
Speaker 2: Now I look at that and go, they're really disconnected.
Speaker 2: I don't want to be like that. It's something that
Speaker 2: obviously for me, like maybe deep down there's something in
Speaker 2: it for me. But I look at that and guy,
Speaker 2: I don't want to be that disconnected. I don't want
Speaker 2: to not be able to talk in the car. I
Speaker 2: don't want to be like anyway. This morning I drove
Speaker 2: off and I was like, I understand why they do it. Yeah,
Speaker 2: why would you want to talk to somebody that just
Speaker 2: wants to bring you down?
Speaker 1: Yes, this is my life. This is my life at
Speaker 1: the moment. And so when those headphones go in, I go,
Speaker 1: I'm really enjoying how disconnected we are.
Speaker 2: Dead set, no judgment, but I didn't understand it. Today
Speaker 2: I understood, yep.
Speaker 1: So watch the game for Christmas. Headphones nothing, get the headphones.
Speaker 1: Headphones are the winds.