Speaker 1: So you're listening to a MoMA Mia podcast.
Speaker 2: Mom and Maya acknowledges the traditional owners of land and
Speaker 2: waters that this podcast is recorded.
Speaker 1: On the second day with tits A rock Hard is
Speaker 1: absolutely horrible having a midwife milking my nipples and doing
Speaker 1: all the stuff.
Speaker 2: The baby Bubble with Claar and Jesse Stevens. It's definitely
Speaker 2: not a parenting advice podcast. Claire, I've got an issue
Speaker 2: that I need to help you. Yeah. You know how
Speaker 2: Luna loves being mood. Yeah, it's like I think she's
Speaker 2: always naked and I love that for her. After her bath,
Speaker 2: she crawls around, she wiggles her little bottom, she climbs,
Speaker 2: she loves doing a downward dog with a I can't
Speaker 2: remember what it's called, but it's when you stick your
Speaker 2: leg up too. Ah. Yeah, no, I can see it.
Speaker 2: I also do not know the word. Yeah. So she's
Speaker 2: into her yoga poses when she is nude, and I
Speaker 2: just say to her, interesting choice. There's not an angle
Speaker 2: of you I haven't seen. No. No, look, that's not
Speaker 2: the issue. The issue is that her other obsession issues. Yeah,
Speaker 2: and who bought her two excellent pairs of shoes for
Speaker 2: her birthday? Three dollar kmart leopard print trainers. Yeah, who
Speaker 2: bought them? They would, that would be you. And my
Speaker 2: issue is that when she's nude and she's doing her
Speaker 2: down with dog and her happy baby, and it's like
Speaker 2: just all the bits, she walks over and she taps
Speaker 2: on her shoes and she taps on her foot. She goes,
Speaker 2: put my shoes on, and it's like, with all due respect,
Speaker 2: you're not going anywhere and you can't walk, and you
Speaker 2: can't walk. But I think the people look more naked
Speaker 2: when they're naked with the shoes on. It's really Yeah,
Speaker 2: it's like it makes the genitals more pronounced, and it
Speaker 2: looks quite predatory. Because I was even at the gym
Speaker 2: recently and there was a woman who walked out of
Speaker 2: the shower with full runners on but otherwise nude, and
Speaker 2: I went, it's one of the worst looks in my opinion.
Speaker 2: It's like a man with a top on and no
Speaker 2: pant he looks more naked than if he had. It's
Speaker 2: like a choice. Yeah, yes, you made the choice to
Speaker 2: have your bits out. Yeah. And I don't know how
Speaker 2: to tell her that no one looks good nude with
Speaker 2: shoes on. It's not flattering to the leg and she's
Speaker 2: stomping around like she has somewhere to be in these shoes.
Speaker 2: She's rolling around on the floor. It's absolutely not lady like.
Speaker 2: But I can't pribe them from her, I know. And
Speaker 2: you don't want to make her feel ashamed of her
Speaker 2: outfit choices. No, she is who she is. Yeah, And
Speaker 2: like sometimes I'm like, I don't know. Sexy movies, They're like,
Speaker 2: it'll be a woman in like a bikinian heels, yeah
Speaker 2: or something. Yeah, And I'm like, well, you just wouldn't
Speaker 2: wear shoes with that outfit. It's a barefoot outfit. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: And Luna, I just look. I do feel like she
Speaker 2: needs some feedback about that look. Yeah. I feel like
Speaker 2: I need to take a photo yeah and show her.
Speaker 2: Do you think it looks good? Do you look ridiculous?
Speaker 1: You?
Speaker 2: Do you look really silly? Our guest this week is
Speaker 2: Veronica Milsen, loved radio host, actor, comedian, writer, and mum
Speaker 2: of two. Veronica is the former co host of Triple
Speaker 2: j's Drive program. She's been a cast member of Sean
Speaker 2: Macrliff's Mad as Hell, and the creator and host of
Speaker 2: a brilliant podcast called Zero waste baby. After giving birth
Speaker 2: to her first baby, Veronica was on a mission to
Speaker 2: reduce the waste for her second, tiny newborn. We are
Speaker 2: simply obsessed with zero waste baby because it's something that
Speaker 2: both of us would have loved to do, but we
Speaker 2: were both and are both incredibly lazy and lack initiative.
Speaker 2: Before we start, how old are your two now?
Speaker 1: Yeah, so mine are four and six. And by the way,
Speaker 1: I never could have done it with my first. It
Speaker 1: was only possible with my second.
Speaker 2: And why is that?
Speaker 1: I think you need to go through just being terribly
Speaker 1: wasteful and feeling bad about it and come out the
Speaker 1: other side. Now. I think it was just about knowing,
Speaker 1: Like first time is just so scary in every single way.
Speaker 1: And so once I got the hang of it, I
Speaker 1: was like, ah, fine, your baby can put up with
Speaker 1: heaps of you know, it doesn't have to be wearing
Speaker 1: the best possible type of nappies or whatever, chucking in
Speaker 1: a cloth nappy. It'll be fine.
Speaker 2: So your first baby was what will refer to as
Speaker 2: a full waist baby. Your second one, you try to
Speaker 2: go full zero waste. My big question is around nappies,
Speaker 2: because nappies can be messy when you're using your disposable,
Speaker 2: your wipes, your everything. Just how does it, how does
Speaker 2: it even work when you're trying not to be wasteful?
Speaker 2: Please explain? Well.
Speaker 1: I ended up discovering and spoiler from a podcast that
Speaker 1: came out quite a while ago, that the first six
Speaker 1: weeks I reckon you just have to use disposable nappies
Speaker 1: because the tiny little baby like I found in my
Speaker 1: personal experience that a cloth nappy was just not going
Speaker 1: to cut it. It was leaky. So in the first
Speaker 1: six weeks I found that I've we should have just
Speaker 1: used disposables, and from that point on, that's when cloth
Speaker 1: can really take over and just going into like the
Speaker 1: nitty gritty of like I ended up renting cloth nappies
Speaker 1: so that then I could give them back. Yeah I know,
Speaker 1: it's like a very extreme and then would wash them
Speaker 1: not on a pot because that uses too much energy
Speaker 1: And it would have been fine if I had renewables,
Speaker 1: but I didn't renewable energy, so I had to dry
Speaker 1: them too outside because I couldn't use a dryer because
Speaker 1: that also used too much dirty energy, So that was
Speaker 1: quite tricky. But then I also experimented with completely getting
Speaker 1: rid of nappies altogether, which was a technique called elimination communication,
Speaker 1: which lots of people have great success with. I didn't necessarily.
Speaker 1: It's the idea that you can potty train a baby
Speaker 1: from like six weeks old.
Speaker 2: Talk me through elimination communication. I have an eight month
Speaker 2: old and I love her unconditionally, but she is hopeless,
Speaker 2: Like please, she didn't. Yeah, So talk me through this
Speaker 2: theory of elimination communication.
Speaker 1: So the idea is that you It happens in stages.
Speaker 1: The first stage is that you put your baby on
Speaker 1: like a mat, and you wait until they do a
Speaker 1: we or a poo, so they've got totally pantless. You
Speaker 1: sit there with them for like hours on end to
Speaker 1: see if they do a we l a poop. And
Speaker 1: when they start doing a wei, for example, you choose
Speaker 1: a noise in advance, like shh, that's a common noise
Speaker 1: that people use, or you could go or something. It's
Speaker 1: basically it's treating a baby a bit like a dog. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you make a noise and then they associate that action
Speaker 1: with the noise, And if you do that enough times,
Speaker 1: then you will soon be able to like hold them
Speaker 1: over a piece of tubwear or a sink or a
Speaker 1: toilet and make the noise and they automatically do it.
Speaker 2: Oh my god. Yeah, So what's the plan when you
Speaker 2: go up the road to the cafe for a coffee?
Speaker 2: Do we just take the baby to the toilet and
Speaker 2: say sh or does the baby maybe shit and it's pressed?
Speaker 1: Well, you kind of complain in advance and hold the
Speaker 1: baby over the toilet and hope that you can just
Speaker 1: get it to we in advance of going to the cafe.
Speaker 1: It's certainly not perfect. Even like the expert that I
Speaker 1: talked to about it was like, there will be accidents galore.
Speaker 1: You just have to be ready for that. The strangest
Speaker 1: thing for me, apart from anything else, was just such
Speaker 1: a little bottom without big patting on it. Yeah, just
Speaker 1: carrying around your baby without any you know. It was
Speaker 1: such a weird change. But I was like, oh, this
Speaker 1: is so odd. Lots of people that you wouldn't expect
Speaker 1: have tried it, like Alice Slavski, you know her, the chef, the.
Speaker 2: Cook Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1: She was one of the people that I talked to
Speaker 1: on the podcast about having done it.
Speaker 2: That's so interesting that people do this with their children.
Speaker 2: I'm very impressed. I'm very impressed as well. And I
Speaker 2: need to go back to the clock nappies for a
Speaker 2: sec because you just said you rented, which to me
Speaker 2: is so another baby has shotten that nappy, it's been washed,
Speaker 2: maybe imperfectly by the former parent, and now it's on
Speaker 2: your baby. Do these cloth nappies, I've always wondered this,
Speaker 2: Do they have stains on them?
Speaker 1: No, they sort of weirdly don't seem to. I think
Speaker 1: that the rental company must just do a really great
Speaker 1: job of cleaning them before they rent them out again.
Speaker 1: Plus I actually do wonder if they don't have that
Speaker 1: many rounds of being rented, which I guess is besides
Speaker 1: the point a bit. But yeah, it still seemed like
Speaker 1: a cool idea. Lots of other people do things like
Speaker 1: nappy washing service, which is good. Yeah, the whole cloth
Speaker 1: nappy thing is so good. One thing that's a bit
Speaker 1: stinky and weird about it is that you've got to
Speaker 1: put like the pooh nappy in a bucket in the
Speaker 1: bathroom and let it soak. And once you've scraped the
Speaker 1: pooh off and popped it in the bin, this is
Speaker 1: a very glamorous time.
Speaker 2: Oh, Wow, a glamorous podcast. In my head, I was
Speaker 2: picturing the poo in the washing machine, yeah, going round round,
Speaker 2: and I had questions about it, but I wasn't gonna ask, Okay,
Speaker 2: w what do you do about wipes?
Speaker 1: So I was the biggest offender with wipes with my
Speaker 1: first baby, Lilah, because I just became obsessed with them.
Speaker 1: I was like, why have wipes not been in my
Speaker 1: life before I started like mopping the stairs with whites.
Speaker 1: Like if anyone was like dirty in a cafe, I'd
Speaker 1: be like, I've got a wipe. I've got heaps of them, dozens.
Speaker 1: As long as you're just using like reusable flannel wipes,
Speaker 1: it's great. You just whack them in the washing machine
Speaker 1: as well as everything else. So I actually ripped up
Speaker 1: old flannel shirts of my husband's that I didn't like,
Speaker 1: but also bought some from the op shop and just
Speaker 1: as long as they don't have buttons or whatever.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Or you could if you had a flannel shirt
Speaker 2: of his that you didn't like, you could also just
Speaker 2: not rip it up and just use it as a
Speaker 2: wipe and then just put it back in his wardrobe. Yeah,
Speaker 2: to try that's true.
Speaker 1: Oh my gosh, I'll have to have another baby had
Speaker 1: such a cruel technique and my husband it's really crazy though,
Speaker 1: once we go to a baby store and realize how
Speaker 1: shamelessly wasteful it is and how much like no one
Speaker 1: really cares. Like in i'll say one of the big
Speaker 1: baby stores, because it's probably going to be the sponsor,
Speaker 1: a whole aisle is called disposables, and I was like,
Speaker 1: oh wow, we just don't care. No.
Speaker 2: And there's something about having a baby where you then
Speaker 2: become obsessed with the idea of disposables. When we were
Speaker 2: going traveling, I was like, I need disposable bottles, and
Speaker 2: then and then I was like I need collapsible disposable
Speaker 2: and I went down this whole rabbit hole that made
Speaker 2: no sense at all. But I'm like, I'm coming up
Speaker 2: with inventions for what I need is a mum. Maybe
Speaker 2: it's because we're just so ty, Yeah, we just want
Speaker 2: to throw everything out and not planeing on.
Speaker 1: That's definitely one of like the undoings for me was
Speaker 1: cloth nappies and not being able to use a dryer
Speaker 1: on a road trip that we went on because there
Speaker 1: was no time to dry the nappies, so you just
Speaker 1: like wash them or whatever and the sink of the
Speaker 1: motel that we were staying at, and then I would
Speaker 1: have to wind the window up while we were driving
Speaker 1: along and they would just be flapping along next to
Speaker 1: the car because I was like, there's no other way
Speaker 1: that these are going to get dry and tie for
Speaker 1: ound next stop.
Speaker 2: You're so resourceful, I'm so impressed. But nappy cream surely
Speaker 2: that trips you up. Okay, you need nappy cream, you
Speaker 2: go and you get your whatever from the chemist, Like,
Speaker 2: is that naughty because it's in a naughty container.
Speaker 1: Well, they do try very hard to do reusable nappy
Speaker 1: cream tubes and containers. A lot of them are just
Speaker 1: very disposable, and so I ended up making my own
Speaker 1: nappy cream, which was it did feel a little bit
Speaker 1: like dangerous in it, Like you wonder about putting something
Speaker 1: that you've made and concocted on your own baby's bottom
Speaker 1: sensitive area.
Speaker 2: That's how I feel about cooking for my baby. I don't.
Speaker 1: So there are lots of people who do it though.
Speaker 1: So there's lots of these recipes online and then you
Speaker 1: can go to like a bulk store and then they
Speaker 1: just sell a lot of the things that you need
Speaker 1: all the ingredients and you can cook up like you're
Speaker 1: a witch making a magical potion and then get it
Speaker 1: ready and pop it in your own little reusable containers.
Speaker 2: That's incredible. What else did most of us not even
Speaker 2: think of that? Are just ruining the environment? Yeah? Like,
Speaker 2: how else are we bad? People? Go on?
Speaker 1: Well, the biggest thing that I felt like I did
Speaker 1: with my first baby that I with my second. I
Speaker 1: was like, oh man, that was so silly? Was you
Speaker 1: just it's such a big deal to be pregnant for
Speaker 1: the first time. You kind of think, oh, I just
Speaker 1: need all the best things. I need a brand new cot,
Speaker 1: I need a brand new pram. And as much as
Speaker 1: you hear people say it a million times, you know,
Speaker 1: just buy stuff off gum Tree, You're kind of like,
Speaker 1: I'm not going to buy a pram off gum What
Speaker 1: if the break doesn't work? That's my little precious angel.
Speaker 1: But in reality, I just wish that I had done that, Like,
Speaker 1: nothing really needs to be new. Everything already exists, and
Speaker 1: then we should just be sharing them amongst it, you know,
Speaker 1: ourselves as a community.
Speaker 2: Okay, but don't you think that maybe like Elon Musk,
Speaker 2: Jeff Bezos, maybe they can save the planet, and maybe
Speaker 2: we can feed our baby with the packet food and
Speaker 2: buy the clothes from the cheapest place possible. Do you
Speaker 2: think that that's okay?
Speaker 1: Yes? Yes, I mean, can we guarantee that will happen?
Speaker 1: I would love for that to happen. I just feel
Speaker 1: like Bezos particularly is making the problem much worse. And
Speaker 1: at least Elon's trying to find a new place for
Speaker 1: us to live. I guess that's somewhat helpful. Do you
Speaker 1: guys feel like you're wasteful or is it not cross
Speaker 1: your radar?
Speaker 2: Oh?
Speaker 1: Yeah, what's your vibe on?
Speaker 2: No? No, no, totally, And even like the big things
Speaker 2: I feel are I think it actually makes you feel
Speaker 2: a bit physically sick. The toys, the clothes, even the food.
Speaker 2: I'm actually with you. I hate, hate, hate waste. I've
Speaker 2: joined toy library. I feel like that might make you
Speaker 2: like me. So I have joined a toilet.
Speaker 1: We've got a toy libraries.
Speaker 2: They're so good, they're so good, and it helps with
Speaker 2: the clutter. And the other thing is, oh, just all
Speaker 2: the hand me downs. And I've also accepted that our
Speaker 2: clothes have stains on them. Oh yeah, because I got
Speaker 2: to a point. I do all my spraying, which not
Speaker 2: good for the environment, but stain remover makes no difference,
Speaker 2: and so now we just get dark colors and we
Speaker 2: just live with stains and we embrace it. Have you
Speaker 2: had to do that because they get stains a lot.
Speaker 2: And then I think, oh, she looks like no one
Speaker 2: loves her.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you just end up feeling okay about having a
Speaker 1: kid that looks so gross. Yeah, all the time. I
Speaker 1: think I've made peace with that. Particularly, my kids make
Speaker 1: such a fuss about me brushing their hair, and so
Speaker 1: they just always look like these wild little children that
Speaker 1: no one takes care of.
Speaker 2: I love those kids, though, they've got character. See, I
Speaker 2: think I've done pretty well purely out of laziness. I've
Speaker 2: actually bought very little because I got everything from you. Yeah,
Speaker 2: because you had a baby that was six months ahead,
Speaker 2: so literally a pump. You had a pump, all the bottles,
Speaker 2: Like I just have a house full of your stuff,
Speaker 2: which was incredibly incredibly convenient. We deserve a gold star
Speaker 2: as well.
Speaker 1: I think, Yeah, you guys together are doing like half
Speaker 1: waste exactly.
Speaker 2: Honestly, were two babies for the price of wine after
Speaker 2: doing zero waste? Baby did you a little bit feel
Speaker 2: like your baby was the waste, not in that sounds rong,
Speaker 2: but the baby. Like I look at Matilda and I'm like,
Speaker 2: you are just like you create waste everywhere you go. Yeah,
Speaker 2: And does that feel like a little bit overwhelming and
Speaker 2: you think, actually, by just having a baby, I'm creating
Speaker 2: problems for the environment.
Speaker 1: Yeah, honestly I did. I mean that's how the whole
Speaker 1: thing started. I was like, my husband and I were
Speaker 1: sitting in bed and we were just both looking at
Speaker 1: the news and every story that came up was like,
Speaker 1: there's floods, there's bush fires, there's this, you know, the
Speaker 1: Amazon is burning. And I looked at him and I
Speaker 1: was like, oh my gosh, should we be even having
Speaker 1: a baby? And he was like maybe not. And I
Speaker 1: was like, Oh, I'm six months pregnant.
Speaker 2: It's like going yeah, And I like.
Speaker 1: The final episode is should we have babies at all?
Speaker 1: And I end up talking to this guy who oh
Speaker 1: the words just slipped out.
Speaker 2: Of my brain the name of seven something.
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, how done? Yeah ball Snipper. So I ended
Speaker 1: up talking to like the world's most busiest sectimist who
Speaker 1: goes around to underprivileged countries like people in third world countries,
Speaker 1: and gives them the option to snip if they would
Speaker 1: like to snip, basically as a free as a gift
Speaker 1: to society anyway. And I was talking to him and
Speaker 1: he was like, we'll just hold your horses because you
Speaker 1: might be all excited about the environment now. You never
Speaker 1: know if you want another baby. And as it turns out,
Speaker 1: I see babies now and I want to weep with joy.
Speaker 1: And I think you're nearly forty. You can't have an
Speaker 1: other baby. I don't know.
Speaker 2: I need to ask, does your second born have a
Speaker 2: superiority complex because she was a zero waste baby? And
Speaker 2: does she walk around with her keep cup like metal
Speaker 2: straw And does she tease and perhaps belittle her older
Speaker 2: sister for being such a drain on the site?
Speaker 1: Yeah? She does, And that's part of the joy of
Speaker 1: seeing her grow up as a zero waste baby. Is
Speaker 1: that whole part of her personality. It's really shone through
Speaker 1: as being on her high horse at all times and
Speaker 1: very superior. Yeah. I do have a whole great hopes
Speaker 1: that she could eventually be someone who saves the word.
Speaker 1: Though I think that's like the one justification of having
Speaker 1: children when the world is going to shit, you're like, oh, well,
Speaker 1: at least maybe they're the one that's gonna maybe. I know.
Speaker 2: I looked at Matilda and I was like, you know,
Speaker 2: she could be the one who changed it all. And
Speaker 2: now she's eight months. She's not hitting her milestones with gusto,
Speaker 2: I will say, And I'm like, maybe not. Maybe she's
Speaker 2: just here for a good time. I think she's here
Speaker 2: for a good.
Speaker 1: Time, which I think is totally valid too. You know,
Speaker 1: good on it, I think.
Speaker 2: So. Can you give us a ten second play by
Speaker 2: play of the chaos of your morning before this chat? Like,
Speaker 2: what was your morning like with your daughters today?
Speaker 1: Well, every single morning, my daughter comes in at about
Speaker 1: five thirty, This is the zero waste one, and she
Speaker 1: just wants to like cuddle real close, like up to
Speaker 1: the face. You know, do you think that this is
Speaker 1: like an exciting thing when you first have a baby,
Speaker 1: but then you realize everybody's child does it. They're like
Speaker 1: face against face while you sleep, and then the other
Speaker 1: one comes in and whenever I'm having a coffee, she's
Speaker 1: like like jumps on top of me and my coffee spills,
Speaker 1: and I go every day, come on, and then we
Speaker 1: madly try to get them ready for school, up and
Speaker 1: about whilst also like multitasking, going so, how many people
Speaker 1: did you want for your birthday party? Right down the list?
Speaker 1: I'm booking it today and thinking about the like crazy day.
Speaker 1: You've got a head. It's an intense time. Yeah, of life,
Speaker 1: isn't it. I mean you guys haven't reached the school
Speaker 1: bit yet, but yeah.
Speaker 2: No, you live a whole life before you come into work.
Speaker 2: And I've just got My fourteen month old is just
Speaker 2: learning her words, which is exciting, and then you go,
Speaker 2: oh no, no, no, Now she can communicate and express
Speaker 2: her needs and she is very stubborn. Yeah, she's like, now, yeah,
Speaker 2: she well, she just her big thing now is that
Speaker 2: she wakes up. She's in bed and she says but,
Speaker 2: which means book, Like I want a book always, yeah,
Speaker 2: And I'm like, now I have to just ignore your wants.
Speaker 2: Is part of my job is your mother, which is
Speaker 2: a whole other phase that I'm ntoring.
Speaker 1: Yeah, as soon as they say will you play with me,
Speaker 1: You're like, oh, I can't say no to right, And they're like,
Speaker 1: I just have to put it put aside five minutes
Speaker 1: to run around behind you like I'm a wolf and
Speaker 1: you're a little rabbit that I want to eat with
Speaker 1: that for five minutes and then you've got a brush
Speaker 1: your teeth and go to school exactly.
Speaker 2: Well, thank you so much for talking to us today.
Speaker 2: Really appreciate it.
Speaker 1: Oh that's a pleasure. Love you guys. Crab crab crap advice.
Speaker 2: Okay, Jesse, it's time for our advice segment. People wait
Speaker 2: for it. They count down. They got to understand how
Speaker 2: to pair it. Yeah, and we read to that, read
Speaker 2: some journals, spoke to some experts, came up with some
Speaker 2: pretty good answers. Because this is a thorny one. Hello,
Speaker 2: I have an eighteen month old girl, and whenever we're
Speaker 2: out in public, people will comment on want a handsome
Speaker 2: little man I have. I was in a shop the
Speaker 2: other day and a woman came up and said, aren't
Speaker 2: you cute, little sir and patted him on the head.
Speaker 2: That's I think she means patted her on the head.
Speaker 2: I never know whether to correct them, and when it's
Speaker 2: been in the company of friends or even family, I
Speaker 2: do have to say, oh, actually she is a girl.
Speaker 2: I feel embarrassed for them and wish I didn't even
Speaker 2: have to think about the correcting. My question is, is
Speaker 2: there a way I can make it clearer that Sophie
Speaker 2: is a girl so people stop greeting her as a
Speaker 2: little dude? Jesse, any advice, Oh, how to relate for
Speaker 2: both of us? I think I we're both in the
Speaker 2: same boat. We have little girls with masculine energy. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I say, quite androgynous energy. Yeah. I think both our
Speaker 2: babies are genderleist. Matilda was about two days old and
Speaker 2: her midwife came in and was helping me feed, and
Speaker 2: she did keep saying, oh, he's not wanting to feed. Oh,
Speaker 2: he's a spirited little guy. And I was in a daze,
Speaker 2: so I didn't speak.
Speaker 1: Well.
Speaker 2: You were probably like, ah, I have a boy. Yeah.
Speaker 2: I was interesting, and my partner had to say, I'm
Speaker 2: so sorry, but it's a girl. It's the confidence for
Speaker 2: me that I want to stop and go. I'm not upset.
Speaker 2: I think a lot of gender is a construction. Yeah,
Speaker 2: but what makes you But what makes you sure this
Speaker 2: is a little dude. It's wet in Matilda's wearing pink
Speaker 2: and purple and someone calls her little man. That you go.
Speaker 2: The energy is so strong that it is undoing. It's
Speaker 2: really clear social cues by sending out yeah exact, because
Speaker 2: I'm betraying my sense of what a girl is by
Speaker 2: just going full, just just to clarify, And still there's
Speaker 2: confusion bubbling. Yeah, well Luna does get little Sarah lot
Speaker 2: or men will exclaim in the lift, as often happens,
Speaker 2: he's staring at me. Okay, and in such a case,
Speaker 2: I don't know what they want me to do about that.
Speaker 2: She's a stare. Yeah. The first issue is the hair.
Speaker 2: It always is. It's a hair. It's that your baby
Speaker 2: looks like a lad. We say, a bit of a mallet. Yeah,
Speaker 2: she looks like she's a British football fan who's about
Speaker 2: to start shit. There is someone who was apparently on
Speaker 2: Love Island UK who bears a striking resemblance to Matilda,
Speaker 2: and it is the fringe that goes halfway down the forehead,
Speaker 2: and it's the blondness. She's so blonde, yes, and Luna
Speaker 2: also has that. But again it looks like a choice.
Speaker 2: It looks like she's made a choice to get sort
Speaker 2: of a new town edgy short fringe and it's boyish.
Speaker 2: There's a lot about Luna that's boyish. So we know
Speaker 2: it's the hair. So the answer is really obvious, and
Speaker 2: that is invest in a wig. Oh baby wigs that
Speaker 2: needs to be in an industry, and I'm talking you
Speaker 2: need to glow it because they pull it off. That's
Speaker 2: a great point. I'm thinking of Victoria's secret style, big
Speaker 2: wave like Toddler's and tiaras except for three months. And yeah,
Speaker 2: you know what, maybe it doesn't even need to be
Speaker 2: a baby wig. Maybe just get an adult wig. Maybe
Speaker 2: get an adult wig and you just go, Yeah, the
Speaker 2: fringe will kind of cover the face a bit, but
Speaker 2: just clip it. Probably clip that out of the way
Speaker 2: and have a few highlights. Might really emphasize that it's
Speaker 2: a girl. Yeah. I also think that there are clear
Speaker 2: signifiers that you're not going with, which is when Sophia
Speaker 2: leaves a house, Sophie wes an apron okay, yeah, really
Speaker 2: just a wig, a wisk a whisk an apron, a heel.
Speaker 2: I also think fake nails, fake like an acrylic right, like,
Speaker 2: that's clearly signifying she's a girl. Jewelry, a chunky necklace,
Speaker 2: a Tiffany bracelet, a spray tan, let's get the eyelashes done,
Speaker 2: fake clashes, fake clashes. I was also thinking that because
Speaker 2: this often happens when I'm out at the shopping center
Speaker 2: with the lunars, that people say, oh, hey, little dude,
Speaker 2: what's it staring at me? And I think if I
Speaker 2: just went to Mecca and said, can we do a
Speaker 2: quick full face, yeah, that would be clarifying. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 2: because then we'd go around. She'd have a cutcrease, she'd
Speaker 2: have her bronza and contour, she'd have a fake eyelightd
Speaker 2: Maybe would say weird, weird choice for a baby, but
Speaker 2: it's a girl. But I'm gonna go it's a girl
Speaker 2: because it's got all the fucked up socialization cues of
Speaker 2: being a woman at just fourteen months. Mm hmm. Okay,
Speaker 2: what's your advice? Okay, so obviously gender cues, Yeah, there's
Speaker 2: something in that. I'll give that to you. Yeah, but
Speaker 2: I'm going to take another approach, lean into confrontation. Okay,
Speaker 2: So when somebody says, hi, little dude, you a pretend
Speaker 2: you don't know who they're talking about, even if they're
Speaker 2: staring at your baby. Correct, you are silent, and then
Speaker 2: you say who and they say, little man, little man,
Speaker 2: I'm pointing out, and you say why, are you pointing
Speaker 2: at my daughter? Oh that's rude. Yeah, especially if you're
Speaker 2: stuck in a lift. Yeah yeah, So I really want
Speaker 2: this mum to lean into start and shit and unnecessarily
Speaker 2: combative and defend it. Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah. I think
Speaker 2: maybe it's a combo of the two. It's going very
Speaker 2: gendered and then when there is confusion, just absolutely losing
Speaker 2: one's shit. I reckon losing one shit, but also dressing
Speaker 2: your child gender neutral is a bit of fun. So
Speaker 2: I think that you dressed them in green, in mustard,
Speaker 2: in black and white things that you can't really tell,
Speaker 2: and then lose your shit when people get wrong, and
Speaker 2: I reckon you demand to know what made them think? Yeah,
Speaker 2: that your daughter was a little sir, what made you
Speaker 2: say that? Go on, why don't you describe her features
Speaker 2: through your eyes? Because I'm going to be offended and
Speaker 2: yell at you about it. Very true. We hope you
Speaker 2: enjoyed this episode of The Baby Bubble and didn't find
Speaker 2: anything remotely helpful. Next time on the Baby Bubble, we're
Speaker 2: catching up with one half of the Two Doting Dads podcast, Ashwicks.
Speaker 2: Be sure to keep an ear out for that, or,
Speaker 2: better yet, subscribe to the podcast and you'll never miss
Speaker 2: an episode. The Baby Bubble is produced by Taylor Strano
Speaker 2: with audio production by Teagan Sadler. We will see you
Speaker 2: next week. Bye bye.